A positively focused workbook that provides opportunities for bullied children to process the harassment they endure.
Experienced elementary school teacher Landes suggests that changing a child’s reaction to bullying may help them turn lemons into lemonade.
In this sequential set of daily exercises for the bullied, the author reassures children that “there are no wrong answers” and “you have the brains, heart, courage and power to make your way; you just need to believe it and believe in yourself.” An introduction for parents, meanwhile, advises them on when to assist and when to step back and emphasizes respect for the “child’s point of view.” The bullied child is “in a fragile state,” Landes warns, and “more outings” or “a new hobby” may help avoid a potential pitfall: “Sitting around having a pity party is the cycle I want to break” she explains. Twelve chapters follow, including “What Do You Think Is Wrong About You?,” “What Do You Think Is Right About You?,” “What Can You Do To Honor Yourself?,” and a brief introduction to meditation. Through stories and occasional bromides (“Time heals all wounds, just give it some time”), Landes guides children with practical advice (such as the importance of personal hygiene), self-reflection (“Can you think of a time when you felt like you weren’t being yourself?”), and a little up-by-one’s-bootstraps tough love (“there’s somebody out there who is better at these things than you are”). The book’s sentiments aren’t earth-shattering, and with its emphasis on building confidence and resiliency, there may also be some discomfort: “People tell me I am special because…,” for example, may result in a disheartening blank from those in extreme situations. However, the underlying message (“You are important and you matter”) is consistent, upbeat, and child-centered.
A positively focused workbook that provides opportunities for bullied children to process the harassment they endure.Pub Date: March 30, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5043-2623-0
Page Count: 128
Publisher: BalboaPress
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should...
Greene (The 33 Strategies of War, 2007, etc.) believes that genius can be learned if we pay attention and reject social conformity.
The author suggests that our emergence as a species with stereoscopic, frontal vision and sophisticated hand-eye coordination gave us an advantage over earlier humans and primates because it allowed us to contemplate a situation and ponder alternatives for action. This, along with the advantages conferred by mirror neurons, which allow us to intuit what others may be thinking, contributed to our ability to learn, pass on inventions to future generations and improve our problem-solving ability. Throughout most of human history, we were hunter-gatherers, and our brains are engineered accordingly. The author has a jaundiced view of our modern technological society, which, he writes, encourages quick, rash judgments. We fail to spend the time needed to develop thorough mastery of a subject. Greene writes that every human is “born unique,” with specific potential that we can develop if we listen to our inner voice. He offers many interesting but tendentious examples to illustrate his theory, including Einstein, Darwin, Mozart and Temple Grandin. In the case of Darwin, Greene ignores the formative intellectual influences that shaped his thought, including the discovery of geological evolution with which he was familiar before his famous voyage. The author uses Grandin's struggle to overcome autistic social handicaps as a model for the necessity for everyone to create a deceptive social mask.
Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should beware of the author's quirky, sometimes misleading brush-stroke characterizations.Pub Date: Nov. 13, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-670-02496-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Perhaps not magic but appealing nonetheless.
Want to get ahead in business? Consult a dictionary.
By Wharton School professor Berger’s account, much of the art of persuasion lies in the art of choosing the right word. Want to jump ahead of others waiting in line to use a photocopy machine, even if they’re grizzled New Yorkers? Throw a because into the equation (“Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine, because I’m in a rush?”), and you’re likely to get your way. Want someone to do your copying for you? Then change your verbs to nouns: not “Can you help me?” but “Can you be a helper?” As Berger notes, there’s a subtle psychological shift at play when a person becomes not a mere instrument in helping but instead acquires an identity as a helper. It’s the little things, one supposes, and the author offers some interesting strategies that eager readers will want to try out. Instead of alienating a listener with the omniscient should, as in “You should do this,” try could instead: “Well, you could…” induces all concerned “to recognize that there might be other possibilities.” Berger’s counsel that one should use abstractions contradicts his admonition to use concrete language, and it doesn’t help matters to say that each is appropriate to a particular situation, while grammarians will wince at his suggestion that a nerve-calming exercise to “try talking to yourself in the third person (‘You can do it!’)” in fact invokes the second person. Still, there are plenty of useful insights, particularly for students of advertising and public speaking. It’s intriguing to note that appeals to God are less effective in securing a loan than a simple affirmative such as “I pay all bills…on time”), and it’s helpful to keep in mind that “the right words used at the right time can have immense power.”
Perhaps not magic but appealing nonetheless.Pub Date: March 7, 2023
ISBN: 9780063204935
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harper Business
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2023
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
