Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child

This is my favourite video about parenting, and I can't recommend it enough. IT's available from the Gottman Institute, or Amazon, or go to my website and get it. You'll find a lot of good books and videos there. Dr. Gottman speaks about the research that clearly shows that how successful you are in life is more dependent on how you get along with others as a child than how smart you were, or how you did academically.

More about the book/DVD: In Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child, (both the book and the DVD) Dr. John Gottman explores the emotional relationship between parents and children. It's not enough to simply reject an authoritarian model of parenting, he says. A parent needs to be concerned with the quality of emotional interactions in the family. Gottman provides a series of exercises to assess parenting styles and emotional self-awareness. He identifies a five-step "emotion coaching" process to help teach children how to recognize and address their feelings, which includes becoming aware of the child's emotions; recognizing that dealing with these emotions is an opportunity for intimacy; listening empathetically; helping the child label emotions; setting limits; and problem-solving. Chapters on divorce, fathering, and age-based differences in emotional development help make Gottman's teachings detailed and useful.

One of the reasons I use this book and DVD in my practice all the time is that it's one of the very few that is based on any research. Most parenting books are written by individuals who basically had a good idea...they thought....and wrote a book of ways to make that idea happen. But often there isn't any science behind what your reading, just someone else's idea of how things should be. Gottman has science. And it's easy to understand!

Finally, this is a fun book or DVD. It's a pleasure to listen to or read, and unlike other books that have one after another technique about child raising this one sets out five basic goals and you finish feeling "I can do that!" I could be a parent like that.

Now I know there are problems between what is and what we would like. Often times I need to present specific parent skills, teach behaviour management and work out intervention details with schools. But behind all of that there needs to be a basic parenting philosophy, and a clear goal of how you wish it would be. Gottman provides that.

There are more Gottman videos on youtube and elsewhere I'll be suggesting, but if your looking for a basic parenting book, this is a place to start.

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This blog is not offered as medical advice or as a means of diagnosing or treating ADHD, learning disabilities, autism, relationship issues or any other disorder. Don't go on line and take an autism, ADHD, intelligence or relationship "test." Diagnosis is complex, and it involves not just looking for symptoms of a disorder, but also ruling out other disorders that might look just like what your worried about. So avoid these on line "tests" which are nothing more than a collection of symptoms. You need to see a licensed or registered professional for that. You can obtain a referral from the British Columbia Psychological Association for a psychologist near you to help you with these matters, or if you are in another province or state contact their psychological association.

My web page lists a number of resources you can make use of yourself in dealing with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) as well as other learning and social disorders. Please visit it at www.adhdhelp.ca or one of my other sites at either Psychology Today, AAMFT, PSYRIS or my professional site.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) assessment and treatment services are offered for individuals, couples, families, children and adolescents in the Burnaby, Vancouver, Coquitlam, Port Moody, New Westminster and Maple Ridge areas of the lower mainland. This includes neuro-developmental assessments, psycho-education and cognitive behaviour therapy. I also provide diagnostic assessments for autism and Asperger's Disorder in my Burnaby office.

Dr. Jim Roche
Registered Psychologist, British Columbia 01610
778.998-7975
www.relatedminds.com