About The Workbook
A Boy’s Workbook of Life is a collection of short stories and other activities that will
give you and opportunity to share real life experiences with your child in an effort to
guide him when he is faced with a similar situation. The child will also have a chance to
share with you his thoughts and feelings about these situations and through this
meaningful exchange, a unique bond will be created that will last forever.
Some Background
The amount of quality time parents have to spend with their children seems to be getting
shorter each year, with increased work demands and increased school work demands.
Then you consider the time children spend with their peers and the time parents need for
themselves, there isn’t much time left for serious discussions about some serious
situations your child will face during the coming years.
This creates a bigger problem when you consider the faster pace that information is
coming at our children, they need more guidance and support from their parents or
someone they can trust to make sense of all this data.
Your child is faced with many situations during the course of a day that they need an
adult’s perspective on but if there is no adult available for them to share with the child is
left to his own interpretation of these events which can lead to incorrect actions or
inactions. And if they are left to do this after so many times, it can become a habit or a
rule of life.
With all the information that is given to our children through all these mediums we need
to provide increased support and guidance to them. You can look at the crime and
suicide rates amongst our teenagers and see that more help is needed. Boy’s in
particular are not as expressive about their emotional needs and are guarded about their
thoughts and feelings. Gaining the trust of boys and getting them to express their true
thoughts is much tougher as they get older and requires a lot of patience. If you ask 100
teenage boys if he wants to talk about anything, 94 of them will say no, emphatically.
And what many parents do is move to the next child, or to work, or to sleep, instead of
trying to draw them out. For a lot of boys the only time they get any real consistent
attempt to express their thoughts is after getting in trouble. Then a lot of the
conversation is one sided with them receiving a lecture on how to behave, and that’s
when they stop listening.
How the workbook can help
The stories in the workbook are truly short, only about 10 to 15 minutes of reading. The
adult can read them at any time but the discussion must take place immediately after
the child reads the story, but can be suspended. For example; you can have the child
read the story before a practice and the discussion can start as you are driving them to
practice. After practice on the drive home you can continue the discussion. The
discussions can last however long they are needed. You will refer to a story several days
after the initial reading because new events will occur that will generate new ideas and
opinions about the stories.
These stories will grab the attention of any child because they are written the way teens
talk, using slang and light profanity. There are two versions of the book that you can
choose,
The original version includes light profanity that may be considered PG-13 and could be
inappropriate for some of the younger readers. There is an “Edited for Language”
version which excludes all of the words that most would consider inappropriate. With
either version the stories will hold every reader’s attention form beginning to end. The
unique aspect about the stories is that at the height of the suspense, the story ends.
Every reader will have and opinion and or feeling about something they have an interest
in. The discussion questions will cover the possibilities and what could have been done
earlier to create other outcomes.
So here you have a short story about a serious life situation that will capture the interest
of the child, that doesn’t take long to read. Through a discussion about the story the
adult has a chance to provide guidance on how to handle the situation but most
importantly: the adult will have a chance to share an experience about a serious life
situation with the child and will relay feelings about the experience. The child will see
the adult in a different light and begin to share his feelings also. If an adult is
persistent, sincere and truly listens to that child’s thoughts and feelings on serious
subjects, the adult will gain the trust of that child, and a bond is formed.
A Boy’s Workbook of Life is a collection of short stories and other activities that will
give you and opportunity to share real life experiences with your child in an effort to
guide him when he is faced with a similar situation. The child will also have a chance to
share with you his thoughts and feelings about these situations and through this
meaningful exchange, a unique bond will be created that will last forever.
Some Background
The amount of quality time parents have to spend with their children seems to be getting
shorter each year, with increased work demands and increased school work demands.
Then you consider the time children spend with their peers and the time parents need for
themselves, there isn’t much time left for serious discussions about some serious
situations your child will face during the coming years.
This creates a bigger problem when you consider the faster pace that information is
coming at our children, they need more guidance and support from their parents or
someone they can trust to make sense of all this data.
Your child is faced with many situations during the course of a day that they need an
adult’s perspective on but if there is no adult available for them to share with the child is
left to his own interpretation of these events which can lead to incorrect actions or
inactions. And if they are left to do this after so many times, it can become a habit or a
rule of life.
With all the information that is given to our children through all these mediums we need
to provide increased support and guidance to them. You can look at the crime and
suicide rates amongst our teenagers and see that more help is needed. Boy’s in
particular are not as expressive about their emotional needs and are guarded about their
thoughts and feelings. Gaining the trust of boys and getting them to express their true
thoughts is much tougher as they get older and requires a lot of patience. If you ask 100
teenage boys if he wants to talk about anything, 94 of them will say no, emphatically.
And what many parents do is move to the next child, or to work, or to sleep, instead of
trying to draw them out. For a lot of boys the only time they get any real consistent
attempt to express their thoughts is after getting in trouble. Then a lot of the
conversation is one sided with them receiving a lecture on how to behave, and that’s
when they stop listening.
How the workbook can help
The stories in the workbook are truly short, only about 10 to 15 minutes of reading. The
adult can read them at any time but the discussion must take place immediately after
the child reads the story, but can be suspended. For example; you can have the child
read the story before a practice and the discussion can start as you are driving them to
practice. After practice on the drive home you can continue the discussion. The
discussions can last however long they are needed. You will refer to a story several days
after the initial reading because new events will occur that will generate new ideas and
opinions about the stories.
These stories will grab the attention of any child because they are written the way teens
talk, using slang and light profanity. There are two versions of the book that you can
choose,
The original version includes light profanity that may be considered PG-13 and could be
inappropriate for some of the younger readers. There is an “Edited for Language”
version which excludes all of the words that most would consider inappropriate. With
either version the stories will hold every reader’s attention form beginning to end. The
unique aspect about the stories is that at the height of the suspense, the story ends.
Every reader will have and opinion and or feeling about something they have an interest
in. The discussion questions will cover the possibilities and what could have been done
earlier to create other outcomes.
So here you have a short story about a serious life situation that will capture the interest
of the child, that doesn’t take long to read. Through a discussion about the story the
adult has a chance to provide guidance on how to handle the situation but most
importantly: the adult will have a chance to share an experience about a serious life
situation with the child and will relay feelings about the experience. The child will see
the adult in a different light and begin to share his feelings also. If an adult is
persistent, sincere and truly listens to that child’s thoughts and feelings on serious
subjects, the adult will gain the trust of that child, and a bond is formed.
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A BOY'S WORKBOOK OF LIFE
| The book can be purchased on Amazon or through the publisher's website: |
| Initiate meaningful conversations about serious life events |
| You want to feel better about his chances in the “real world” |