Customer Reviews

Dr. Rob's Guide to Raising Fit Kids: A Family-Centered Approach to Achieving Optimal Health

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"Dr. Rob's Guide to Raising Fit Kids" seems more of an attempt to get kids to play sports, then to actually get fit. I wanted to like this book and do to some extent, but it was more focused on team sports then exercise. A majority of kids do not play team/individual sports because of the cost issues, so the majority of the book wouldn't help most kids. Also, over half the book deals with meal plans and recipes which seems a bit overboard (he could have used this space for more content). Dr. Gotlin does a good job explaining to parents how to get their kids involved in sports and how to deal with injuries. His style of writing made the book easy to read and understand. Maybe it was the `name' of the book that gave me the impression of a more `fitness' book for kids to help get them outside and away from inside gaming! If your kids are in to sports I would say read the book. If you're looking for a more fitness oriented book to guide you, I would pass on this one.

Advanced reader copy received from Res Marketing Alliance

With today's rising obesity rates, many parents want to ensure their children stay healthy and fit. "Dr. Rob's Guide to Raising Fit Kids: A Family-Centered Approach to Achieving Optimal Health" is a guide for parents who want their children to avoid the easy pitfall that is obesity. With guidelines and tips for children of any age, information on activities and better diet choices, it's an informed guide, sure to help children get fit and stay fit. With extra advice on how health is a family mind set, "Dr. Rob's Guide to Raising Fit Kids" should be required reading for any parent.

Dr. Rob is a doctor, parent and children's sports coach who provides useful ways to improve the health and diet of today's kids. He starts out talking about how kids are struggling with obesity at a young age because of a general inactivity epidemic. Many children remain sedentary for much of the day, sitting in school or in front of the TV. This has concerning implications for their long term health. The numbers and trends he shares are unsettling. One particularly memorable example is that for the first time in history children's life expectancy is declining.

He gives advice to help children get the most out of sports (hint: they're supposed to be fun for the kids, not to let parents live vicariously). The overriding message for parents is that confidence leads to success and success leads to confidence. He also discusses recognizing and dealing with sports injuries. One appreciates his knowledge and experience as a medical doctor to cover treatment instructions and when to see a doctor. The generally idea is if you're in doubt, see your doctor.

The latter portion of the book covers proper nutrition. He teamed up with a nutritionist to create sports-themed meals for kids and there are several recipes for kid-friendly foods that can work for adults too. The end of the book has a few appendices with useful web sites and organizations for further research.

The book was well thought out, pleasant to read and emphasized ideas enough to get embed them into the ol' cranium.

The copy I received seems to be an early unfinished version of the book. Topics were only briefly covered in some chapters and coverage was inconsistent chapter to chapter (i.e. recommended sports, equipment and meal plans do not carry over consistently). The chapter on equipment included buying guides for Baseball, Basketball, Soccer and Tennis. The chapter on meal plans included 7 day plans for Baseball, Basketball, Lacrosse, Soccer and All-Star sports. The meal plans included food substitutions. Plans varied from 1300 to 1800 calories per day, which is well under the amount required (per the table provided a few pages before the meal plans). The concept of this book is great but I think the content needs to be developed before I could recommend it. Chapters are not balanced in content: there are 11 chapters but the chapter on meal plans alone equals about a third of the content of the total book. The Appendices includes 'resources' all of which are websites, these are listed by broad category without annotation. There is an indication that an index will be included in the completed version of this book.

When I picked up this book, I was under the impression I would be getting information on how to raise fit kids - all ages, all kinds of fitness. However while this book included a small amount of information that would benefit parents of all children, it was very much geared toward the sports playing 6-11 year old set.

Chapters 1-2 give a general overview of the childhood obesity epidemic and some things you can do to build fitness habits into your children. Also included are some basic exercises for children.

Chapter 3 starts the focus on sports for 6-11 year olds. There is a basic overview of the different ages and what skills they may have as well as the parent's role at that time.

Chapter 4 goes over sports equipment and how to choose what is best for your child. I would think if you have a child in sports this would be a very helpful chapter.

Chapter 5 goes over the parent coach relationship. Dr. Rob is a coach and a parent so he is able to speak from both sides.

Chapter 6 goes over safety in sports and also addresses specific injuries and how to handle them. Helpful information for anyone.

Chapter 7 is a short talk on alcohol and drugs.

Chapter 8-9 go into some menu plans and a few recipes. The plans each have a sports title such as Home Run Breakfast to encourage your children to eat healthful food. Not sure if this will actually work or not, not having a sports-obsessed child myself.

The last couple chapters are a Q&A with Dr. Rob and some resources.

I think that if you do have a child 6-11 years old who plays or is interested in sports, that this will be a very useful and helpful book for you. If you don't have a child that falls into that category, while this was an interesting book, I would not recommend it for you.

This book is a very good book for parents of serious, competitive athletes and amateur coaches. To me, it wasn't a book that was extremely relevant to parents of regular kids that aren't athletic that need help staying fit. There was a small exercise section that did have some exercises that children who do not participate in sports could do, but overall I'd say the book is geared towards parents of children who participate in team sports. That said, the book is very detailed and gives great advice on many things. There is a breakdown of each age group and what that age child gets from their sport experience. Dr. Rob tells the best age to start sports, gives a guide to buying sports equipment for each sport, and includes a section on healthy menus and yummy recipes that can benefit all children. The section for coaches and the section on how to manage injuries both were very detailed and would be very beneficial to the parent of a competitive athlete who is also a coach of their child's team. Overall, I would recommend this book to any parent who has a child that participates in team sports. I think it's a worthwhile book that can teach any parent about keeping their little athlete safe and healthy both mentally and physically. 4 stars.

As parents, don't we wish children came with instruction booklets? In the area of fitness, Gotlin has truely answered this call. While a bit preachy in chapter one, Gotlin quickly moves into meatier subjects dealing with exercise for kids, team sports, and diet. Jewels of the publication are sections outlining how children at different stages of development deal with issues in team sports. He also includes a section outlining how to choose equipment for the young sports enthusiast. For example, how to choose a tennis racket for a six year old. (Who knew there were guidelines? Certainly not the people at the athletics store). The end of the book extends great information about the childhood diet with menus and healthy recipes (my kids loved the healthier Mac and Cheese recipe). It is very much a worthy read.

When my oldest was young I was pretty clueless about how to get on a team and what was expected for equipment, practices, etc. I had no idea what sports injuries were common or how to avoid them. I thought I knew about good nutrition but had no idea how to get him to eat a balanced diet. Dr. Rob addresses all these issues in this volume in an easy, conversational, helpful style. I feel much better prepared to be the team mom this time around.

His first point is that fitness is a family affair. One can not expect to raise fit kids if the parent is not willing to commit to a healthy lifestyle, which includes playing, being active, eating and shopping with a balanced, healthy outlook. Building the right habits for a healthy, vibrant life takes the whole family working and playing together. Once you get that pattern ingrained in the parent's expectations the rest comes along.

My favorite chapters are the ones on what sports equipment you will need for different sports, the exercise guide, the descriptions and treatment for common injuries, and the meal plans. There are some yummy recipes using fresh, healthy ingredients put into diet plans in categories like "World Series Game" and "NBA Finals".

I highly recommend this book for families with kids and coaches working with kids in sports programs. Good, balanced advice in an easily accessed format.

This book focuses on children, children's health, children's nutrition, and children in sports. with a particular emphasis on the latter. I think that, as a book about children in sports, it is pretty good. The section about parents as coaches was very good, and I'll probably re-read it again once I start coaching ball for my kids (if I ever do). However, I was disappointed in a couple of things. First is that the book is touted as having fitness guidelines for kids of every age. Maybe I simply have a different set of criteria for what constitutes "kid," but this book is about ages 6-12. While I understand that it doesn't include teens, kids (to me) also means children younger than 6. He has a little bit of nutritional information for children under 6, but not much. It's also very heavily sports-oriented, rather than how to incorporate and achieve overall fitness into your life. The nutritional information was good, but I have doubts about the success rates of using words like "baseball diet" to get your child to eat better food.

In short, if you're looking for something to help you with ideas about how to incorporate fitness and health into your sports-hating child's life, this probably isn't the book for you. If you're looking for something for younger children, this book also isn't for you. If you're looking for general guidelines, nutrtional information, and sports-oriented fitness for older children, this book is for you.

Dr. Rob's Guide to Raising Fit Kids by Dr. Robert S. Gotlin.

Overall I thought this was a very good book with a lot of useful information. In first chapter, Fitness is a family affair, Dr. Rob states, "Our sit-down lifestyle often leads to obesity, which has the potential to kill us and our children. "The American lifestyle is toxic." (Pg. 7) I really appreciated Dr. Rob's perspective that if we are to have fit and healthy kids, we have to do it as a family - parents must model the behavior changes they want to see in their children. We home school our two children and physical fitness is definitely a family issue for us. The book is full of excellent ideas and suggestions, along with helpful information about safety and necessary equipment for different sports. I do have a few criticisms, though. One is that his section on caloric requirements for children and the meal plans are a little too complex for the average reader and do not correspond to each other. If the average calorie requirement for a 9 to 13 year old boy is 2,600, then why do most of the meal plans for active, athletic children playing basketball, baseball, Lacrosse, soccer, track and field, etc, have only 1,200 to 1,800 calories? That just doesn't add up. Otherwise, I really appreciated the important information on things such as; how to correctly fit athletic shoes, how to avoid common injuries and the glycemic index and protein gram charts. Altogether, a worthwhile book if you don't mind getting out your calculator to adjust the meal plans for your own kids and family.