Customer Reviews

Our Family Meeting Book: Fun and Easy Ways to Manage Time, Build Communication, and Share Responsibility Week by Week

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The bulk of the book is made up of proposed agendas and weekly calendars. The agendas have some good ideas, but I suspect the 52 weekly calendar pages are not going to be very useful to most people. Most "organize your life" books talk about the importance of having JUST ONE family calendar where EVERYTHING written down, and perhaps ONE pocket sized calendar for each adult where everything is transferred diligently to the family calendar.

The 52 weekly pages in "Our Family Meeting Book" could not stand alone as a family calendar because users are encouraged to flip around between agendas/calendars and thus it would not be chronological. Maintaining these calendar pages in addition to a family calendar is just redundant. Although perhaps the calendar could be used to record accomplishments or something.

Anyway, page 4 contains the most valuable information in the book - 10 tips for holding a successful family meeting. The book would have been considerably more useful if the author had fleshed out these tips. For example, tip #1 is "Establish Ground Rules", but "our Family Meeting Book" provides just three examples of single ground rules. I think examples of a complete SET of ground rules, "These are the 10 rules the Jones use, and here are the 7 rules the Clarks use", or even sample rules for homes with teenagers versus homes with young kids, would have been more helpful.

And tip #9, "Include fun activities", tells the reader to "try playing a game, telling a joke, creating something, sharing a story, or singing a song". There is SO MUCH that could have been expanded on here! People who want to start having family meetings are probably really busy and somewhat stressed and don't want to go to the local crowded and noisy Toys-R-Us looking at walls of games trying to find "fun activities". Some tried and true recommendations, such as "The Set card game is an excellent thinking game involving pattern recognition that children 5 and over can play on equal footing with teens and adults", would have been much more helpful.

The last few pages are also useful, a list of free summer activities, brainstorming pages for summer vacation, a camp planner, a party planner, a chore chart, etc..

I love the ideas in this book. In addition to giving a format for family meetings, it also gives the reader very value-oriented topics to discuss during the meetings. It is a great tool for any family who wants to start these kind of meetings and it is equally as helpful to those already having these meetings (like my family). Great ideas!

Many experts recommend that families have meetings on a regular basis, but have you ever wondered how to go about doing this in a constructive way? This book is a great tool to get you started! It will not only help you keep track of your weekly discussions and decisions, but it will also help you plan your menus together as a family, and there are great discussion ideas for each meeting to help encourage good communication between family members. There are logs to keep track of the upcoming activities for the week, and many tools that you can make copies of and use repeatedly, such as chore charts, trip and party planners, bank account logs, and much much more! Although it takes a lot more than a book to keep a family running smoothly, this book would surely help out!!!

The is one of the best books on family meetings that I have seen in a long time. I interviewed the authors on my radio show "Parent Talk" when the book was first released in 2002 and I continue to recommend it to parents in my "Love, Limits, and Lessons" parenting class. It is unfortunate that the publisher did not continue with it and this book is now out of print. Purchases used copies while you can!