It's OK Not To Share And Other Renegade Rules For Raising Competent And Compassionate Kids (2012) - Plot & Excerpts
This book didn't really offer me much in the way of new information but I can agree with most of the information she shared.*I prefer her solution to sharing to the RIE solution, however, both solutions make more sense for a daycare where none of the toys belong to any of the actual children rather than moms-at-home with their babies having play dates. I think Super Parents Super Children might have the best solution for moms.*What drove me insane about this book is that the author is a little inconsistent and doesn't think through her arguments. She lists Punished By Rewards as a recommended book at the end yet uses various punishments and rewards throughout in order to control the children. Don't help your child down from the tree?!!! That's an attempt to control them rather than a way to relate to them honestly. That IS a punishment. How would you like it if you bit off a little more than you could chew and your husband refused to help you because he thought that was "good" for you, he wanted to "teach you a lesson"? The chapter "Give Kids Power" was the most annoying since it doesn't occur to her that children raised with respect don't need to "play power games." In fact, if you see your kid playing power games you should take that as a sign that you have not treated your child with enough respect or someone in his life isn't. And children won't need to fight off bad guys and pretend to kill their friends if they have never been exposed to that morally repugnant crap most children are exposed to. She argues that war-play is okay but never questions why children think this is an important thing to play anyway. Children won't ever want to play war unless you have exposed them to war and they think it is an important thing to practice. She acknowledges that children only practice life and what they think is important and then thinks its fine for kids to spend their early years practicing fighting battles. Can we take a minute to assess WHY kids think battles are what life is about?!!!!Author needs to study NVC, or read Consciously Parenting. "It's not okay" is not what she should be advising parents to say to their children. It begets the question: for whom? to whom? There is no difference between saying "it is bad to do x" and "it is not okay." BOTH ARE JUDGEMENTS HOW DOES SHE NOT SEE THAT?!!!!! "I don't like it when you" is more accurate and more honest and not judgmental like "it's not okay." Great guide for parents who are open to this kind of parenting. It's called renegade, but some rules are old-fashioned, some are based off of cutting edge research, and some are based off of best practices. They're all presenting logically and the author gives examples of phrases to use and words to watch out for. Since my LO is still an infant it seems very do-able, but I wonder how much I'll retain by the time I need to pull this stuff out of the hat. If I do, I may just go and buy a copy instead of borrowing from the library.
What do You think about It's OK Not To Share And Other Renegade Rules For Raising Competent And Compassionate Kids (2012)?
I am loving this book! I wish all parents would read it!
—Tdavis
