Customer Reviews

Raising a Self-Disciplined Child: Help Your Child Become More Responsible, Confident, and Resilient

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

 

 

If you are looking for a step-by-step guide with bullet points and checklists, this is *not* the book for you. In each chapter, there is a lot of good explanation of the "why" behind self-discipline and the components of it, along with a healthy amount of case studies of parents with varying troubles in disciplining their children. At first, the case studies were very interesting, but I did find by the end that they were extremely repetitive. I almost felt like I was reading a manual on how to be a family therapist, not necessarily a better parent. The structure of the case studies were always the same: validate the parents, ask "How would you children describe you? How do you want them to think of you? What are you goals in disciplining your children?", reassure them that they want the process to fulfill the parents' goals, teach the problem-solving method, some examples on how they practiced/anticipation retorts, parents report surprise that the kids were more cooperative, etc.

My son is 2.5 years old, and I was really looking for a resource that would help me lay some groundwork in the earlier years to prevent problems I see in adolescence. While I completely agree with everything in this book and probably would find it valuable if persistent problems pop up when my son is older, this is not the parenting guide I was looking for.

5 stars: good material on self-discipline, why discipline is necessary, some good techniques for building a problem-solving and respectful environment in the home.
4 stars: writing and organization. far too repetitive.
3 stars: not really a step-by-step "help" guide.

average: 4 stars

"Self discipline may be more responsible for differences in achievement than any other factor." From "Raising a Self-Disciplined Child" by Robert Brooks and Sam Goldstein. The book was written to "help your child (grandchild, student) become more responsible, confident and resilient."
As the mother of four children in four years, I needed help. I read every parenting book I could find. Each one had some useful ideas. "Raising a Self-Disciplined Child" brings together all the best and most important principles. The format is user-friendly.
For each concept, the authors recount the experiences of an actual family. "Take-home messages" are italicized and set apart. Additional recommended reading, references and an index are provided.
Yes, it's a book that addresses children with problems. More important, it's a book that provides a blueprint that will guide parents to prevent problems.
"Children are more likely to listen to adults they perceive as fair, empathic, and respectful than to adults who seem arbitrary, inconsistent and angry." This quote is from the chapter "The Mindset for Effective Discipline" which describes the styles of parenting and explains why the "authoritative" (not to be confused with "authoritarian")
style was proven best by research. There are questions for parents to consider in measuring their own empathy toward their children. There are examples of families and the observation that "insights of children often provide information that can be used to prevent problems."
Other chapters include practical, usable advice on teaching children how to solve problems, how to deal with disappointments, how to learn from mistakes and how to respond when life seems unfair.
Every chapter is excellent, but my favorite is "Encouraging Your Child to Make a Difference." One quote: "Not only should children observe parents engaged in bettering the lives of others, but in addition, from an early age, they should be involved in these kinds of activities themselves."
If you only read one parenting book....let it be this one!

The author came to speak at our school and found him to be a great speaker. This book is a must for everyone even if you don't have kids of your own. It really gives one a new perpective of understanding children and their personalities. This book teaches one to empower and create resilience amongst children. Absolutely wonderful!

Very good advices on how to deal with discipline issues. Sometimes I got so stressed for not knowing how to better approach my child without yelling or hitting. This book has been extremely helpful.

This book contains many compelling and thought provoking real-life examples of ways to improve your relationship with your child and ways to to instill confidence in them. I highly recommend it!

I really wanted to like this book, and it's not bad as such, you just have to wade through so much pap to get to the points. The book for me would have been much better if it was condensed and if each of the authors tackled a chapter on their own as opposed to the `we' that is constantly mentioned. "We asked the Wilkines what they typically did" everything is WE and I found it annoying very quickly because I find it hard to believe that it was always a 'we' situation.

The case study family stories are so drawn out, maybe it was written to make me feel like I was there however, too much irrelevant information listing every families failed attempt before success made for a tiresome read. It would have been a great book condensed to say half the size. They needed some serious editing and I think that their publishers have done them a disservice when the potential was there. If they were paid by the word, they'd have made a fortune. Sadly, all it did was spoil the read.