The Everything Toddler Book: From Controlling Tantrums to Potty Training, Practical Advice to Get You and Your Toddler Through the Formative Years (Everything (Parenting)) [Paperback]

Linda Sonna (Author)

Book Description

Series: Everything (Parenting) | Publication Date: March 1, 2002

No parent needs a child care book as much as the parent of a toddler! The toddler years are an exciting and rewarding time, as your child learns to stand, walk, say words, and use the potty for the first time. Yet, along with all of these incredible milestones come all sorts of daunting parental challenges - from continuous cries in the middle of the night to the first boo-boos to erratic eating habits to public temper tantrums. What is a parent to do?

The Everything Toddler Book offers professional advice on handling every aspect of your child's physical, emotional, and social development. With quick, easy-to-understand advice and positive reassurance, this helpful book provides frustrated - and often sleep-deprived - parents the quick answers they need to their toughest questions.

Featuring true stories from the trenches and ample space to record developmental milestones, The Everything Toddler Book is an indispensable guide to enjoying these wild and wonderful years. It tells you how to:
Prepare great meals toddlers will actually sit still for and eat
Provide comfort for teething and other common problems
Travel by car, train, and airplane with minimal hassle
Handle a child who refuses to listen
Toddler-proof your home
Buy the best toys and games
Get your child on a workable sleep schedule
Resolve jealousies among siblings

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Linda Sonna, Ph.D., has written THE HOMEWORK SOLUTION: GETTING KIDS TO DO THEIR HOMEWORK and THE HOMEWORK PLAN: A PARENT'S GUIDE TO HELPING KIDS EXCEL. Her column, "EduCaring," has appeared in parenting magazines across the country. She lives in Taos, New Mexico, and teaches creative writing and psychology at the University of New Mexico.

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Adams Media; First edition (March 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1580625924
• ISBN-13: 978-1580625920
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 8.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #153,208 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Before medicating your child for ADHD or depression, see the documentary at http://www.documentary-log.com/you-are-watching-the-drugging-of-our-children/. Then read my Parent's Guide to ADHD to find other ways to help your child.

I acquired a lot of technical knowledge about psychology while working on my doctoral studies at the University of Illinois, but my real education took place over the next thirty years.

The many young therapy patients I worked with were my real teachers. Most troubled children and adolescents, I learned, are acutely aware of their problems and needs. They helped me understand why they misbehaved, felt depressed and anxious, had trouble getting along at home, or weren't doing well in school. Once they were able to share their knowledge with the important people in their lives, the solutions for even the most difficult problems tended to be clear.

Living the exquisite joys and daunting challenges of being a foster mom also played an important part in my education. Helping to raise six children sensitized me to parents' struggles. It definitely made me more sympathetic to their dilemmas and need for concrete answers!

I began each new parenting book by reading all the self-help books and scientific studies I could find on the subject, and this research rounded out my education. I was amazed to find that often the self-help books and formal studies were at odds. For instance:

* Most potty training books say that children aren't ready to begin learning until age 2 to 2 1/2, while the research shows that most of the world's children are fully trained by age 2! In the early 1900s, most parents began working with infants on potty skills at age 2 months.

* While most self-help books recommend Ritalin and other psychiatric drugs as the only truly effective treatments for attention deficit disorder, the research shows that changes in diet and exercise can dramatically reduce or eliminate most children's symptoms!

* Research studies suggest that children with particular personalities respond differently to particular child-rearing methods, but most self-help books propose a single method for everyone.

Despite my many decades of study, I don't pretend to have all the answers about how to make the life better and happier for children. My ideas continue to change and evolve. I have many more books planned, and hope that this forum can be yet another method of educating myself. Let me know what you have learned, and I'll pass it on!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It really has everything that helps., April 8, 2002

By 

Susan Sanders (Dallas, TX) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Everything Toddler Book: From Controlling Tantrums to Potty Training, Practical Advice to Get You and Your Toddler Through the Formative Years (Everything (Parenting)) (Paperback)

There's just so much information in it. It's hard when kids this age are always into everything, and the author is right, it works instead of saying "no-no" it's better to sit down and show them the things they keep getting into to satisfy their curiosity. Now my daughter walks up to the TV and points to the buttons and says "no-no" instead of me having to keep giving her timeouts and having tantrums. All the lists of fun activities to keep her learning in all the different areas are good,like little ways she can help around the house, and using boxes and regular things from around the house instead of buying all the expensive toys.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Ok book if you have others to get advice from, October 20, 2006

By 

M. Szymanski (Warren, Mi USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Everything Toddler Book: From Controlling Tantrums to Potty Training, Practical Advice to Get You and Your Toddler Through the Formative Years (Everything (Parenting)) (Paperback)

This book was good for some very basic info on toddlers. I didn't like the format because it jumped from one thing to another. Most of the info seemed to be geared toward 2 years and up, and the section on feeding was boring. It was mostly about the food pyramid and RDA's. Ugh.

19 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Does this woman even have children?, June 3, 2004

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Everything Toddler Book: From Controlling Tantrums to Potty Training, Practical Advice to Get You and Your Toddler Through the Formative Years (Everything (Parenting)) (Paperback)

I'm still reading the book, but already I feel like this woman clearly doesn't have kids...or at least doesn't have one like mine. Do any parents really set up activities for their toddlers such as creating a balance beam for them to practice walking? I chase around my daughter and we do activities as they come. Somehow, even without me following the author's suggestion she's learned to walk, do stairs, pick things up from the floor and stand up without pulling herself up. From this book, you'd think you have to work with your child to accomplish these things.

I've loved most of the 'Everything' series, but this one doesn't seem to fit my style of parenting or my child.