I’m chatting on the phone with my friend about giving Chanukah gifts to our kids’ teachers (a topic for a different article!), when she suddenly stops me and says, “Oh, my parenting teleconference class is starting soon. Let me call you back.”

Parenting teleconference class? I think to myself. Now doesn’t that sound official! And her oldest child is just six years old!

Intrigued, I decide to ask my friend more about this class when I speak to her later. To my surprise, she begins gushing its praises, telling me how the class is totally changing her way of viewing her children’s misbehaviors; how it’s giving her so many practical tools to use when dealing with her little ones; how it’s the best thing in the world; and how every parent on Planet Earth should be taking this course. Well, she doesn’t exactly say that last line—but the message comes through loud and clear!

When I hang up with her, you’d better believe how gung-ho I am about signing up for this “parenting teleconference class” myself!

What is it about parenting our children these days that makes so many of us run to the nearest parenting class available, teleconference or otherwise, without stopping to collect $200 first (though, in the process, we will actually find ourselves paying that much, or even more!)? Are our parenting skills so lacking in all of us that we can’t do our job without the help of professionals?

The truth is, as any parenting expert will tell you, raising kids these days is a whole lot more challenging than it ever was. Between the media and secular influences and it being the “instant gratification” generation, raising children b’derech haTorah in our day and age is up against a lot of struggles and opposition.

Which is why so many parents and educators are turning to professionals for help with raising their children. And which is why parenting classes and books have recently become so popular.

But, as my friend will rush to assure you, not all parenting classes are created equal…and neither are all parenting books.

50 Pathways to Parenting Wisdom is a parenting book in its own class. Written by Shira Frank, LCSW, a social worker with over thirty years of experience, who has been working in private practice for over twenty years and whose areas of specialization include family therapy and parent training, this book offers fifty techniques, all practical and easy to implement, to raising children in today’s world. From teaching children coping mechanisms, to dealing with specific behavioral challenges, to working with teenage issues and unique family situations (such as divorce and step-families), the advice in this book is broad-ranging as it is relevant to all parents of the 21^st century. Boasting haskamos from Rav Shmuel Kamenetsky shlit”a, Rabbi Dr. Abraham J. Twerski, and Dr. David Pelcovitz, as well as an Introduction by Rebbetzin Tziporah Heller, 50 Pathways to Parenting Wisdom is a book that you, as a parent, will want to consult with over and over again on  your child-rearing journey.

May all parents be blessed with the wisdom to know how best to educate each of their children, and may we all have much Yiddishe nachas from our families!

Click here to purchase online.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 5th, 2013 at 2:25 pm and is filed under General, New Books. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.