Better Parenting

Staff Picks is curated and designed each month by the Gottesman Libraries' staff to highlight resources on educational topics and themes of special interest. Arunika Sharma, Library Associate, describes her selections and theme below. 

The book display for March covers a collection of books that will help you discover more about your child, your parents, and yourself both as a child and a parent. These books will guide you through what to do and what not to do while raising kids and how to raise them healthier and happier. You will be able to understand what children need from their parents and how to be there for them in the most effective way possible. I hope these books act not just as a knowledge resource for you, but also allow you to reflect upon your childhood and understand your parents better. I have also included some children’s books that will remind you of your childhood memories spent with your parents and how special our mothers and fathers are. I hope these books will take you down the memory lane of your childhood and make you cherish the special bond that parents and children share.

Following are the books in the display currently on second floor:

Cherry Pies and Lullabies - This is a book about everyday love. It is a book that says how you do a thing is not what matters. What matters is that you do it with love. And love - freely given and joyously received - is what family customs and families are all about.

Mothers Are Like That – Whether the mother is a pig, a duck, an opossum, or a human, she looks after her little ones. Carol Carrick's gentle portrayal of maternal love is paired with her son Paul Carrick's evocative illustrations in this tender and reassuring picture book for the very young.

Angel to Angel: A Mother’s Gift of Love - I know a lady, oh so fair! To me she gives such loving care. I love her more than any other, because that lady is my mother.

In Daddy’s Arms I Am Tall: African American Celebrating Fathers - When you follow in the path of your father, you learn to walk like him.

My Father’s Hands - A father makes a green and growing place and finds among the shadows of bushes and flowers hidden treasures. Cupping them in his earth-stained hands, he calls his daughter to come and share his discovery. Each time, she finds a garden creature to marvel over and remember: a delicate pink circle of worm, a beetle in shining gold armor, or a leaf-green mantis who boldly balances upon her own steady and caring fingers. With graceful, loving words and vibrant art, Joanne Ryder and Mark Graham portray a special father who shares what he values most - all the beauty and wonder of the natural world. In this children's book, author Joanne Ryde writes about her own father, a thoughtful, gentle man who opened doorways of wonder for her by holding tiny creatures in his hands and helping her discover how unique and marvelous each one was.

Parenting From the Inside Out - In this book, child psychologist Daniel J. Siegel and childhood educator Mary Hartzell draw from research in neurobiology and attachment to explain how interpersonal relationships directly affect the development of the brain, and offer parents a step-by-step approach to a deeper understanding of themselves that will help them raise compassionate and resilient children.

Becoming Attached: First Relationships and How They Shape Our Capacity to Love - The struggle to understand the parent-child bond ranks as one of the great quests of modern psychology, one that touches us deeply because it holds so many clues to how we become who we are. Becoming attached offers insight into this fundamental issue of emotional life. It is a voyage of discovery in child emotional development, as well as, a voyage of personal discovery, as it is impossible to read this book without reflecting on one's own life as a child, a parent, and an intimate partner in love or marriage.

The Incredible Years - "If parents are confident and ready for inevitable problems and pitfalls, there will be room for flexibility, whimsy, and creativity." This invaluable handbook provides parents with guidelines not only to help prevent behavior problems from occurring but also with strategies to promote children's social, emotional, and academic competence.

Teach Your Children Well - "Teach Your Children Well" is a call to action. Psychologist Madeline Levine brings together cutting-edge research and thirty years of clinical experience to explode once and for all the myth that good grades, high test scores, and college acceptances should define the parenting endgame. She shows us how to shift our focus from the excesses of hyper parenting and the unhealthy reliance on our children for status and meaning to a parenting style that concentrates on both enabling academic success as well as developing a sense of purpose, well-being, connection, and meaning in our children's lives.

Raising Children Who Soar - A step-by-step guide on how to help children become successful risk-takers: ready to leap at life's opportunities and triumph over setbacks along the way. This book offers insight into how we can keep our children safe in an uncertain world, as well as raise them to be confident in taking the healthy, emotional risks necessary to succeed in life.

Baby Minds - "Baby minds" is not another program for creating "super babies". Instead, it builds on activities that babies instinctively love, to develop their unique abilities and make your daily interactions full of the joy of discovery.

For Love of Children - This book offers parents a scientifically sound psychological method for predicting and controlling their child's behavior by using positive rewards. It gives parents the techniques for developing in their children the behavior that will lead to successful adulthood.

All Joy and No Fun - Recruiting from wide variety of sources - in history, sociology, economics, psychology, philosophy, and anthropology - the author dissects both the timeless strains of parenting and the ones that are brand new, and then brings her research to life in the homes of ordinary parents around the country. Through lively and accessible storytelling, Senior follows these mothers and fathers as they wrestle with some of parenthood's deepest vexations - and luxuriate in some of its finest rewards.

The Psychology of Parental Control - What is parental control? Is it positive or negative for children? What makes parents controlling with their children, even when they value supporting children's autonomy? Are there alternatives to control and how might we apply them in important domains of children's lives, such as school and sports? This book addresses these and other questions about the meaning and predictors of parental control, as well as its consequences for children's adjustment and well-being.

Bringing Up Bebe - When American journalist Pamela Druckerman had a baby in Paris, she did not aspire to become a "French parent." Then she noticed that French children sleep through the night at two or three months old. They eat braised leeks. Their parents sip coffee while the kids play by themselves. And the French kids are still boisterous, curious, and creative. Why? With a notebook stashed in diaper bag, Druckerman realized that the French do not just have different parenting philosophy - they have a very different view of what a child is. In this deeply wise, charmingly told memoir, Druckerman recounts how she discovered that children - including her own - are capable of feats of understanding and autonomy she had never imagined.

Bringing Up a Moral Child - Many of today's parents struggle to raise their children without the help of an extended family or religious training. They want to give their children a strong sense of moral values, but they do not know how. "Bringing Up a Moral Child" is the perfect book for parents who are concerned about their children's moral development.

Between Parent & Child – New Solutions to Old Problems - All parents want their children to be secure and happy. No one deliberately tries to make his child fearful, shy, inconsiderate, or obnoxious. Yet in the process of growing up, many children acquire undesirable characteristics and fail to achieve a sense of security and attitude of respect for themselves and for others. The purpose of this book is to help parents identify their goals in relation to children and to suggest methods of achieving those goals. Along with offering concrete suggestions and preferred solutions for dealing with daily situations and psychological problems faced by all parents, this book also sets forth basic principles to guide parents in living with children in mutual respect and dignity.

Parents and Children, Love, and Discipline - This book is written to help parents take advantage of the many specific techniques that can assure a positive approach to child rearing, and to provide positive solutions to problems that concern the entire family. While stressing positive parent/child interactions, the book also emphasizes ways to help each young person develop personal values and achieve his highest potential. 

Intrusive Parenting - In this book, the author raises critical issues such as understanding the nature of the effects of psychological control on children's development. The author stresses on the need to bring both a developmental and phenomenological perspective to the study of parental psychological control.

How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk - This book will give you the know-how you need to be more effective with your children - and more supportive of yourself. Enthusiastically praised by parents and professionals around the world, the down-to-earth, respectful approach of Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish makes relationships with children of all ages less stressful and more rewarding.

Compassionate Child Rearing - In this brilliantly conceived and revolutionary work, Dr. Firestone develops the theory and underlying dynamics involved in disturbed family relationships and the "poisonous pedagogy" that characterizes generally accepted patterns of child-rearing. The author expands on the descriptions of the traditional abuses of children previously offered by Alice Miller, R.D. Laing, James Garbarino, and others. He describes a process through which parents can uncover and work through ambivalent feelings toward their children, to gain a more compassionate view of themselves and of their children.