[easyazon-image align=”none” asin=”0553386697″ locale=”us” height=”333″ src=”http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51trgKnnKuL.jpg” width=”216″ alt=”The Whole Brain Child” ]Consistent Presence and Attentiveness
A Review of
The Whole Brain Child:
12 Revolutionary Strategies to Nurture Your Child’s Developing Mind
Daniel J. Siegel, M.D. / Tina Payne Bryson, Ph.D.
Paperback: Bantam Books, 2012
Buy now: [ [easyazon-link asin=”0553386697″ locale=”us”]Amazon[/easyazon-link] ] [ [easyazon-link asin=”B004J4X32U” locale=”us”]Kindle[/easyazon-link] ]
Reviewed by Jared Boyd.
Reading a book on parenting can be a bit overwhelming. Everyone seems to have the best idea and theory for raising happy and healthy children. One can come to parenthood perhaps feeling confident that one has the tools and abilities to nurture young lives, only to find that within a few years, and after a few children, one can quickly be reduced to tears and a wash of hopelessness. If this sounds a bit dour, and maybe all-too-familiar, The Whole Brain Child by Daniel Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson fills the large, empty spot on the parenting bookshelf—the empty spot that has been waiting for a truly helpful parenting book. This book is concise and concrete. It answers a lot of questions about child development without losing the reader in unnecessary details.
The Whole Brain Child is about integration. Siegel and Bryson open the book with a good old fashion anatomy lesson of the brain, which, in light of the recent wave of neurological research, is a rooted and welcomed approach toward shaping the way parents think about what’s going on during those unpredictable tantrums in the grocery store, and the stubborn dinner-table “disobedience”.
Integration is about coordinating and balancing the separate regions of the brain. Integrating the emotional right brain with the more logical left brain, and the lower “reptilian” brain, responsible for impulses and quick reactions, with the more developed prefrontal cortex, which can provide a more involved and deeper perspective on the world. A person’s brain works best when the “upstairs” and “downstairs” are integrated with each other— when logic and emotions are working in harmony.
I came to the work of Dr. Siegel through my own search for greater integration. As a father of 4 girls (ages 9, 8, 6, and 2), our home is full of emotions. Over the past few years I’ve been trying to pay attention to those emotions a little better, to really engage with my girls and help them sort out and navigate the complexities. Often-times, in the midst of the most heightened moments of emotions, I found that I would either shut down, or feel a wave of anger come over me that immobilized my parenting. Neither of these were options that could continue. Parenting uncovered part of my inner life that needed some attention. I began to read Anatomy of the Soul by Curt Thompson (which is another wonderful book), who makes substantial use of Dan Siegel’s research. This ultimately lead me to The Whole Brain Child.
The authors, who are parents themselves, recognize that parenting often feels like survival. Siegel, a medical-doctor specializing in neuropsychiatry, and Bryson, a PhD and parenting expert, offer an accessible look into the most important (and often neglected) tool in the parenting tool-box: the child’s brain. Siegel and Bryson focus their strategies and scenarios for pre-kindergarten to grade-school aged kids with plans to expand their material in another book for the more nuanced teen years.
If bringing the best of neuroscience to bear upon the daily struggles of parenting seems a bit out-of-reach and out-of-touch, it isn’t. Siegel and Bryson offer twelve very practical and available strategies (with some helpful charts in the back) for helping develop integration, both for your children, and equally important, for yourself. And this is the game-changer; it turns out that the most important thing for parenting isn’t fostering “obedience”(though the authors agree that this can be important), the most important thing, is fostering “connection.” Our brains grow new neuropathways when a process of relational connection is fostered, particularly during an emotional moment. The flip-side is that those pathways can also be abruptly halted when a child’s emotional life is shut down, dismissed, or neglected.
Bryson tells of a story when her son is on the verge of disrupting an entire restaurant with his impending anger outburst; he doesn’t want to eat his quesadilla. He leaves the table and pouts as the tantrum begins to brew. Here, Bryson says that parents have two options. Option #1: we can go the traditional “command and demand” route and offer a cliched threat in a stern tone, “Stop making faces, young man. Go sit down and eat your lunch or you won’t get any dessert.” Or, Option #2: We can try to tap into the “upstairs brain” (prefrontal cortex) and get him to try to do some thinking— rather than escalating the fighting/reacting response of the lower brain. The strategy here is what the authors call engage: don’t enrage. When a parent engages a child while they are stuck in reactivity (rather than allowing the child to take the parent into the same reactivity), a parent helps a child to engage their pre-frontal cortex by prompting a conversation that requires some thought. For example, in the above scenario, Bryson shares that she encouraged her son to negotiate with his father about eating the quesadilla. Dad and son came to an agreement about how many bites the son would eat. Simply going through the process of negotiation activated the prefrontal cortex, calmed the emotions, and diverted a melt-down. Neural pathways are formed, the relationship is intact, and everyone gets to finish their lunch. The authors might say that the goal of parenting isn’t getting kids to eat their quesadillas; the goal is connecting with them where they are, and helping them to engage their whole brain in order to foster emotional well-being.
Siegel and Bryson make every effort to make brain science parent-friendly. Of course, the examples they share can feel a bit oversimplified at times. However, these illustrations are meant to communicate a strategy, not necessarily provide a picture of exactly how smoothly the conversations are expected to go; the reader should keep this in mind. Siegel specifically points out that timing is everything: “When your four-year old is screaming ‘I wanna swing longer!’ as you carry her under one arm away from the park, that may not be the best time to talk to her about appropriate ways of handling big emotions.” Both authors frequently remind the reader that successful parenting isn’t finding the big moments to land significant conversations, it’s about paying attention during the daily parenting challenges where the whole-brain perspective will really pay off.
I suspect that the exciting discoveries in brain neuroplasticity will continue to help shape the way we think and live, with intentionality, toward human flourishing. The Whole Brain Child challenges parents to take seriously how much attention is required in good parenting. The reader will feel challenged and equipped. It turns out that teaching kids diligently in the everyday—sitting at home and walking alongside them on the way, in the wake-up time and during the bedtime routine as highlighted in the Hebrew shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-9)— this consistent presence and attentiveness, this is what matters.
—–
Jared Boyd is a Pastor and Spiritual Director in the Vineyard Movement. He lives in Columbus, OH.
C. Christopher Smith is the founding editor of The Englewood Review of Books. He is also author of a number of books, including most recently How the Body of Christ Talks: Recovering the Practice of Conversation in the Church (Brazos Press, 2019). Connect with him online at: C-Christopher-Smith.com
 Reading for the Common Good From ERB Editor Christopher Smith "This book will inspire, motivate and challenge anyone who cares a whit about the written word, the world of ideas, the shape of our communities and the life of the church." -Karen Swallow Prior Enter your email below to sign up for our weekly newsletter & download your FREE copy of this ebook! |
Understanding Christian Nationalism [A Reading Guide] |
 Most Anticipated Books of the Fall for Christian Readers!
|
 Hilarious One-Star Customer Reviews of Bibles |
