Positive Discipline for Preschoolers

This is a great book for all parents, but in my opinion more specifically parents who are going through the preschool years for the first time with their young one.  How many parents out there have ever felt frustrated with your young one? They won’t listen to anything that you say, have their own opinion about everything and they are always right in their mind.  This is the perfect book for you, because there are always those times when you think that you have lost your limit and cannot take anymore. This is a book that can help you avoid those times all together, this book takes you through the step by step process of disciplining your child without having to use actions and words that you would not like. This is an easy read, not too over whelming in size, the chapter sizes are easy, each of them with their own theme and idea.  This book has six sections with their own theme and within each section there are little chapters that help break down those broad topics and get into great detail.  This is a great book to help you and your child bond and have and understanding that discipline is needed and it is not anything personal to the child it is just a way of life, like my mom always told me ‘you’ll thank me later.’ And that is the truth, through her way of disciplining me, I do thank her for not letting me get too out of hand as a youngster, my teachers have said the same.  The reason that I really enjoyed this book is because it emphasizes that parenting is not easy and there are going to be hard times that go along with all the good, it tells you that being a parent isn’t going to allow you to be perfect, you are going to make mistakes and the beauty behind that is that you can learn from those mistakes and better yourself next time. Although the title of this book suggests that it is simply about disciplining, but that is not the case, it talks about all aspects of being a parent, starting from birth and all the emotions that go along with it.  This books talk about getting in-tune with yourself not only your child, because being in-tune with yourself makes it easier to connect with your child and that is when your child is more likely to listen to you and do as you ask. 

The quality of this writing is very good, the author writes in a way that is understandable and not too overwhelming with science and large words that can often times lower the level of understanding.  This is a great book for all parents who want a little input and a little push in the right direction as far as discipline is concerned.  Although I do not have any children of my own, I work at a school and work with children from the ages of five all the way up through thirteen year olds, this book has helped me identify other ways to go about how I discipline the children that I work with, one that really stuck with me is to put an emphasis on the fact that is it not punishment it I discipline. It has also helped to recognize children who have had positive types of discipline, poor types, along with no discipline at all, the actions that these children have make it easy to identify. I would recommend this book to a teacher, parent, or just someone who is interested in children and discipline.

References:  Nelsen, J., Erwin, C., & Duffy, R. (1998). Positive discipline for preschoolers, for their early years--raising children who are responsible, respectful, and resourceful. (2nd ed.). Prima Pub.