I often come across the phrase "twaddle-free" in regards to schooling my kids.  I guess it means to provide an academic setting that is not dumbed down to the current American standards, providing resources to stimulate and enhance the child's mind instead of pandering to the lowest common denominator.

Try as I might, I really have a hard time with this.  It isn't that I don't care to read good, age-appropriate literature to my kids, I just don't care for that to be the only thing we read.  We do alot of reading with most of it being older books and good literature that does fall into the "twaddle-free" category, but I realize that my kids have other interests, too, and aren't limited.  As long as they do the required reading, the rest is their choice within certain parameters.

I have also always been a firm believer in the validity of the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible, and have considered it to be the only valid translation.  Our church caters to the unchurched and uses the English Standard Version (ESV), and while I disliked to hear it at first I have come to find it's language to be very understandable and an easy read.

The question I asked myself is, if I am giving my children Bible readers for school that are paraphrases of Bible stories in age appropriate language, what is so bad about using the ESV, which is not a paraphrase, as a family Bible to read to the kids?  I have been reading from the ESV this week and even my 5 year old can do a narration based upon what he is hearing... we've been reading Acts.   

Yes, we do still read the KJV and mainly do copywork and memorization from it, but as far as readability and comprehension the ESV seems to far outweigh the KJV for our family.

I guess I would have been the one to consider the ESV twaddle when compared to the KJV.  No my kids don't have to think as hard trying to figure out what is being presented, and they don't have to spend time translating from the language of 1611 to the language of today.  All they have to do is sit, learn and enjoy reading the Bible... which is what they are now doing.