This guide teaches parents clinically-tested techniques from UCLA's world-renowned Children's Social Skills Program for helping their 5- to 12-year-olds make friends and solve problems with other kids. Also provided is concrete help for handling teasing, bullying, and meanness, both for the child who is picked on and for the tormentor.
Hi, I'm Fred Frankel, author of "Good Friends are Hard to find: Help your child find make and keep friends." Perspective Publishing, 1996. This, my first book, was translated into six languages, adopted by over 500 libraries and won a National Parenting Publication award. Recently, I have updated this book for today's parents. I published it as, "Friends forever: How parents can help their kids make and keep good friends." San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 2010.
Before I wrote these books, I developed Children's Friendship Training, a class that teaches children how to make and keep friends. Over the years, I have helped over 1,500 children at UCLA with friendship problems. I have learned much from the children I have helped, as well as from my own children, now ages 26, 9 and 6. Recently, my colleagues and I studied what happened to some of the children 3 years after they finished my class. I was gratified to learn that many of them not only continued to have friends but were regularly getting invited on play dates.
I helped to develop the same kinds of techniques for teens, co-writing for therapists, "Social skills for teenagers with developmental and Autism Spectrum Disorders: The PEERS treatment manual." New York: Brunner-Routledge Publishers, 2010. I also wanted to help teachers help teens to fit in and co-wrote, "Social skills success for students with Autism/ Aspergers: Helping adolescents on the spectrum fit in." San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 2011.
As I continue to teach friendship skills, I realize that our social world is always changing. Parents and children are constantly faced with new challenges. My best teachers are the parents and children I help, my own children and my readers. I encourage you to write to me with your observations, comments and concerns. My email is ffrankel@mednet.ucla.edu.
