Rating: 
Summary: Good in Theory
Review: The messages in this book cannot be faulted: treat your child with respect and teach self control. The prequel, "Raising Your Spirited Child", teaches parents to first adjust to their child's temperament and is quite good. Much of content is repeated in this book. The disadvantage of this book is that the messages get lost in the overly abundant stories used to humanize and illustrate behavioral points. And all have simple causes and neat conclusions. Reading was slow and not particularly beneficial. For a parenting book that better addresses common problems, common responses and better responses, read "How to Talk to Your Child". However, there's still the need for a book that addresses how to handle situations where time doesn't allow diplomacy or diplomacy doesn't yield results.
Rating: 
Summary: If you want to read just one parenting book- this is it!
Review: This book has more descriptions, information and tips that "resonate" with me than any other book I've read. You'll find yourself thinking "Yes! That's EXACTLY what MY child says (or does)!" Then Mary helps you see the reaction you're likely to get with each potential response... based on your child's temperament (most books overlook the fact that a statement or action that calms one child can enrage one with a different temperament).My favorite sections are the tips about temperaments (especially teaching children and parents how to say or do things differently to avoid upsetting others) and helping children change their "bulldozing statements" (often button-pushing ones for parents, such as "You're not my boss!" or "Shut up!") into statements that persuade others to listen ("I'd like a choice" or "I didn't like what you said"). Have you read a lot of books and wonder if you'll really learn something new in this one? Absolutely. With two spirited children of my own, I've enjoyed the following (plus many others), but now recommend "Kids, Parents, & Power Struggles" instead: Parenting with Love & Logic; Raising your Spirited Child (an excellent supplement); How to Behave so Your Children Will Too; Magic 1-2-3; Setting Limits; How to talk so kids will listen... (and others in their series- great supplements, though); Children are from Heaven; Children the Challenge; plus others from Dr. Sears, Leach, & Brazelton.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Resource and Information
Review: This book has really helped me learn better methods of dealing with and understanding my 3 year old son. The book provides some questionaires that help you identify strong parts of a child's temperment and then supplies strategies for dealing with those temperments. They work too! It really helped me take a step back from what was becoming a very negative, constantly yelling, stressful relationship and move towards making it positive and enjoyable. The ideas discussed are not about new ways to punish but methods to use to teach your child self discipline and stress management. It also keyed me in to differences in personality that were starting to be points of contention in our relationship. I would recommend this book to anyone who would like to build a more positive relationship with their child.
Rating:
Summary: Everybody Wins
Review: This book is brilliant! It teaches you to empathize rather than chastize your children, and in doing so, they learn to respect you more. I'm not big on self-help books, but this is one that I can whole-heartedly recommend. A friend told me about it and I read it so I wouldn't insult her. And I am so glad I did. I passed it on to my husband, and he really learned a lot from it too. In fact, we learned a lot about each other in the book. I have already ordered The Spirited Child, Mary Kurcinka's other book, and am looking forward to reading it.
Rating: 
Summary: There is more to power struggles
Review: This book is written much like "RYSC Workbook" in the setting of a parenting class. The main focus is to determine and identify the feelings behind the misbehaviour. To provide support and nurturing by being an "emotional coach" and helping the child in identifying his/her emotions. If all this fails to bring peace, you may suspect "invisible" medical issues, and are encouraged to seek professional help.
I did not disagree with the content of this book, but I feel important areas were either omitted or minimized.
Most of the power struggles described, seemed to be nothing more than typical misunderstandings, where the child has a tangible reason for being oppositional.
To me the main source of power struggles centre primarily on the parent not the child. So many parents are ovrwhelmed and hindered by feelings of guilt associated with maintaining standards and rules. Unable to tolerate their child being unhappy with them, they unwittingly surender their parental authority to the child. This book does not stress enough how insecure and difficult children become when there are insufficient rules and limits on their behaviour. Power struggles become a search for clear boundaries and have absolutely nothing to do with the reasons expressed by the child. They just don't understand why they become so upset over some trivial thing.
The author suggests that if you can determine the childs emotional need behind the power struggle, you should not look at the behaviour as manipulative. Regardless of the circumstances and underlying emotions, when a child tries to change a "No" to a "Yes" it IS manipulation! There is always a reason, manipulation is a two way street and always a mutual avoidance of something.
There is a good section in this book which helps parents to determine sources of stress in a childs life and describes the many medical problems which could be a factor. Also a very informative chapter on temperamental differences and how they relate to discipline.
Overall a good book to read but would strongly recommend reading "The Manipulative Child: How to Regain Control and Raise Resilient, Resourceful, and Independent Kids" and "Setting Limits" for a further understanding of power struggles and more importantly, what to do.
Rating:
Summary: Even better than Raising Your Spirited Child
Review: This is an outstanding book- pragmatic,insightful, hopeful. The reviewer who suggested that it doesn't draw firm enough boundaries for 'manipulative' kids quite clearly missed the point, as is clear by his use of the pejorative word manipulative. In this book Kurcinka effectively moves the goal posts: identify your core values clearly and explicitly, holding your children to those, and then, within that framework, help them (and you...) develop the skills that we all need to cope in the world: knowing what we want, understanding the feelings that are driving our behaviour, negotiating for a reasonable outcome. Kurcinka really does take a lifetime approach: helping us to help our kids (and sometimes ourselves) learn the skills that will help us deal with the inevitable and endless situations in which other people have different wants & needs than our own. And her reminder that improvement, not perfection, is what we are looking for is reassuring on those 'bad-parent' days. That, with the humour & stories of people making a bigger mess of it than you are found in her previous book, make this a wonderful, encouraging book. Don't miss it!
Rating:
Summary: Best I have read so far
Review: This is the type of book I read cover to cover as fast as I could, and know I will refer back to many times in the years to come. It has a lot of practical advice, and made me feel like "I can do this", or at the very least like I have some tools to help me do it as best I can.
Rating:
Summary: Best I have read so far
Review: This is the type of book I read cover to cover as fast as I could, and know I will refer back to many times in the years to come. It has a lot of practical advice, and made me feel like "I can do this", or at the very least like I have some tools to help me do it as best I can.
Rating:
Summary: great book
Review: This was a very well written book. There is no mumble jumble to this book. Well informative and enjoyable. I would highly recommend to anyone who wants to become a better parent. I find it so important to let go of the old style of parenting and concentrate on the way a child should be treated without punishment (but of course with the proper form of disipline), critisim, belittling, and of course without spanking. A child is a human being and should be treated as such. He/she is an equal in your family. When you've read some great books such as this one you will learn and appreciate the proper way a child should be parented and taught. And these NEW parenting techniques REALLY DO work. Put yourself to the test and everyone will benefit form what you get out of it. I also recommend Kids are worth it(Barbara Coloroso), How to talk so kids will listen & listen so kids will talk(Faber& Mazlish), How to raise an emotionally intelligent kid (John Gottman) and The 7 habits of a highly effective family (Stephen Covey) Enjoy!
Rating: 
Summary: Parents, children, and emotional intelligence
Review: This well-written book is a fine, worthy follow up to the very useful Raising Your Spirited Child. The author uses the work of Daniel Goleman on Emotional Intelligence to help parents learn to avoid power struggles with their children. The author advocates the need for parents to both ddevelop their own emotional intelligence and to help their children develop this qualities. Part one gives a good, if not detailed enough, overview of what emotional intelligence is and why it's important. She could've referenced a bit more research here; it does exist. Parts Two and Four look at how parents can connect with their children to be "emotion coaches" for them. Part Two is about building a better relationship with your child. Part Four is is focused on life skills. I really enjoyed these sections of the book, although they, too, could've been more detailed. That said Kurcinka is gearing this book to a general audience and probably didn't want to get bogged down in alot of theory and research. That's actually a good thing - the book is not at all dry. It's readable and I think parents will be able to relate to the examples she uses. She uses alot of real life case examples from her own practice. I didn't find Part 3 to be as useful as the rest of the book, because it was all about temperment. This material was covered in detail in her previous book, which I've read. Everything about it was pretty much a carbon copy of the original book "Raising Your Strong Willed Child." For those who haven't read that book, the information is very useful, and I think necessary, but for me it was repetitive. She could've shortened or deleted this section of the book and given more exercises, activities, and overall detail in the other three parts. Overall, this is a very useful book for anyone who wants to learn to lessen conflict and power struggles with children. It's geared more toward children under 12, but the materials can also be applied to teens. Highly reccommended.
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