Book Nook: The Empathy Advantage - Coaching Children to be Kind, Respectful and Successful

I recently had a chance to review The Empathy Advantage: Coaching Children to be Kind, Respectful and Successful, by award-winning educator and education/parenting writer Lynne Azarchi. Lynne is the director of Kidsbridge Tolerance Center, a nonprofit organization dedicated to fostering bully prevention, anti-bias, diversity appreciation, empathy, and empowered youth. Over her career she has helped education more than 30,000 students.

This book is written for parents, caregivers, and teachers to help children and students to develop social-emotional skills to make them better citizens of the world. By incorporating the ideas in this book, children will be able to be more compassionate with themselves and others. There are tips and strategies in the book, as well as online resources and places to go for further exploration. Activities included are easy to incorporate, since they take just 10-20 minutes. I tried out some of the activities with my own kids, and they found them to be interesting and engaging. 

I liked how the book emphasized how important it is to start early - but yet, even if you haven't been incorporating these kinds of conversations, you can still start at any time to encourage empathy. It also strongly encourages face-to-face time with kids - something that might seem hard to do, but is well worth it, in my experience!

For more information, visit www.lynneazarchi.com, or connect with Lynne on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.