If you're a Christian parent of boys, you might be interested in Raising Boys by Design: What the Bible and Brain Science Reveal About What Your Son Needs to Thrive. As a teacher, even though I only have daughters, I appreciated reading this book. I like the balance between scientific explanations behind boys' behavior, and Christian foundations for behavior guidance and parenting techniques.
I had a chance to interview Michael Gurian, co-author, to find out more. There is a great deal of information packed into this book - way more than I can include here - but if you find what he says intriguing or helpful, I highly encourage you to check out the book to find out more.
1) What was the inspiration behind writing this book?
For
a number of years, both of us, as child development experts, had been
asked to write a book on raising boys for Christian parents. We had
each gathered research
and looked toward doing a book but also both felt we wanted to bring
the Bible and brain science together in a helpful way. To do this, we
needed one another. As we met and became friends, we brought our
research together and realized that we were the right
combination, the right team, to find common ground between the Bible
and brain science.
2) Why is it so much easier to build strong children than to repair damage later?
Two
big reasons: The human brain is fragile. We need to build a strong
brain from the very beginning in order to make sure a child has the
internal resources to survive
life's normal difficulties and life's tragedies. If we build a strong
brain--nourish a strong, compassionate, loving soul--from the very
beginning, our child has the best chance of surviving and thriving no
matter what happens in life.
3) What are some things that parents of boys and girls need to recognize about how boys are different?
- Scientists generally study four primary areas of difference in male and female brains: processing, chemistry, structure, and activity.
- Gray-matter areas of the brain are localized. They are information- and action-processing centers in specific splotches in a specific area of the brain. Males tend to spend more brain time doing, feeling, thinking, working, and playing with neurotransmission concentrated in these specific (localized) parts of their brains. This can translate to a kind of tunnel vision when they are doing something.
- Boys may need to compete in order to learn well and do well.
- Our boys at times need different strategies for stress release and stress response than our girls.
- Girls and women tend to input or absorb more sensorial and emotive information than males do.
- Males tend, after reflecting more briefly on an emotive memory, to analyze it quickly, then move on to the next task.
- Males, in general, concentrate, focus, and pay attention somewhat differently, from a brain standpoint, than females.
Excerpted from Raising Boys by Design by Gregory L. Jantz, PhD, and Michael Gurian. Copyright ©2013 by Gregory L. Jantz, PhD, and Michael Gurian. Excerpted by permission of WaterBrook Press, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
4) What are a few of the things that boys need to survive?
The table of contents should provide a bulleted list of these things, such as:
1. Both a maternal and paternal approach to child raising, if possible.
2. Schools that understand how boys are naturally inclined to learn and grow.
3. Rites of passage into manhood.
4. Character development and emotional development as two sides of one coin--the coin is HERO development.
5.
Use of technology in balance with time in nature, time with family,
time doing work and chores, time in faith communities, time in service
of others.
6. Parents, mentors, and others who build in boys the four essentials: a sense of honor, enterprise, responsibility, and originality.
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