I love a good parenting book, I can read them in a couple of evenings, so when I get asked to review them I am more than happy to say yes. Raising Children; The Primary Years has come at the right time for us as Boy has just started nursery. This means I can read away and find out what I have in store.
I enjoyed reading this book as it seemed to have some sensible advice rather than stuff which I disagreed with. Is that wrong? Its written in a friendly accessible way by parenting journalist Liat Hughes Joshi who also writes for Mother and Baby Magazine and The Telegraph. Contributors include Dr Jemma Rosen-Webb, a clinical psychologist specialising in helping children and families, and Dr Harriet Tenenbaum who has a PhD in child development.
Raising Children is one of those books that you don’t need to read from cover to cover. It’s divided up into themes. These include a chapter on friendship and bullying, and ones on food, sleep and gadgets amongst others. In each of these areas there is some background information about the problem, with some fascinating research. For example, according to a German study 20- 40 % of 9 year olds had trouble getting to sleep. The book goes on to provide information from a child psychologist and also some really good advice about how to deal with the problem.
This is a book that is going to remain on my bookshelf for a while, joining the ranks of my current bible Toddler Taming. It’s printed on nice paper and is nicely presented which makes it easy to read. I loved the idea of providing tips from other mums, I found this especially useful and meant that it is not in the least bit condescending.
I cant comment practically on the advice, because I am not there yet. However, I think that with most issues and problems with children it is useful to have a range of different things to think about. This book provides that and as a result, at least for me, just being able to dip into something like this gives me a bit more confidence in my own decisions. I think its worth a read.
Raising Children is available from www.pearson-books .com and bookshops from 01 January, priced £10.99.
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