Children as Sculpture?

From Tony Wagner's website:

Glowing reviews of Creating Innovators from USA Today and more…

USA Today recommends the book as “a road map for parents who want to sculpt their children into innovative thinkers” (March 19, 2012), and Kirkus Reviews calls it “a seminal analysis promising hope for the future” (March 13, 2012.)

Anyone else want to throw up at the idea of sculpting children? I mean, I'm looking forward to this book as much as anyone, but we REALLY REALLY have to stop a looking at children as blocks of marble, with twitching chisels in our hands.

Do we really believe we can "sculpt" children? Do we think it is a desirable thing to do? Do they get a say?

How about by letting them become the people they want to be?  Be an innovator, be a poet, be a software engineer, a father, a teacher.  Make furniture, build houses, plant trees.

I have faith in Tony Wagner and I believe that I will find his book to be an exciting contribution to the education ideas I believe in. I doubt Tony talks about sculpting. The way to foster innovation is to open the world up to kids. The way to open up the world to kids is to discover and honor who they are, and devote time, support and resources to helping them become the people they want to be.