Happy Reading Days

I'm on a reading tear recently resulting in a few books I'd like to recommend. Somehow I don't seem to come across bad/useless books anymore. Maybe this is because I get such high quality recommendations from ya'll or perhaps my tolerance for shlock is so low the mediocre books never make it out of the library. This month I've hit 2 inspiring non-fiction books and a set of entertaining junior novels.

From the land of inspiring:

The New Global Student by Maya Frost. From another UPS alum, this book is all about why and how to take or send your child abroad. Super inspiring for me. It is the ideas behind books like this that steered us towards homeschooling in the first place. The specifics of how we can experience the world with our children at many ages has me in an international frenzy.

The Explosive Child by Ross Greene. In desperate search for relief to some of the conflict going on around here, I picked this one out of a rather large pile of "behavior" books at Barnes & Noble. I've just started implementing the ideas from the book and we've already seen a reduction in screaming/tantrums or at least their duration. We'll see if the strategies hold for the long term, but I have high hopes.

Someone asked why I chose this book over the many others out there on the subject. 1. it deals directly with the brain and its pathways - there is actually some scientific basis for the theories behind this book 2. it treats the children (and parents) with a great deal of compassion and respect. The solutions have to do with understanding our children and coaching them to grow the missing pathways rather than manage, rewarding or punishing (which I know from experience just do not work with my child) 3. at a glance, I recognized that mastering the strategies recommended by this book would help me be more the parent I want to be, whether I have "explosive" children or not.

From fun land:

Enchanted Forest Chronicles by Patricia Wrede. This is a series of 4 books full of stereotype breaking princesses, witches and dragons. With lots of action and clever conversations, Theo and I have been competing for turns at them as each title rolls in from the library.

I've got a new stack from the library, hopefully something that will inspire me to share again, soon. In the meantime, what are you reading? Anything I should add to my list of must check-outs?