Growing a Girl: Seven Strategies for Raising a Strong, Spirited Daughter

“Mackoff’s strategies for enhancing girls’ self-esteem and creating equal opportunity are clear, practical, and most important, achievable.”—Peggy Orenstein, author of School Girls: Young Women, Self-Esteem, and the Confidence Gap
 
“IS THAT YOUR DAUGHTER? ISN’T SHE PRETTY?”
 
Like parents of girls everywhere, psychologist Barbara Mackoff often heard her young daughter Hannah dismissed with those words. So often that she started to reply: “And she’s smart too.” Hoping to counter the culture that she feared would stereotype her daughter and diminish her confidence, Dr. Mackoff spent three years searching for strategies to nurture Hannah’s growing sense of self. The result is Growing a Girl.
 
Offering hundreds of specific suggestions and tools for fostering a daughter’s independence and individuality, Growing a Girl encourages parents to act now by exploring seven practical paths. Based on clinical research and Dr. Mackoff’s highly acclaimed Growing a Girl workshop, this extraordinary book offers parents the skills to shatter stereotypes that can stunt a daughter’s growth while giving her the tools to nourish her strength, spirit, and capacity to care.
 
YOU WILL DISCOVER:
• How gender stereotyping starts at birth—and how you can prevent it
• Why she can wear a velvet dress to the ballet and still climb to the treetops
• What to do about Barbie dolls and traditional fairy tales—without spoiling your daughter’s fun
• How to discover and honor her feelings
• How to counteract our culture’s emphasis on physical beauty
• How to bring home heroines—in books, magazines, movies, and in her community
• How to recognize and strengthen your daughter’s learning style—and build on her natural interesting science and math
• And more.

It's no news that many self-assured, spirited girls lose their exuberance and confidence during adolescence. Mackoff, a family therapist, hopes to counteract this effect by arming parents with the means to help younger girls (preschool through age 12) develop and maintain confidence as they grow. The author?who conducts "Growing a Girl" parenting workshops?claims that the "biggest difference between girls and boys is how we treat them." Readers need not necessarily agree with that sweeping statement in order to appreciate Mackoff's sound specific advice on providing girls with positive female role models, encouraging girls in science and math and nurturing competence and self-reliance. Mackoff discusses why team sports are beneficial for girls, why parents should praise girls for accomplishments rather than beauty, how to keep girls safe without instilling fear and other pertinent topics. Key ideas are boxed at chapter endings, and non-sexist reading and software suggestions for girls are included. The text is softened with personal anecdotes about Mackoff and her daughter, though some of her own family rules may seem restrictive or petty (no Barbies, scratchy lace or bow headbands for her baby Hannah). Still, this well-researched book?Mackoff cites studies and statistics throughout?will make parents think twice about the messages their daughters are receiving from home as well as from their communities.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.