I have been cutting down on doing product reviews ever since our 3rd kiddo came along in end of Sept 2013. I do still accept review pitches but only when time permits and if it is something that I can see it being useful and beneficial to our family. Also, as busy as I am with 3 kiddos, home cooking, taking care of hubby's administration site of the business and swamped up with managing my FB page and blog, I just can't say no to reviewing good books! Reading is my passion and coupled with books that are of parenting, children, family or religion or educational genre, all the more I gotta say yes!
Title: New Old-Fashioned Parenting: A Guide to Help You Find the Balance Between Traditional and Modern Parenting
Author: Liat Hughes Joshi
Publisher: Vie (February 12, 2015)
ISBN: 978-1849536721
Paperback: 255 pages
Description from the product page:
"There's been a revolution in the family; it's now all about the kids. We've moved on from children being 'seen and not heard', but we're now plagued with the worry of ending up with 'that child' - the one who's running amok and is ill-prepared for life. This book combines contemporary and traditional childrearing methods, bringing fresh thinking to some of the essential parenting issues of our time:
* Managing screen use * Encouraging independence * Finding the balance between school and play * Compromising between parenting that's pushy and not involved enough * Establishing the 'best of both worlds' approach that works in the modern world for modern families.
In this manifesto of new old-fashioned parenting there's no pandering, no spoiling, and definitely no dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets at dinner time."
Firstly, I love the title. I came from a simple family, no spanking, no harsh discipline and I love it. I've always tried my best to emulate my parent's parenting style and I trully believed that theirs is the old-fashioned parenting that works (Look at me! Success story hahaha!) and hopefully will be able to make use of the good ones and apply them onto our parenting style in this modern world.
Some of the tips highlighted in this book that I agree with and love:
- Rewarding your kiddos. I believed it is a good motivational tool but should not be overused that it loses its power. Not all chores to be done around the house by kiddos need to be rewarded, I let them know they should contribute and help out as a teamwork.
- Letting off steam. Yes, I shout especially when things get too overwhelming for me to handle. Yes, of course I regret that the moment it happened. We are all human. But like the book said, don't do it too often and watch out as kiddos will easily observed and replicate what and how you behave and react around them. I always make sure I apologised to our kiddos for screaming, explaining to them that mummy is sorry for shouting and scolding etc that mummy need some time off to cool down and calm down as well.
- Training up little helpers. I've read somewhere before that young children do not process negative instructions well. So I make my instruction as simple and straightforward as possible. But unlike the book, I try not to use the word 'please' so often. My personal reason for this is because I don't want to be seen asking for help too often by saying please too many times. As the parent who are most often at home with them all the time, I would want to exert my authority and for our kiddos to remember what mummy said means business.
In addition, I also remember reading somewhere that young children cannot multitasks that well, so we as parent have to keep our instructions short and sweet. Don't go telling your young child 'Go clean up your toys then pack your books into the shelf and tidy up the room'. This sample already represents 3 tasks for them to do, of course for us adults we will understand but for kiddos, we need to give them instruction one by one.
Another page worth to take note of:
About the book structure, I like the 'Common barriers to the NOFP way' section where it highlights the usual doubts and worries on any parents' minds and gives you a better perspective on how to tackle these doubts and concerns.
We practised some of the tips listed in chapter 8 - "Less is More" such as toy rotation, though I wanted to share some other tips we practised which were not listed in the chapter such as:
- Our motto when deciding whether to purchase anything - Do we want it or do we need it?
- Buying preloved items (I've bought some awesome educational stuff and toys for our kiddos this way)
- Keep gifts by relatives and friends given during Christmas or birthdays and space them out for following year/occasions
I skipped chapter 11 which touches on children of preteen age (our kiddos are all below 7 still), chapter 12 as I personally feel with the crime rates in our country now, it is really hard to let go and let our kiddos venture out on their own and chapter 13 on divorce and not being a family unit.
In summary, I would totally recommend this book for any parents wanting to work on their parenting approaches, to take the best from both traditional old-fashioned approach and the modern new style of parenting nowadays.
The book is available at all major bookstores. For international fans, you can find it at Amazon
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I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with a copy of the book in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine. And if you'd like to read my previous book reviews, you can do so by reading this post of mine called "My Book Reviews"
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