Customer Reviews

Growing a Girl: Seven Strategies for Raising a Strong, Spirited Daughter

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The author has done a tremendous job of taking many experts' views of the "right" way to raise a girl, discussing their merits (pros/cons), and then giving her own recommendations. She includes specific information and tips for situations you're likely to encounter (from Barbies, to adults commenting on how beautiful your child is, to playground and friendship struggles). She doesn't come across at all with a "raise your daughter this way....or else..." attitude, but she does really get you to think about how and why you choose to react and how important it is that you understand your child even if you don't agree (empathy). A bonus is that many of the strategies apply to both boys and girls....and the chapter for fathers is truly wonderful (especially if you're unlikely to get the father to read an entire book). Also, unlike other books, this book takes you right from your daughter's infancy through teen years and beyond. It's a book you'll probably read over and over as your child reaches a new stage of development.

Bottom line: You'll learn practical tips and strategies to help keep your daughter's self-esteem strong from preschool through teen years and beyond. This book has been the favorite among my friends with girls. Best wishes to you and your girl(s)!

Recommended by the director of my daughter's preschool, I was delighted beyond belief to read this book. Most books (and many are wonderful) focus on the frustrations of being a young woman in our gender biased society, something we already know and unfortunately don't define for ourselves until later in life. This book gives new moms and dads a chance to recognize the dilemnas very young girls face each day and help give their daughters a voice, strength, opportunities and a better understanding of the culture around them. And even if you are progressive and smart and think you know how to raise a daughter, this book is a wonderful reminder of all the little things that make such a huge impact on a little person. A wonderful gift.

I find many of the instances of sexism that Mackoff sites are somewhat suspect and reaching. However I don't care one bit, as the advice she gives is EXTREMELY usable. She helped me make my own decisions on how to help my girl thrive in this world, with many applied strategies. I don't want to raise my girl to be a boy, or to be what I decide she will be, but rather to discover what she wants to be, embracing her femaleness and her plain old humanness. I would say that 80% of what she recommends is excellent parenting advice that would apply equally well to boys as well as girls. Few books have as much usable, action-able advice as this book has. And I do read quite a few books. I will be requesting all people who have an active role in raising my daughter (ie grandparents, and hopefully teachers) to read it. (FYI I am a man/dad)

I recently became a parent and although my daughter is years away from facing some of these problems, I still think everyone with a daughter should read this book, no matter their age.

Mackoff provides thoughtful, well-researched examples in a clear and concise manner. I like the fact that she included her own daughter in various stories. She also provides great references for girl-friendly books, videos, etc that were a great help to me.

I also saw myself in a lot of these scenarios and could totally relate to what girls face today. We really are a product of our childhoods. I don't want my daughter to suffer through the same things I did or fall into the same traps as me and I think this reference will help me keep my gender glasses in place.

Highly recommended.

This book offers good, practical advice on raising girls, and shows parents how to eliminate their stereotypes as they bring up their daughters. However, the author constantly urges parents to push math and science so that girls can get high paying jobs in traditionally male-dominated jobs. To me, this doesn't make a girl successful. It's fine if a girl's interests are in the math and science fields, but we shouldn't just expose them to these areas. Also, the author makes it sould like a woman who chooses to raise a family is from the dark ages. This life choice is not encouraged, and that's a disservice to women who want to make family the top priority in their lives.

I appreciated the author's honesty and candor in describing her thought processes while raising her daughter. My problem with this book is that the conclusions of the book are obvious. The author self-admittedly spent much of her time torn between the urge to fight gender stereotyping by encouraging her girl to be as boyish as possible and the realization that urging a girl to always be boyish is pretty much the ultimate rejection of feminine worth. This subject has been sufficiently hashed out over the last decade or so, and to me the conclusions of the book seemed painfully obvious. Raising children is a difficult and disorienting task, and I appreciate the author's attempt to clarify this issue, but this is old news.

I am a university-educated, stay-at-home-mom of a one-year-old daughter. My husband and I find appeal in traditional gender roles and we have developed a system that works very well for us. Knowing that it would not work for everyone, I want to make sure we raise our daughter with a broad understanding of the possibilities this world has to offer. This book offers a few good suggestions in furthering that goal.

"Growing a Girl" is a compilation and summary of many, many studies, generously peppered with stories from the author's own extensive interviews. As such, there is no proof offered that following her methods will produce "happy" or "well adjusted" women. Mackoff frequently admits that there is a study to support any theory, so it's hard to know the quality of the scientific basis of her strategies. Her style is at times choppy, with many references, and I occasionally thought, "Ok, I guess you had to be there," because I failed to understand the punch line of the story. It is fairly readable, but offers little that is new or unique.

Mackoff's goal is to encourage parents to become equalist parents: "one who creates more equal opportunities for her daughter through loving exposure." This is not a book about Mommy Wars! In fact, the author addresses this topic only long enough to say, "I suggest that equalist parents become conscientious objectors in the Mommy Wars." I am also very pleased that the book contains absolutely no male-bashing.

Mackoff argues that girls are individuals and should be treated as such. They should be allowed to grow into their own person, unfettered by the expectations and agendas of their parents. This is accomplished through her seven strategies: discover your own stereotypes, believe her story, declare her independence, bring home heroines, wear gender glasses, tell the truth about beauty, and learn what she learns.

The book is generally useful (though it contained little that I had not already read elsewhere), but I do have a few complaints. Mackoff urges parents to consider their daughters as individuals, but she regularly refers to "boys" or "girls" as a homogeneous whole. She says that girls must be allowed to become the person they truly are, but that seems to apply only as long as their true self is not a "girly" girl. Mackoff's strong feminist side is kept pretty well in check, but she occasionally goes over the top, in my opinion (she disapproves of Sleeping Beauty because "she doesn't even try to wake herself up").

I am also bothered that this book addresses girls only, with the applicability to boys mentioned only in passing, and only for two of the seven strategies. I would prefer a more holistic approach: teaching how to parent both boys and girls so that everyone grows up respecting everyone, including themselves.

I loved "School Girls" by Peggy Orenstein, which exposed what culture and marketing do to our girls, but was left wanting more information about what to do about it. This book is the answer. I appreciate that author Dr. Barbara Mackoff gives specific, practical information, from examples about what a parent might say when her daughter asks why there hasn't been a woman president to lists of books to read with positive female characters.

I'm a stay-at-home mother and some feminist books either ignore my role or cast it aside. Mackoff presents a case for nurturing our daughters' interests whatever they are and for mothers in all roles to show their daughters their strengths.

I found this book to be very thought provoking. It made me rethink what I say and do with my daughter. As a former middle school math teacher, I have seen the problems that adolescent girls develop during their teen years. I have actually heard teenage girls claim that they are too dumb to do math because their mothers are not good in math. It always made me cringe and it challenged me to convince these girls that the stereotype was wrong. This book pointed out other stereotypes that I had not thought about before. It gives specific strategies that I can use now with my three year old daughter and others to use as she gets older. Even though I may not use every suggestion in the book, I am much more prepared to help my daughter learn to use her own mind and not be afraid to do so.

As father of an only daughter I am always looking for perspectives and tips to raise a strong confident girl. This book has a heavy focused on "don't make your daughter a Barbie". This pretty common knowledge in 2010. It does have some useful ideas and approaches but some quick hunting and pecking will save you from reading the anti-Barbie mantra over and over.