The Top 50 Questions Kids Ask (Pre-K through 2nd Grade): The Best Answers to the Toughest, Smartest, and Most Awkward Questions Kids Always Ask

by Susan S. Bartell

Praise for the Top 50 Questions Kids Ask "Dr. Susan is highly gifted at helping parents and kids connect from the heart. This book honors our innate wisdom, supports us in nurturing our kids' emotional growth and empowers us to be the parents we were meant to be." ―Renee Peterson Trudeau, life balance expert/coach and author of "The Mother's Guide to How to Reclaim, Rejuvenate and Re-Balance Your Life" "The Top 50 Questions Kids Ask is an insightful guide on the issues and concerns every parent and child faces. It's a must- read guide that both moms and dads should keep at their bedside." ―Allison O'Connor, Founder and Editor, SingleMindedWomen.com "Finally, a book that answers all those questions we parents go in a cold sweat about! Dr. Susan tackles the tough ones such as money, shyness, siblings and religion. Plus, we get the psychology behind it all to better understand our kids. You'll find yourself using this book every day." ―Pam Atherton, journalist and host of "A Closer Look" radio talk show "Dr. Susan Bartell is the go-to person for all questions kids ask. No one is better qualified or more in touch with this age group to lend her expertise to a book that aids parents in improving communication with their ever-curious children." ―Renee Raab Whitcombe, author of "Look Who's Going to be a Big Sister" and "Look Who's Going to be a Big Brother" Are we rich? Why do I have to go to school? Where do babies come from? If you're the parent of a four- to eight-year-old, there's no doubt you've heard them already―and there are countless more to come. Questions! They come in all curious, nagging, touching, annoying, and downright weird. What they all have in common is that parents are often at a total loss for how to answer them. Inside you'll find the concrete responses that will make sense to kids, stop the nagging, reduce your frustration, and begin healthy new conversations that will enrich your child's view of the world. You'll learn to talk confidently with your child about the toughest of topics, with advice and support from expert family psychologist Dr. Susan Bartell. Responding to your child's questions can be a remarkable parenting opportunity―if you just know the right words to say.

Genres: Nonfiction, Parenting

240 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2010

Reviews

[Nathan Albright · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fascinating and worthy book mostly because it is written with a different agenda than most books about questions. Most books about questions seek to laboriously think up of questions to ask to gain information to gratify the idle curiosity of the writer and the person asking the question. This is especially true when it comes to questions directed at children, since children tend not to give the sort of answers that are desired of them when it comes to questions. This book, though, does not look so much at the questions we want to ask children but rather the sort of questions that late elementary school age kids will ask their parents or other trusted adults. And not only does this book focus on the questions that kids will ask, but it also looks at the sort of answers that deal with the question behind the question, since what is asked may not always be what is really on the mind, or may spring from deeper concerns that the child may not be able to fully articulate. This is a book that does good serve in helping adults deal with inquisitive children in a way that is age-appropriate but also informative when it comes to some of the fundamental questions, and the author is unafraid to deal with questions of religion as well.

This book is more than 200 pages long and is divided into ten chapters that divide up the 50 most popular questions that are asked by late elementary school students based on what was reported to the author through various surveys. The book begins with acknowledgements and an introduction that discusses this book as part of a series related to the questions that children ask and also give information on how it was that the questions were gathered. After that the book discusses the nagging questions that are particularly common for children to ask, and what it is that children are getting at when they nag adults about what is for dinner as a means of addressing other concerns that they do not know how to or do not want to discuss (1). After that comes a look at questions about the world outside (2) that children want to understand better. This is followed by questions that deal with who is in charge (3) and can be seen to offer challenges to authority. After this come questions relating to fears and how it is that parents can encourage children to be brave (4) in dealing with the world and its dangers, as well as to think about how to address those fears in a constructive manner. After this comes chapters that deal with questions about God (5), relationships with siblings, especially regarding questions of fairness about how siblings are treated with regards to private time, privileges, bed time, and the like (6), money (7), growing up fast and wanting the same privileges that others have (8), private questions about the personal life of adults (9), and one last question that the author deals with at the end about how a parent would like it if their child never asked them questions, before the book ends with information about the author.

What is it that leads certain questions to come up? As someone who is still very fond of asking questions, including questions I have asked before to see if the answers are any different, I tend to ponder the reasons why I ask questions and also tend to think of the reasons that would lead others to ask questions of me. Some questions come about because of idle curiosity. Something triggers a thought and the end result is that one wants to know something and asks someone who one would think knows the answer. For example, once I had a young child ask me what restaurant meant and it prompted an interesting bit of research into French culture and cuisine in the late ancien regime period. Other questions spring from things that bother or trouble us and which it is hard for us to articulate. And this book deals with plenty of those questions, which are worthwhile to think about because they force us to examine ourselves as beings who should be asking the right sort of questions ourselves even though we cannot do so very easily or well.

[Lydia · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I don't completely agree with all her responses...I do think that this book provided great insight and in general really good answers to those questions kids ask. I liked how it showed how certain questions are related and what the kid is really trying to know. I liked it enough that I went to put the 3-5 grader one on hold...but the library doesn't have it in their system yet.

[Child960801 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent. Emmet's still a little young for this, but very informative. I like how she explains the reasoning behind asking a certain question as well as how to respond to their real question.