Optimistic Parenting

Happier lives. Less stress. Family harmony. That's what all parents of children with challenging behavior want. Learn how to get there with this groundbreaking guide to confident, skillful, and positive parenting. A book you'll want to share with every family you know, Optimistic Parenting helps moms, dads, and other caregivers develop more positive thoughts and perceptions--a key ingredient of successful parenting and effective behavior management. One of the most highly regarded experts on challenging behavior--and a parent himself--Dr. V. Mark Durand delivers both philosophical hope and practical help to parents of children with a wide range of challenges. With keen insight, gentle humor, and practical tools and strategies, Durand guides parents step by step through the process of pinpointing the "why" behind challenging behavior tuning in to their own thoughts, emotions, and self-talk understanding how their thoughts affect their interactions with their child interrupting negative thoughts and replacing them with positive, productive ones achieving a healthy balance between taking care of their own needs and their child's needs using effective emergency strategies when quick behavior intervention is needed implementing long-term strategies for lasting behavior improvements weaving functional communication training into everyday routines and interactions addressing the most common problem areas, such as sleep and transitions increasing mindfulness and parenting "in the moment" Engaging stories from the author's extensive experience illustrate how parents and other caregivers can develop more effective behavior management techniques. And practical tools and exercises, developed and tested during Durand's decades of work with thousands of parents, help families on their own journey to better parenting and happier lives. A lifeline for overwhelmed parents--and a great source of insight for the professionals who work with them--this highly motivating guidebook will help families reduce children's challenging behaviors and approach the future with optimism and confidence.

A revolution in working with difficult students began during the 1980s, with a dramatic shift away from dependence on simply punishing bad behavior to reinforcing desired, positive behaviors of children in the classroom. With its foundation in applied behavior analysis (ABA), positive behavior support (PBS) is a social ecology approach that continues to play an increasingly integral role in public education as well as mental health and social services nationwide. The Handbook of Positive Behavior Support gathers into one concise volume the many elements of this burgeoning field and organizes them into a powerful, dynamic knowledge base – theory, research, and applications. Within its chapters, leading experts, including the primary developers and researchers of PBS: (1) Review the origins, history, and ethical foundations of positive behavior support. (2) Report on applications of PBS in early childhood and family contexts, from Head Start to foster care to mental health settings to autism treatment programs. (3) Examine school-based PBS used to benefit all students regardless of ability or conduct. (4) Relate schoolwide PBS to wraparound mental health services and the RTI (response to intervention) movement. (5) Provide data and discussion on a variety of topics salient to PBS, including parenting issues, personnel training, high school use, poorly functioning schools, and more. This volume is an essential resource for school-based practitioners as well as clinicians and researchers in clinical child, school, and educational psychology.

New York Times bestselling author Martin E. P. Seligman's The Optimistic Child is "the first major work to provide an effective program for preventing depression in childhood — and probably later in life" (Aaron T. Beck, author of Love is Never Enough). The epidemic of depression in America strikes 30% of all children. Now Martin E. P. Seligman, the bestselling author of Learned Optimism, and his colleagues offer parents and educators a program clinically proven to cut that risk in half. With this startling research, parents can teach children to apply optimism skills that can curb depression, boost school performance, and improve physical health. These skills provide children with the resilience they need to approach the teenage years and adulthood with confidence. For more than thirty years the self-esteem movement has infiltrated American homes and classrooms with the credo that supplying positive feedback, regardless of the quality of performance, will make children feel better about themselves. But in this era of raising our children to feel good, the hard truth is that they have never been more depressed. As Dr. Seligman writes in this provocative new book, "Teaching optimism is more than, I realized, than just correcting pessimism...It is the creation of a positive strength, a sunny but solid future-mindedness that can be deployed throughout life — not only to fight depression and come back from failure, but also to be the foundation of success and vitality."

What do we wish most for our children? Next to being healthy, we want them to be happy, of course! Fortunately, a wide array of scientific studies show that happiness is a learned behavior, a muscle we can help our children build and maintain. Drawing on what psychology, sociology, and neuroscience have proven about confidence, gratefulness, and optimism, and using her own chaotic and often hilarious real-world adventures as a mom to demonstrate do’s and don’ts in action, Christine Carter, Ph.D, executive director of UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, boils the process down to 10 simple happiness-inducing steps. With great wit, wisdom, and compassion, Carter covers the day-to-day pressure points of parenting—how best to discipline, get kids to school and activities on time, and get dinner on the table—as well as the more elusive issues of helping children build healthy friendships and develop emotional intelligence. In these 10 key steps, she helps you interact confidently and consistently with your kids to foster the skills, habits, and mindsets that will set the stage for positive emotions now and into their adolescence and beyond. Inside you will discover • the best way avoid raising a brat—changing bad habits into good ones • tips on how to change your kids’ attitude into gratitude • the trap of trying to be perfect—and how to stay clear of its pitfalls • the right way to praise kids—and why too much of the wrong kind can be just as bad as not enough • the spirit of kindness—how to raise kind, compassionate, and loving children • strategies for inspiring kids to do boring (but necessary) tasks—and become more self-motivated in the process Complete with a series of “try this” tips, secrets, and strategies, Raising Happiness is a one-of-a-kind resource that will help you instill joy in your kids—and, in the process, become more joyful yourself.

Sometimes in our childhood, we fantasize about our future parenting skills and how we will be the ultimate mom or dad. These grand visions rarely survive the first few months of our own journey as parents-once that specter of self-will first manifests in our new bundle of joy. We quickly learn that while parenting is infinitely rewarding and a wonderful blessing, it is also a difficult, sometimes confusing, often thankless responsibility. We find ourselves wishing for a clear, simple, and preferably, illustrated instruction manual. In Purposeful and Persistent Parenting, John and Cindy Raquet seek to share, through encouraging examples of their journey toward God-honoring parenthood, the lessons they learned in raising their eight children. With personal stories of triumph and failure, goal-setting (and resetting), many practical tips, and a little blue tape, they hope that this work will be a valuable companion on your own adventure in parenting and instrumental in helping you to truly enjoy the work of raising your children.

This parenting guide to ODD offers expert information on your child's condition, provides insight and empathy to what they are going through, and equips and empowers you to make practical changes in your parenting approaches. It provides an overview of tried-and-tested techniques from a mother of a child with ODD to support you in response to typical questions you may have: - "Why is my child acting this way?" - "What does this say about me?" - Why doesn't my child respond to punishment or reward?" - "What am I supposed to do next?" Overall this book teaches you how to avoid common mistakes in responding to ODD, the crossover with similar diagnoses such as ADHD, how to distinguish the disorders and how to improve your own resilience and confidence.

This book provides a comprehensive outline of the major parent training programs for parents of children with intellectual or developmental disabilities (IDD), including Autism Spectrum Disorder. Parents or primary caregivers spend the most time with a child, and training them in behaviour management and intervention strategies is critical to improving a child's behaviour, to helping them to learn new skills, and to reduce parental stress. Authored by eminent specialists in the field and written for researchers and clinicians supporting or treating families, each chapter focuses on one of the key evidence-based parent training programs - from Incredible Years® and Positive Family Intervention through to Pivotal Response Treatment and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. Each chapter provides a breakdown that features an introduction to the model, evidence for the model, a full description of the model, a discussion of implementation and dissemination efforts, and concluding comments. Grounded in research, this definitive overview provides the evidence and guidance required for anyone considering investing in or running a parenting program.

Ensure that your kids (and you) thrive during distance learning when school is at home! To say the pandemic of 2020 threw parents and educators a curveball would be an understatement. Suddenly, we were charged not only with meeting our children’s emotional and social needs, but also helping them fulfill their academic tasks outside of the school and classroom. Feelings of stress, anxiety, and guilt were inevitable. While you’re recreating the structure and routine of school and attending to students’ mental health, the Good Parenting Strategies (GPS) offered in this essential guide will help you help your children succeed while learning at home. Ben Springer, an expert educator and school psychologist, provides you with real-life scenarios and ready-to-use tools rooted in positive psychology that show you how to Manage stress and anxiety at home Focus on the key ingredients to learning (both distance and face-to-face) Prevent problem behaviors before they occur Build resilience and find happiness Also included are more than 25 charts and tools that are accessible online for ease of printing. Full of humor, insights, and guidance fit for parents and teachers alike, this book equips you to confidently face challenging student behaviors, emotions, and schoolwork both now and in the future—and, perhaps most importantly, to begin to heal.