Only has standard information

If you have read other books about discipline this one will bring nothing new to you. I ordered it because with a title like this I thought perhaps it would give some information that I could use for my baby so we can try to curtail things early on, but the advice it gave for the first year was to simply push their hand away from what they shouldn't do and distract them. Hmmm...my baby is a little advanced for that not to mention it was quite obvious. I quickly read over the rest of the book and set it aside. It has nothing new.

Here are some examples of what you will find:
Page 34: Cardinal Rules for Parenting
1. Be consistant.
2. Take a cool, calm, and almost nonchalant attitude when giving out consequenses.
Her negative consequenses include:
1. taking away
2. time-out
3. Setting (in which she actually discusses the time a child should be in time out)
4. keeping the child in time-out
5. use of the timer
I don't think that section was titled properly.
She deals with types of parenting styles, types of children, her view of behavior management, her smilely face system for ages 3-6, sleep problems, meal time wars, and potty training. Then gives advice for dealing with specific types of inappropriate behavior and children with ADD/AHDD (only 10 pages for that) and some ideas for single parents.

The only real definite plus was that I really enjoyed quizzes that she gives quite often to see if a particular topic applies to you. They were quite fun.

Really, she just runs throught major issues and, I think, states the obvious. If you haven't read about disciplining (teaching not just punishing) children this is a standard book. I didn't see anything objectionable in it. But if you've read and read and are looking for something insightful look elsewhere.

I give it three starts since it isn't bad advice, just nothing truly original.

I'd recommend "The Blessing of the Skinned Knee" or "To Kindle a Soul".

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To Anonymous - where were you in math class?

I have not read this book, I was just looking through reviews. Anonymous seems not to understand the grammatical and mathematical terms first, second, third, etc. If s/he thinks that the fifth year means we are talking about a five-year-old, than what does s/he think about the first year? A one-year-old? Then how do you refer to a 0-12-month-old baby? The 0th year? Anonymous: the first year means from birth to 12 months, the second year means from 12-24 months (one-year-old), the third year means 24-36 months (two-year-old) and so on. Therefore the book phrased the age categories absolutely correctly. Thought you should know... Now I am interested in reading the book!

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Who edited this book?

After reading the three reviews on this book, I purchased a copy. I noticed that in chapter 1, "Understanding the Stages of Development" there are some BIG errors with the layout. Under the heading "The Third Year" on page 14, it discusses 2 year old behavior. Under the heading "The Fourth Year" on page 16, it discusses the behavior of a 3 year old. This mismatched problem continues throughout the rest of the chapter and completely left out the behavior of 7 year olds, for which that heading, "The Sixth and Seventh Years" covers 5 and 6 year old behavior. I kept wondering if anyone who wrote the previous reviews actually read this book. If you can ignore the multiple errors and just read through the book, I think it's worth three stars.

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