Reviews for Bringing Up Geeks: How to Protect Your Kid's Childhood in a Grow-Up-Too-Fast World

The average rating for Bringing Up Geeks: How to Protect Your Kid's Childhood in a Grow-Up-Too-Fast World based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2010-11-03 00:00:00 Don Dillon I don't read parenting books. I have parenting books on my shelves by FRIENDS I keep meaning to read and haven't. (Sorry, friends.) But I picked this up because of the title. I thought it was going to be a book about nurturing your kid's geek tendencies. Not the biting-the-heads-off-chickens kind of geekery; the confidently-obsessed-with-something-brainy-and-self-directed kind of geekery. I was hoping for specific strategies to help my kid find her passion, nurture that passion and deal with kids who think her passion is supa lame. I was hoping for discussion on good geekery vs bad geekery, making sure our geeks have social skills and empathy, preventing bullying. The author defines geek with an acronym: Genuine, Enthusiastic, Empowered Kid. Hey, that too sounded promising! But I shoulda paid attention to the subtitle: How to Protect Your Kid's Childhood in a Grow-Up-Too-Fast World. THAT'S really what the book is about. It takes as a given that you want to keep kids away from pop culture and that parenting means making kids do the activities YOU want them to do. I was hoping for a book that encouraged self-direction, not obedience. And as a fan of popcult, I was hoping for guidance in finding the good stuff and talking about the bad stuff, and walking the line between banning and discouraging crap. FYI, the book also has a strong Christian gloss -- as a Jew it didn't really trouble me, but someone raising kids without religion is likely to have Issues there too. This book's more Nerd than Geek. True geeks know what I mean.

Review # 2 was written on 2009-04-20 00:00:00 Prakash Sharma The subtitle of this book is "How to Protect Your Kid's Childhood in a Grow-Up-Too-Fast World," and defines geeks as Genuine, Enthusiastic, Empowered Kids. This book made me feel validated as a parent. As if we are actually doing not too badly as we decide how to raise our children. The author, a parenting columnist and mom of 4, has 10 rules for raising "geeks": Rule 1: Raise a brainiac Rule 2: Raise a sheltered kid Rule 3: Raise an uncommon kid Rule 4: Raise a kid adults like Rule 5: Raise a late bloomer Rule 6: Raise a team player Rule 7: Raise a true friend Rule 8: Raise a homebody Rule 9: Raise a principled kid Rule 10: Raise a faithful kid Nonreligious readers should probably avoid Rule 10, because it talks about the importance of spirituality in a child's life...and how that helps them cope with some of the stresses of being a "geek." While I was reading this book, we were dealing with an issue my middle schooler told me about (regarding some inappropriate behavior going on at school), and we made the decision to talk to the teacher about it. My middle schooler was not happy about this, but I explained to him that sometimes doing the right thing is not the popular thing. I highly recommend this book for parents who want to raise children who are individuals and do not just go along with the hip and cool kid culture.