March Book Review - The New Dare to Discipline

I have been working hard on my goal of reading 1 non fiction book on parenting each month. I love reading but it has to be fiction so this is a stretch for me to read a non fiction book each month. The pressure of doing a "book review" on the blog is helping me do it. Something really cool happened with my review on last month's book. I read "The Power of Parent Child Play" and wrote about it back in February. The author actually read my blog review and commented!! You can go check it out in my February posts. How cool is that!! She and I started emailing and have been chatting which is really cool. We are even friends on Facebook now. What do you think - Is James Dobson (my hero) going to comment on this post?

So last month's book that I read was an oldie but a goodie - "The New Dare to Discipline" by James Dobson. Overall I thought the book was really good. The main themes were excellent. It really brought home the point of making sure to establish good discipline not just to make it through the fun toddler/preschool years but to make sure that you have a healthy relationship with your child for life. The formative years are so important because it forms how your child is going to relate to you through their teen years (scary thought). I liked how Dr. Dobson talked about the balance between love and discipline. That is such a fine line to walk that I struggle with at times. It was good to get some perspective on it. I also found the "magic tools" that he talked about very helpful. This is how to use rewards to motivate children. I knew most of the basics about punishment (spanking, time outs, removing things, etc.) but I hadn't thought much about the power of rewards for children. That is something I definitely plan on using with the kids.

Ben is a strong willed child so we continually struggle with discipline issues at time so the book was very helpful in how to deal with some situations. I do wish that it had gone more in depth into how to deal with specific situations. I would love to find a book that spells out what to do in every parenting situation. Do you think it is out there??? I have bought Dobson's "The Strong Willed Child" so that one will be read sometime soon. The book was organized in an easy to read fashion (something I must have for a non fiction book). The majority of it was a question and answer format which was good (held my attention). The book does take on the controversial topic of spanking. Dr. Dobson is a proponent of spanking in the right context. It is to be reserved for only very specific situations (defiance). I think his thoughts and ideas on the subject were very well written. We have worked to implement many of his suggestions into our discipline over the last month. Hopefully to make us better parents!

I am a huge Dr. Dobson fan so I of course thought the book was great. If you haven't ever read it I recommend it! Hope you enjoyed my review. It is a good way for me to remember what I read and to hold me accountable for doing my reading! This month's book is by the same author as last month (we are friends now!) and I am super excited about it! Can't wait to share it with you.