The Myth of the Spoiled Child, Alfie Kohn
The Myth of the Spoiled Child, Alfie Kohn
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The Myth of the Spoiled Child
Challenging the Conventional Wisdom about Children and Parenting

Author: Alfie Kohn

Narrator: Alfie Kohn

Unabridged: 8 hr 12 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 03/25/2014

Synopsis

Somehow, deeply conservative assumptions about how children behave and how parents raise them have become the conventional wisdom in our society. It's widely assumed that parents are both permissive and overprotective, unable to set limits and afraid to let their kids fail. We're told that young people receive trophies, praise, and A's too easily, and suffer from inflated self-esteem and insufficient self-discipline. However, complaints about pushover parents and entitled kids are actually decades old and driven, it turns out, by ideology more than evidence.

With the same lively, contrarian style of Alfie Kohn's bestselling books about rewards, competition, and traditional education, The Myth of the Spoiled Child systematically debunks the story that we hear with numbing regularity. Kohn uses humor, logic, and his familiarity with a vast range of social science data to challenge media-stoked fears of spoiling our children. He reveals that the major threat to healthy child development isn't parents who are too indulgent but those who are too controlling.

About Alfie Kohn

Alfie Kohn writes and speaks widely on human behavior, education, and parenting. He is the author of fourteen books, including Unconditional Parenting and The Myth of the Spoiled Child (both available as Tantor audiobooks), and scores of articles. He lectures at education conferences and universities as well as to parent groups and corporations. Kohn lives (actually) in the Boston area and (virtually) at alfiekohn.org.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Nick on October 04, 2016

I received a copy of this book for free through Goodreads Giveaways. I am of two completely opposing opinions in regard to this book. On the one hand, I find much of the research the author cites to be accurate, agree with a number of the conclusions he comes to, and overall see the educational sys......more

Goodreads review by Justin on April 18, 2014

This book is the application of Alfie Kohn's parenting philosophy, set out in his book Unconditional Parenting, to current fashions criticizing today's parenting as too indulgent, children as too lazy, and of course, children as too spoiled. It turns out, Kohn argues, that being mean to children, ha......more

Goodreads review by Sarah on March 27, 2014

Alfie Kohn’s ideas are always radical and incendiary and this book is no exception. I’m a huge fan of all his writing, and find that his ideas crystallise concerns I have always had as a teacher and parent about the focus of contemporary education. It’s still confronting to read, though, as it force......more

Goodreads review by Brittney on April 04, 2014

Writing about what’s wrong with the youngest generation, also known as Millennials, has been exhausted as a subject. Mostly writers have come to blame bad parenting for all the ills of the world. No matter which side of the political spectrum you fall on, you’re likely to believe that strict parenti......more

Goodreads review by April on April 15, 2014

Originally posted here: The Steadfast Reader I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Confession time: I picked up this book as a hate read. I opened it with the attitude, "This is gonna be a crazy, liberal book on how we ought to be coddling out children and......more

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