Infant-and-Toddler-Development Books

we have this book, along with 'your 2 year old' and 'your 3 year old', and love it! we have also bought this as a gift for other parents-- great book! great advice! great gift! a must-read for all parents! it really helps you understand where your child is, where they should be, and where they are headed at this special and challenging time in his/her life.

I was SO disappointed in this book (I would have given negative stars if I could, it is so bad). While the information was barely decent, they just slapped a new cover on it to make it look like a newer edition (which I found very deceiving, so shame on me for not checking the dates!). It was hard to read (some of the language was extremely awkward and at times doesn't even have the same meanings as today).

It was also not good at covering the whole year from 1 to 2. The authors generalized way to much and lumped everything into what an 18-month old would do! I bought this book to see how my child would develop through the ENTIRE year, not see what he should be doing at only 18 months!

The book is not well organized, clumsy, out-of-date for lots of important information, and even the typed font was old-fashioned & hard to read. I don't even know where the subtitle came from (fun-loving & fussy) as that wasn't covered either.

THIS BOOK IS VERY OUT OF DATE to say the least! Save your money & don't buy this series. I recommend the "Positive Disipline" series or even the "What to Expect" series instead. They both do a MUCH better job covering a child's development, and are easy & even fun to read!

I recommend these books (Your ONE Year Old, Your TWO Year Old, Your THREE Year Old, Your FOUR Year Old, Your FIVE Year Old, Your SIX Year Old, Your SEVEN Year Old, Your EIGHT Year Old, Your NINE Year Old, Your TEN-to-FOURTEEN Year Old. These books were writtten by Louise Bates Ames, PhD, Fances L. Ilg, MD and Sidney M. Baker MD of the Gesell Institute of Human Development. They are NOT a "how to" book for parents -- but rather provide a perspective of life from the child's various ages. I found the books to be of such value that I purchase the entire series for new parents. Somehow I forgot to purchase these books for my niece when she started her family. She expressed some concerns about her seven year old son's behavior (that I knew from experience to be that typical of seven year olds). I purchased the books from the series that will help my niece from here on. She LOVES them! I have a feeling she will use them and pass them along to other parents. My original set are part of my permanent library. I highly recommend these books for your permanent library as well!

Readable, mostly sensible, but with some attitudes that make me cringe.

A parent writes that she's afraid her son will become a homosexual because he seeks comfort from dad all the time. Does anybody really think that anymore? And the answer, which is that the son will "probably" turn out "normal" is both dated and biased. Then there's the cigarette thing. And a mother whose friends think a baby gate is horrid. Just old, old stuff.

But the four stars are for the sensible and compassionate approach to understanding that your baby is an individual, is experimenting with how to act, and needs your help and loving care. There's a lot of good material in here; be judicious and you'll find it's worth reading.

This book definitely needs updating. Though it has some good information, it's mostly intuitive and I found quite a bit of bad advice. The "Stories from Real Life" are clearly out of date as one references "sleeping medicine" for a baby prescribed from a doctor and many more reference spanking and slapping an 18 month old's hands. This book was not for me!

I saw this book at a library display and decided to read it. What a refreshing and unique way of looking at having a baby, especially a daughter. I was able to relate to so many of the stories and laugh at the creativity of the author. Wonderful book.

Come on Jessica from Michigan, lighten up! You didn't "get" this book at all, did you even read it? She's not actually charging her daughter anything, just trying to figure out what it really costs financially, and even more so the huge life changes involved in having a child. And her eventual point is that we ALL owe each other... in ways that you can't ever really count, and it doesn't matter because you can't count what you get in return either. I certainly owe my mother more than I could ever pay her, for the financial, physical, and emotional sacrifices she's made. I expect that it will be the same way when I have a daughter... in fact, my having a daughter is one way of trying to repay my mother. That's just how it goes. This book made me think, more than anything else I've read, about what my mother's done for me, and the changes that I'll go through when my baby is born. I laughed, I cried, and I have a whole new appreciation for my mom, and for what I'm getting ready to do. I plan to buy it for the next friend who gets pregnant!

First of all, this woman has "unprotected sex for several weeks" and now she has the nerve to bill her first born for all the expenses. If she made the choice to to put herself in that situation then she should have been responsible for the outcome. Her daughter Callie was in no way indebted to her mother for her mother's actions. This book was dreadful and I can't imagine any mother indebting her own unborn child.
Take responsibility for your own actions, your child owes you nothing.

So I guess Callie will be billing her mother for all Callie's psychologist appointments when she is older.

I loved this book. I laughed so much and insisted on reading passages to my mom and/or husband throughout the book. As a first time mom of a baby girl, it was so funny to hear her take on the first year.

It's very much in the same comic vein as the "girlfriend's guides" books. Raising a child is serious business, but you need to have a sense of humor!

I sympathize with her desire a) to take back some control over the tumultuous event of having a child and b) reclaim and reintegrate your "old" life into this new one. I loved reading the financial "categories" for her expenses.

I highly recommend the book and will add it to my list of baby shower gift books!

Loved it. I wish I had it when my daughter was born. Betsy writes about so many of the ups and downs of the first year. I will be purchasing it for all girlfriends when their first children are born!

I recommend this to all new parents. It really does help to explain why they're doing what they're doing. It makes it much easier to have patients when you understand a little better about what's going on it their heads and bodies. I love this book.

Remember when you are reading this that it is 20 yrs + old and lots of the information has changed drastically since. I found some of the information useful, but please take it all with a grain of salt. For example, the author continually recommends putting baby on his stomach to sleep, refers to mom as the primary caretaker and writes about what happens when dad gets home from work and mom has to cook dinner, etc. Things have changed, so buy another more recent book in addition to double-check your facts.

THIS WAS A GIFT FOR A WOMAN HAVING HER FIRST BABY.
SHE ADSOLUTELY LOVRD IT AND THOUGHT IT SO ORIGINAL AND SOMETHING SHE REALLY APPRECIATED AHD COULD USE

I purchased this book for my daughter who is a new mother. I had received a copy of the original version as a gift when my son was born 33 years ago. Even though it has been updated, the book is outdated. It is still interesting, especially to those of us from the 'old school,' though with so many changes in pediatricians' recommendations (back vs. stomach, delaying feeding whole foods, etc.), the book is not appreciated by new mothers - they are afraid to stray even a little bit from their pediatrician's advice. I can only wonder how we were able to raise such healthy and happy children! :)

Loved this book when I had my first child 28 years ago. This has been my favorite baby shower gift ever since. And the new mothers all love the gift.

I am using this book for the second time around. It's still full of fabulous information. As with anything you have to take it all with a grain of salt. I use this book reguarly to determine if I should take a toddler into the ER on the weekend or if it can wait until Monday.

I wasn't totally impressed with this book. It definately has some good points and advice and there is information to be learned, I just thought it was average in the format.

I had to buy this book because The Mother of All Pregnancy books was so helpful. I found the book useful already with my 14 month old and find that I need to reference it whenever new toddler behaviors decide to surface.

I had liked The Mother of All Pregnancy Books and decided to try this one. But I don't find it nearly as complete or helpful as "What to Expect the Toddler Years". I haven't read it cover to cover, but so far I find that the sections don't delve deeply enough into topics or offer unique suggestions/advice.

How can you not like a book with this title? It is a huge book with tons of information. I find it a lot more helpful and user friendly than the what to expect series....but that's just my opinion...Great information - I keep it out for ideas, suggestions and to check up on my toddlers progress.

This is a nice relaxing book that change my perspective of newborns. If you thought newborns aren't capable of much other than sleep, eat, cry and gaze pointlessly you might want to reconsider your thinking. Newborns are capable of a lot more. The book has lovely pictures and if you are expecting a baby the knowledge in this book will surely enhance your bonding with your baby in the hours after birth and will help you understand some very simple cues your newborn will communicate to you.

This book is brief and simply written with wonderful photos. It discusses the characteristics of infants only in the first days of life; it doesn't cover how, say, a 1 month old is different from an infant. The pictures are wonderful and informative. For a more thorough discussion without the excellent photos, I recommend What's Going on in There? : How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life by Lise Eliot

What's Going on in There? : How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life

The photos in this book are great, however, I wish they weren't all in black and white. Great information and research done on newborns. Worth purchasing.

I'm a pediatrician, and I recommend this book, not only to new parents, but also to health care professionals. This fascinating work is basically an annotated illustrated bibliography to the research in this field. Any professional who wants to know more can take this work as a wonderful, paradigm-shifting and enlightening starting point, and follow the cited works to further work.
I do a lot of teaching, and I recommend this book to doctors, nurses, midwives, doulas, lactation consultants, and to medical, midwifery, and nursing students, and particularly to residents and fellows in pediatrics, OB and family practice--and of course, to new parents. A huge body of research over the past several decades has demonstrated a grand repertoire of innate hardwired newborn capabilities, including a wonderful capability for very young babies to interact with, and respond to, their parents beginning the first hour of life. My reasons for recommending this updated work begin with all the reasons that the parents who have reviewed this book here have already so eloquently stated. Beyond that, let me add: Marshall Klaus is a neonatologist from UCSF, co-editor and author of Klaus and Fanaroff, a solid neonatology textbook, and a careful and very observant researcher and scholar. Phyllis Klaus is a brilliant and thoughtful psychotherapist. They are an amazing team. The book is beautifully illustrated and fully referenced. Much of the work cited are the classic, seminal studies in the field. It should be required introductory reading for every pediatric resident and neonatology fellow on the planet.

This was by far the best book I've read during pregnancy. It's a fast and interesting read with great information and research that both my husband and I found equally exciting and valuable. I can't stop telling people about it. It's the only book I've read that doesn't preach about the wrong and right way to do things, but offers research to show how intelligent and aware newborns are. It is much less about the parents and much more about the babies. I would highly recommend this to anyone expecting a new baby in their family.

I keep both Newborn Head to Toe and Toddler Head to Toe on my nightstand to refer to questions I have about my 2yr old and 10mos. old. This book discusses a lot of common problems that your kids may have in a very matter of fact, non-alarmist, informative way. I have some of the other books that people have discussed in earlier reviews but, they are so bulky and dense, it takes a while to find the answer you need. This one is great for a quick reference and has been helpful for when I should call the Dr. and what questions to ask. Absolutely indispensible!

I found this to be a great compliment to my list of reliable resources. If my kids aren't bleeding or have a raging fever, I consult this book before I call the doctor's office with minor concerns. It has helped me get "smart" on infant conditions and what I can do about them. But although I like this book I woulld NEVER substitite it for a call to the doctor if I had doubts or questions.

Dr. Natterson overviews all sorts of concerns that new parents have about their babies, in an informed and comforting way. Her attitude on breastfeeding is encouraging and realistic. She certainly reccomends breastfeeding in all situations where it is possible, but supports those mothers for whom it is not feasible. Too often these women are made to feel like failures and are unable to discuss these problems with their pediatrician. Better to provide informed advice than pressure.

Although a small part of the book, her sections on breastfeeding are misleading and inaccurate at best. You can tell that she is strugling to make it sound like she thinks the breast is best, but is really not convinced of it herself. She makes many suggestions that can be actually detrimental to the establishment of a breastfeeding relationship, including just about any excuse to supplement with formula and sugar water. She also seriously neglects to state the advantages of breastmilk.

In the section on circumcision, she is also out of date. She suggests that circumcisions are not painful to infants less than 1 month and do not require anesthesia. This has been proven false in several studies. She also understates the risk factors and complications of circumcisions, while overstating the complications of leaving the child intact.

If you are looking for a book to repeat all the same information you have been hearing about babies for the last 20 years, this is your book. If you are looking for an accurate, upto date book on children, look elsewhere.

In a word, this book is simply a TREMENDOUS resource for any parent. Cara Familian Natterson is a very highly regarded pediatrician is the greater los angeles area. Although she trained at Harvard, UCSF and Johns Hopkins, she approaches all subjects in a thoughtful and non-intimidating approach. She is able to use her superior knowledge of pediatrics to provide an informative overview for any parent. All (or almost all) of your questions will be answered by this read. THIS BOOK IS A MUST BUY. If you buy one book to learn about your newborn -THIS SHOULD BE IT!!

This book made our child's first year a real joy. The schedules were invaluable. When our child turned one, my husband and I wished the authors had written a second book for the toddler years. A must for any new parent looking to feel more in-control.

I bought this book while I was pregnant. Until I actually had the baby, this book was my favorite out of all, about twenty books, I've purchased because of simple guidelines, easy to read outline of what to do from changing diapers to putting child to sleep, and the schedule factor from day one to one year old. Life would be so wonderful if everything is by the schedule and a baby can follow it. My mistake was to let my husband read it. My baby is now little over three months old and very calm and alert. Of course, he cries when he's tired or hungry or his diaper is soiled like any other babies. My husband, now a firm believer of this book, gets very upset at my little one when he's off the schedule or cries more than this book implies. I also don't believe you ever need to let your baby cry to sleep and I'm still fighting with my husband about this issue. My baby gets very sweaty and his face turns bright red whenever he cries. I can not let him cry like that even for five minutes. He also changes constantly. He first slept through the night at six weeks and now, he wakes up once or twice at night because his nose is plugged or he didn't have good feeding at night. Sometimes he doesn't feel like eating much like us and might want to eat early the next time. This in turn creates a fight between me and my husband that he thinks I feed him all over the place and disrupting his schedule. I wish I never bought this book to begin with.

This book contains a great deal of commense sense information that repeats what you have probably already read in numerous other baby care books. Some of their advice also directly contradicts advice from our pediatrician. The tone of the book comes across as very "know it all" and I found that frustrating and condescending. Their advice is based on their experience as parents of 3 children and as parents, we all know that we all do things differently. Buy with caution, and follow the advice from your pediatrician first and foremost. Most of the rest of the advice in this book you could get by talking with your friends that have kids.

Excellent book - it covered important brand-new parenting topics and presented many good ideas that are referenced in many other reputable sources but without unnecessary wordiness. The book is small enough to be read in a few hours by other family members and friends.

The title of this book should be
"36 Things that might be good in your baby's first year, and 64 things that might not."

The hard part of reading this book is determining which ones are the good things and which ones are not. There are some that are just not good advice and it makes me wonder about all the other ones.

Also, it is important to know where the authors are coming from. Both authors had twins, and one had three babies within 12 months. That is just not standard, and it causes them to recommend things that are not best for parents of a single baby.

I have read about 10 books during this pregnancy and this one was my least favorite so far.

This book is for parents who regularly yell at, threaten, berate, and lose their temper with their children, and are looking for calmer, more reasonable alternatives. Unfortunately, that was not me, so I did not find much useful info in here. It is not for parents who are looking for firmer and stronger discipline strategies to deal with children who are constantly challenging them.

Also, it is quite a stretch to say this book is for preschoolers AND toddlers. It's really just for preschool age, unless your toddler is highly advanced verbaly.

This book is VERY basic and overall boring. There are better books out there for sure. Try your local library!

I felt this is a good book at helping parents deal with issues they are having with their kids. My issues were my 3 & 4 year old would not listen the first time around and i was always repeating myself. Also they use to go to bed without complaints and now they keep coming out or fighting. This book gave us methods to use, which seem to be working. This book help me see things my kids do that push my buttons, and how to stop this. Now i feel more calm even when my kids are losing it. I don't have that 'i am going crazy' feeling very often. I found myself saying "Stop!" or "Don't!" all the time. Now i am calmer and say things like "Let's make a better choice please." My kids seem to like it better, and have a good idea of the rules and consequences. The book help us with more structure without giving a schedule.

The book is easily readable, a quick read, which I appreciated. And many things were discussed, not necessarily answered for me, but things I am thinking about were answered. The reason I gave it 4 stars instead of 5 is because my situation is different from the author's situation, so some of the material misses the mark (for me).

At the same time I will keep the book for future reference.

I decided to try this method because I had used the Boys Town Common Sense teaching method as a school project. I really liked its "non-bully" approach to dealing with students who were misbehaving. I particularly liked the preventative approaches that reduced the amount of misbehavior in general. Now that I have a toddler, I really wanted to use the same type of approach and had struggled with doing so. I tried other books and methods but found them to be outside my style or ridiculous and difficult to apply. This book is just what it says: "Common-sense" and it WORKS. It is easy to apply and doesn't require a Masters to use. My son has made amazing progress behavior-wise. I highly recommend this book for those who like a simple program for profound results.

Gimme a break! Memorizing is the easiest thing for children to do. Being able to mouth off thousands of information does not make one a better or more intelligent person. Kids need to learn how to analyze, interpret, solve problems, and think critically and creatively. In this age of information explosion, such "encyclopedic knowledge" is less relevant than before. Any information today can easily become obsolete tomorrow. Kids need to learn values, to become human. I bought this book and it almost turned me into a "Mom from hell". I'm glad I changed my mind about it and decided to trust my child and be more relaxed about her development. My goal is for her to become an enthusiastic, lifelong learner - not a computer databank.

Doman's techniques may work to some extent, but his view on what constitutes "knowledge" is rubbish. Like many simpletons, Doman believes trivia is true knowledge. "Bit of intelligence" is his label for a piece of trivia, implying that the human being who has memorized the most trivia has accumulated the most intelligence. If you want your child to be a Jeopardy contestant, read this book immediately. If you want your child to be a thinker, don't waste your time and money. Albert Einstein, one of the greatest thinkers of all time, despised trivia. Do you want your child to be an Einstein or a Trabek?

This book has its pros and cons to be sure. However, the most important aspect of this book was not the individual facts the author encourages you to teach, but the vast potential he shows each and every child to possess. Your child. My child. The neighbor's child. Despite what others have come to believe and thus expect from little children, their potential is vast. And the book tells you how children most easily pick up information.

I found the work in preparing the "Bits of Intelligence" cards to be time consuming and/or expensive, but the outcome is real and the learning process a great deal of fun for my girls ages 4 and 1 1/2. They love spending the short focussed, happy time with their mom. The book encourages you to physically hug and verbally encourage your children before and after each learning period of 30 sec - 2 min. What child wouldn't love a no pressure, mom's happy and hugging me time.

I had just read the book when I decided to teach my then 9 mon old her colors. I applied the basic colors from colored paper to the size poster cards they recommend and "flashed" them to our baby three times a day for a few days and VOILA, she knew her colors. I would ask her to pick up the yellow block or bring mom the blue ball and she would correctly identify the colored item the great majority of the time. The book doesn't talk about using the method to specifically teach colors, but I was honestly a bit skeptical about the reality of their methodology, so I applied it to our lives in our way.

I feel as if their is nothing they can't learn. My goal for this summer is to teach the fifty states. I had started with a few that our relatives live in and immediately my then 3 yr old started picking up info from newscasts and children's books and connecting it to what I had taught her. "Mom they are talking about Massachusetts. Isn't that way up north where Grandma lives." She then went on to remind me of the state bird and tree (which I cannot remember). What was so exciting was that SHE was so excited to be able to learn additionally info. in a meaningful way because she had something to connect it to.

I had difficulty finding three times a day when all three of us were awake, up and in a good mood. Also, sometimes my four year old would just not want to play. We have put the cards away for weeks at a time, esp when sick etc. And it takes some organization. A copier would be of benefit also. But remember, if you can read this book with an open mind and not get bogged down with the multitude of info it talks about teaching your children, then it can be a wonderful tool to use in teaching them whatever you want. Children are happy to learn new things, be it about saints, leaves, food or clouds. Let them learn and have fun too!

5Starts is not enough, when it comes to improving our children, there is not enough stars in heaven to rate this book. I encourage you to not be like "The Mother from Hell" look beyond her comments. It is clear that she ABSOLUTELY did not understand the methodology or the philosophy behind it, as she clearly labels it a memorization exercise. On the service the whole program looks like nothing but memorization. However if you understand the philosophy you understand that it is all about Quality repetitive stimulation, not memorization. The philosophy is simple and we have heard it a million times, The brain is like a muscle the more you exercise (stimulate) it the more it develops. There is one important difference however, the development of the brain is some what inversely proportional to ones age. The youngest mind (Infant mind) responds (develops) the best to stimulation. There is one other major point we need to understand. There is a difference between learning and developing the brain. Developing the brain is the establishment of the neuron connection in the brain in to the different areas of the brain, this is how your increase your IQ. Learning is the activity of studying a subject, and internalizing it, this is how you increase your wisdom/knowledge.

We all understand to become a professional athlete, we need to develop the capability of the muscles to perform the work and we need to learn the skill to perform the work. We also understand there is no way to separate the two different development areas. That is as a beginner to any sport you have to and do develop both the skill and the ability at the same time as you participate. The whole point Glenn and Janet Doman are making is one that any good coach understands, the most effective way to increase the rate of development and potential of ability is to engage in quality repetitive stimulation.

My degree is in Education, and I am a student of life and how we, and why we learn, Glenn and Janet have written several books that clearly explain why and how to increase your child's potential. The philosophy is sound and the methods are well proven. There is but one thing to consider, are you willing to develop children that are smarter then your self and give them a real chance to excel. If so read the books, understand the philosophy and consistently employee the methods. Your children will be greatly rewarded!!

I wanted to pipe in that we have used this and the other Doman books with our 3 children with wonderful success. This book is so easy to follow, and will provide you with many hours of joyful interaction with your child. We started the BITS with my son at 8 months and at 6yrs old he is now doing 5th grade work with ease.

After finishing this book I felt sadly indifferent towards it. I didn't feel like I lost my time or money with this book but I didn't feel like I added any great activities to my personal activity database either. Would I recommend it? I guess not. If no activity sticks out in my mind after a fresh reading, I guess it means I won't refer back to it very often and neither will you possibly.

When our baby was born I was of the mind set that I didn't want to rely on everyone else for child raising ideas. This put me in a difficult position because I've never been around babies before. So, I put away my pride but kept searching for ideas on my own too. That's how I found this book. Lansky has included a lot of great ideas for helping you interact with your baby in creative ways. I agree that it is not perfect (and am not sure that any book really is), but this can be easily overlooked due to the other very redeeming qualities.

So I'm flipping through the book and thinking "Did I actually pay money for this?". So many of the activities were things that I (and many other parents) are already doing with our babies. Like playing with rattles, talking to your baby while looking in the mirror, kicking at toys, pointing to objects and saying the sounds they make, peek-a-boo, waving bye-bye... you get the idea. But the moment I knew I wanted to get my refund was when in the 0-3 months section, the author suggested going to the hardware store to buy a blank set of keys to put on a strong ring to "make great noise and be cool teethers". The thought of my infant's delicate gums knawing away at the sharp edges of metal keys--YIKES!!

I originally had this book on loan from the library when my baby was 7 weeks- about the time you start to wonder how you are supposed to fill the hours with your curious little bundle. Anyway, after having used the book so much I went ahead and purchased a copy. Love how it's a small book and the ideas (games/rhymes, etc) are sectioned out by age. Some of the rhymes or activities seem a little odd and ancient, and I wonder about their origin, but I've used enough of the material to make it a worthwhile and recommended purchase for new parents.

It's a good little book that can definitely help people who had no prior experience in baby handling. As a first time parent, I really appreciate the help!

Vicky Lansky offers a book that is organized by appropriateness for each quarter of baby's first year, and includes wide variety of play activities. Each sector of the book (0-3 mo., 3-6 mo., etc.) is preceded by the summary of developmental milestones.

However, in comparison to Baby Play (Gymboree) by Wendy S., Dr. Masi, Roni Cohen, Dr. Leiderman, this book lacks pictorial support. I have encountered a couple of activities that are not easy to follow just by reading the instructions. A simple picture or a photograph would eliminate this problem.