Customer Reviews

How to Be a Friend: A Guide to Making Friends and Keeping Them (Dino Life Guides for Families)

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book is an excellent tool for parents and teachers to use with kids in the often times daunting world of social relatedness. Even kids who are very social would enjoy the way these gentle reminders are presented. Highly recommended for the special needs arena of Aspberger's and High Functioning Autism. Our autistic son loved and responded well to the almost "social story" approach. This truly spelled out a lot of social do's and don't's for him. His typical sister loved it as well. As a parent I highly recommend this book be in every kindergarden and first grade and second grade classroom. I bought several copies.

I really like this book -- it has some GREAT ideas and my 5 year old son (he has a twin sister) likes me to read it to him.. the only problem is there is so much on one page, it's set up sort of like a comic strip with individual "bubbles" for thoughts/words coming from each character so I have to constantly point to who is saying what, which can cause some of the meaning to be lost on a younger child. There is also a lot packed onto each page that is very distracting so I try to fold the book or cover parts of it with my hands so my son can concentrate on each individual part. But all in all, I am happy with it, if only that it creates a storyline for me to follow to explain to my son how to make friends. Book is probably geared more towards 6-7 year olds.

I do not write reviews often, only when I am unbelievably pleased or completely disappointed. My 3 1/2 has had a tough time making friends with peers. We bought a couple of books and videos as one means for helping her along.

Let me start by recommending the series of books by Cheri J. Meiners. The books don't even compare in regards to teaching my 3 1/2 year old lessons related to friendship and interacting with others...check them out.

As for the book being reviewed, as one reviewer commented the pages are much too busy. In addition, there is a lot of negative content meant to teach children what behavior to avoid, however for a 3 1/2 year old, I think the more exposure they get to negativity the more apt they are to emulate it. Examples:

"You Stupidosaurus!"
"You can't play it's only for boys!"
"Nya, Nya, na, na, na"
"You can't play with her. You're my best friend."
"This game is dumb I quit!"

I'm not naive enough not to realize that my child will be exposed to this, but to be exposed to these concept at 3 1/2 via a book, could be counter productive.

Even the section on ways to be a friend has examples I found asinine:

"My parents are getting divorced. Please don't tell anyone." "I won't"...Can you think of better examples to emulate trust? Yeah me too.

If these quotes haven't deterred you, then spend away, but do check out the Cheri J. Meiners series as I can tell you the books were far and away better for my 3 1/2 year old.

This teaches that friendship is reciprocal - your child doesn't have to go along with other kids all the time and they, in turn are expected to reciprocate by letting your child come first. Good teaching book. Too many books advocate giving guests their way at the expense of their host. Fortunately, this one doesn't. Useful for classes and families.

My son originally received this book as a gift from a family member. He loved to have this book read to him and later to read it for himself. In my opinion, this book is a great tool at home and in school to teach young children what it means to be a friend - something that is difficult to learn for some children.

Since my son has now out-grown this book - I use it in my tutoring classes and plan to use it later when I become a full-time teacher.

With caddiness starting at even earlier ages these days, I bought this book to help my 6 year old daughter understand that not everyone demostrates good friendship. She's so sensitive and doesn't understand why others don't respect her feelings. This book reiterates how to be a good friend and how not to be. It praises being kind and caring so it reinforced what she knew to be correct behavior. The illustrations she recognized immediately to be Marc Brown's adorable and colorful characters. I highly recommend this to any child who's learning to deal with bullies and pushy kids in school.

.. and should be listed as such. My daughter loves this book, she is very intent as we read it, which means she is taking it in. She has been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, which is a high-functioning form of autism. These kids have difficulty with social situations, and they are visual learners, so this is awesome.

I actually give this book four and half stars. I liked it a lot and it had lots of good advice about how to be a good friend. It described how I feel when I feel shy. I am five and almost three quarters and my sister who is two liked it also.
Jacob (with help from his mom)

My two boys love this book. Its a childs simplistic version of "How to be a Friend" and it is great. Right on their level and easy for them to relate to. The Arthur type characters are appealing to children and they make the book their choice for the evening and want me to read it again and again :) I have the hardback, it was a great find.

I bought this book to find out how to help my 10 year old with some basic friendship issues. This book was VERY basic and geared for a younger child, but I feel that it is a great book for any parent. My daughter read it also and said that she thought it was very helpful, but a little too "kiddy" for her taste.