Off Road Parenting: Practical Solutions for Difficult Behavior

Discusses ways parents can improve their children's behavior through such techniques as positive reinforcement and teaching cooperation, in a work with an accompanying DVD that includes a variety of scenarios and solutions.

Grade 11 Up--Written by two psychologists and a parent, the book and DVD cover ways adults can improve children's behavior by teaching cooperation, tracking their actions, using positive reinforcement, writing contracts and enforcing limits such as house rules, time outs, or extra chores. The book provides an overview of each topic and gives roadmaps to follow when watching the DVD. Viewers have the option of pursuing different tracks as they watch each chapter. By choosing the child's appropriate age level (under 7, 7-12, or 12 and above), parents can see simulations of real-life scenes enacted by families embroiled in conflict at each stage of a child's development. In many cases, adults can decide whether they want to see the problem resolved immediately (harmony) or watch the child continue to misbehave (misery) in order to learn additional techniques to handle defiance. It is also possible to return to the main menu to investigate other conclusions or to view the same topic for another age group. Between sections, the narrator, Dr. Rick Delaney, summarizes the material and explains why the methods work. By offering a variety of scenarios and solutions, the DVD provides alternatives for dealing with difficulties common to children from toddler to teen years. Although the DVD features diverse children as well as blended and foster families, it would have been more effective had it not reinforced gender stereotypes. Nevertheless, this unusual format and the opportunity to select several probable courses of action make it an effective and interactive way to learn parenting skills.--Laurie Edwards, Susquehanna Art Museum, Harrisburg, PA
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