Happy Kids: The Secrets to Raising Well-Behaved, Contented Children. Cathy Glass

      

      Cathy Glass

      Happy

      Kids

       The secret to raising well-behaved, contented children

       Copyright

      HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

       www.harpercollins.co.uk

      First published by HarperCollinsPublishers in 2010

      Copyright © 2010 Cathy Glass

      Cathy Glass asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

      A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library

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      Source ISBN: 9780007339259

      Ebook Edition © OCTOBER 2010 ISBN: 9780007351770 Version 2016-08-17

      Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

      Copyright

      Introduction: Why?

      CHAPTER ONE First Years

Baby and the 3Rs: 0–1

Toddler and the Terrible Twos: 1–3

Some Techniques

      CHAPTER TWO Preschool

Rising Five: 3–5

      CHAPTER THREE More Techniques

      CHAPTER FOUR School

       Starting School: 5–8

       Big Fish in a Little Pond: 9–11

      CHAPTER FIVE Factors Affecting Behaviour

       Stress Factors

       Siblings

      CHAPTER SIX Difficult Children

       Turning around a Difficult Child

       Maintaining Control

       Reforming Siblings

      CHAPTER SEVEN Not Your Own

       Step-parents

       Acting Parents

       Teachers

       Others who Look after Children

      CHAPTER EIGHT Other Factors

       Diet

       Special Needs

      CHAPTER NINE Metamorphosis

       Pre-teen and Early Teen: 11–15

       Older Teen: 15–18

      CHAPTER TEN Grown Up

       Young Adults

      Conclusion

      Remember

      Index

      About the Publisher

       Introduction: Why?

      Why another book on child rearing? The idea came from my readers. After the publication of my fostering memoirs I received thousands of emails from parents and childcare workers around the world. They sent their love and best wishes for the children I had written about, and also praised me for the way I had managed the children’s often very difficult behaviour:

      I tried that method and it worked …

      What a good idea …

      My son used to be very controlling so I handled it as you did and (amazingly) he stopped.

      I’d never thought of dealing with my daughter’s tantrums that way before …

      I now talk to my children rather than at them.

      You should write a book!

      Their comments made me realise that the techniques I use for successfully changing children’s unacceptable behaviour were not universally known – indeed far from it. I wasn’t sure I knew what I did, only that it worked. So I began analysing how I approached guiding, disciplining and modifying children’s behaviour, the psychology that lay behind my techniques and why they worked. This book is the result.

      As a parent you want the best for your child: you want them to be a happy, self-assured individual who can fit confidently into society. As a parent you are responsible for making that happen. There will be others involved in forming your child – teachers, siblings, friends, relatives, etc. – who will have some influence on your child, but ultimately your son or daughter will be the product of your parenting, good and bad.

      I often feel it is a great pity that, as parents, we are not given training in the job of child rearing. No other profession would unleash an employee on a job without basic training and on-going monitoring, but when we become parents, the baby is put into our arms and, apart from a few words of encouragement from a kindly midwife and weekly trips to the clinic to weigh the baby, we’re left to get on with it. We’re supposed to know what to do, having somehow absorbed along the way the contents of volumes