by Jeanne McSweeney and Charles Leocha $6.95

ISN'T IT TIME WE BEGIN SPEAKING WITH OUR KIDS?

DON'T LET YOU CHILDREN GROW UP TO BE STRANGERS.

It is easy to recommend that parents and relatives spend time with children, but today's family often finds both parents working with limited time to spend with children. Getting To Know Kids in Your Life, by Charles Leocha and Jeanne McSweeney, helps make the time spent with children as positive, educational and creative as possible. The questions in this book provide openings to conversations and lessons that you can teach children and that you can learn from them as well.

The R-word, relationship, isn't only for consenting adults. Relationships with children-yours, grandchildren, nieces, nephews and young friends we meet and teach-are even longer-lasting and more significant. Getting To Know Kids in Your Life makes talking with kids easier than ever. Written by the creative team of Jeanne McSweeney and Charlie Leocha who created the best-selling Getting To Know You, this book offers hundreds of questions and scores of activities making it easier than ever for grownups to talk to, play with and learn from 4- to 7-year-old children.

Questions include: "If you could be any animal, which one would you be? If you could ride on a flying carpet, where would you go?" or "Would you still brush your teeth every night before going to sleep if your parent's didn't make you? Why?" Activities in the book require adults and children to do something together such as, spending an afternoon riding different kinds of public transportation, picking out shapes in clouds and talking about how they are made, or playing a simple game of "I Spy."

Kids love it when grownups start asking these questions and pay attention to them.

Anyone who has spent time with young children knows they grow up faster than grownups can imagine. All of us have been surprised by unexpected words from the mouths of babes. Using Getting To Know Kids in Your Life with children allows grownups to enter the wonder of a child's world and it allows children to share with grownups who are taking the time to show interest in what they are saying, experiencing and imagining. Quite simply, there is no better way to get to know another person better and there's no better way to show a child you love them.

When grownups first use Getting to Know Kids in Your Life with children, they are amazed at the enthusiasm generated by the attention. The answers kids provide are fascinating glimpses into the world as they see it. Grownups, in turn, will see children in quite a different way after going through a few of these questions together.

The activity between kids and grownups is where
values are developed and seasoned.

Time is a grownups' greatest investment in children. It is in sharing conversation that parents can learn what their children are hearing at school, on the playground and from other adults. It is only through speaking with children and listening to them that adults can learn about how kids are growing up.

Everyone wants the children close to them to be happy, well-adjusted, self-confident, and able to relate well to and care about others. These qualities start with how much time grownups spend with children during their formative years. These years are some of the most important in terms of development and they are some of the most enjoyable to spend with kids.

This book is a literally a collection of questions and activities that will lead to hundreds more and make the time you spend together with children special. Parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, daycare providers, babysitters, and preschools will all find new ways to explore life and the world of children.

Getting to Know Kids in Your Life

by Jeanne McSweeney & Charles Leocha

$6.95, paper, 160 pages

ISBN: 0-915009-27-7