Test Your Child: How to Discover and Enhance Your Child's True Potential

This book guides new parents though all the stages and aspects of a child's development, plus gives great ideas of how to help the child through each stage. From games to play to helpful toys. It is a great guide

Once again I was not let down by this book, one of Stoppard's latest. From cover to cover this book is full of precious advice that can help you become an enthusiastic parent. The book outlines each phase of your child's development and provides examples of games that you can play to refine his/her natural intelligence. Like all of Stoppard's books, the book's layout is very appealing and simple to follow. What I like in particular are the pages dedicated to each stage of your child's development. She covers each milestone in every aspect from mental development to bladder control. For example, I never knew that potty training was such an incredible act of mental and physical maturity! Even for this she explains all the whys and hows. Once you finish the book, you will understand what it means to "teach" your child, which does not mean just reading,writing and arithmetic. My only complaint: The book is just a wee bit too short. Then again, maybe that means I was just enjoying it too much.

Some people I have met online say there is really no need for parents to read up on childcare...but I disagree. From the moment a child is born, they are learning. As a parent, you become their teacher, playmate and counselor. From the very start you need...information...information...and more...information. This is a practical guide to help parents of babies and young children understand and develop their child's unique abilities. Dr. Stopppard explains how children achieve each milestone and includes a stage-by-stage guide for parents. You will find ideas for games, activities and play that will help parents to be their child's first teacher. The homemade fun section looked especially fun with clay, soap bubbles, modeling dough, finger pain, pasta jewelry, vegetable printers, rainy day beach , edible finger pain for babies, baby play dough and more. The seven sections include: Parent as Teacher (Skills that encourage learning, rearing helpful children, using discipline positively, communicating successfully with your child) The Normal Course of Development (Understanding the stages, charting development, mental development, locomotion, sociability, personality, speech) Factors Affecting Development (health, happiness, parental attitudes, gender, personality, empathy, vulnerability, stress), Simple Tests (taste, hearing, verbal skills, intelligence, observation, perception, vision) Tools for Learning (providing a stimulating environment, choosing toys, using household items to make toys, home-made fun, the computer, television and video, books and reading, toys for various ages up to 7 years) The Special Child (The gifted child, under-achieving child, autistic child, child who stutters, child with learning disorder, sight-impaired child, physically disabled child) Your Child and School (Choosing a nursery, starting Primary School, The changing relationship between you and your child) The special chapter on Locomotion is very interesting. You can see what a child should be doing by a certain age and what you can do to help. Some of these ideas will come naturally to parents, but others were new ideas I had not yet seen. The handy index makes this book easy to use and you can look up age groups very easily. I love the colorful illustrations and easy-to-find age groups. Once you read the toy section...you will be heading off to the toy store! How did parents survive without this guide? It is an exhaustive study of what a child should be learning and when. This is a must for new parents and is really a gift for a child to give them a great start in life. ~The Rebecca Review