Nurture The Nature: Understanding And Supporting Your Child'S Unique Core Personality

From Michael Gurian, the best-selling author of The Minds of Boys and The Wonder of Girls, comes the next-step book that shows how any parent can tune into a child's unique core personality, hard wiring, temperament, and genetic predisposition in order to help that child flourish and thrive.
Based on the most recent brain research, Nurture the Nature features the Ten Tips for Nurturing the Nature of Your Baby, self-tests, checklists, and many other tools for you to help your kids get exactly the kind of support they need, from infants to adolescents.
While offering positive ideas for nurturing your child, Gurian also shows how to avoid the stress, pressures, and excessive competition of what he identifies as social trends parenting. Most parents know instinctively that their child is unique and has special potential, weaknesses, and strengths. No child is a blank slate. Gurian calls on parents to turn away from one-size-fits-all approaches and instead support the individual core nature of a child with effective and customized loving care.

Michael Gurian is a family therapist and the New York Times best-selling author of The Wonder of Boys, The Wonder of Girls, The Good Son, Boys and Girls Learn Differently! and The Minds of Boys, among many others. He is cofounder of the Gurian Institute and a pioneer in the fields of family development, education, and gender studies. He has appeared on Today, Good Morning America, CNN, NPR, and in the New York Times, USA Today, Time, Newsweek, and elsewhere.

Understanding your own and your child’s core nature: an observation tool.
Acknowledgments.
Introduction: rediscovering our children.
Your Child’s Nature.
Nurture the Nature of Your Child.
Essential Parenting.
A special feature for moms and dads with newborns: Ten Tips for Nurturing the Nature of Your Baby.
Part one.
Protecting the nature of YOUR child.
Chapter 1: Escaping the social trends parenting system.
What Is Chronic Stress in the American Family?
The Social Trends Parenting System.
Nurturing Your Child’s Nature.
Getting Started.
Chapter 2: Understandinging the core nature of your child.
Using Nature-Based Theory in Your Family.
The Myth of the Blank Slate Child.
Eight New Sciences That Can Help You Understand Your Child’s Core Nature.
Creating a Profile of Your Child’s Core Nature.
Your Essential Parenting Blueprint.
“Who Am I?”
Part two.
Nurturing the nature of your child.
Chapter 3: Nurturing the nature of your infant.
Preview of Essential Developmental Tasks.
Information Essential to Nurturing the Core Nature of Your Infant.
Natural Differences Between Infant Boys and Girls.
A Revolution in Parenting.
Essential Mothers, Essential Fathers.
Parents-Beyond-Parents.
The Importance of the Mother-Infant Bond.
Burning Question: Can Vaccinations Harm My Infant?
Parenting as a Spiritual Discipline.
Chapter 4: Nurturing the nature of your two- to three-year-old.
Preview of Essential Developmental Tasks.
Information Essential to Nurturing the Core Nature of Your Toddler.
Natural Differences Between Toddler Girls and Boys.
The Importance of Play, Order, and Discipline.
Self-Awareness of Your Own Core Nature.
Burning Question: How Do I Handle Tantrums?
“She Was a Handful!”.
Chapter 5: Nurturing the nature of your four- to six-year-old.
Preview of Essential Developmental Tasks.
Information Essential to Nurturing the Core Nature of Your Four- to Six-Year-Old.
Natural Differences Between Boys and Girls Age Four to Six.
Handling Sibling Rivalry.
Helping Your Self-Educating Child Ask, “Who Am I?”
Redefining Food, Shelter, and Clothing.
Burning Question: How Do I Find the Best School for My Four- to Six-Year-Old?
Moving Forward with Both Peace and Excitement.
Chapter 6: Nurturing the nature of your seven- to ten-year-old.
Preview of Essential Developmental Tasks.
Information Essential to Nurturing the Core Nature of Your Seven- to Ten-Year-Old.
Natural Differences Between School-Age Girls and Boys.
Focusing on the Art of Relationship to Protect Your Child’s Core Nature.
Protecting a Child’s Core Nature by Creating Symbiotic Marriage or Symbiotic Divorce.
Burning Question: How Much Media Is Too Much?
The Courage of Parents.
Part three.
Nurturing the nature of your adolescent.
Chapter 7: Nurturing the nature of your eleven- to fourteen-year-old.
Preview of Essential Developmental Tasks.
Information Essential to Nurturing the Core Nature of Your Pubescent Child.
Natural Differences Between Early Adolescent Boys and Girls.
Helping Your Pubescent Child Through Early Adolescent Adaptations of Core Nature.
Joining Together to Link Fathers and Men to Early Adolescents.
Burning Question: How Do I Protect My Early Adolescent’s Self-Esteem?
Moving Forward with Pride.
Chapter 8: Nurturing the nature of your fifteen- to eighteen-year-old.
Preview of Essential Developmental Tasks.
Information Essential to Nurturing the Core Nature of Your Middle Adolescent.
Natural Differences Between Middle Adolescent Girls and Boys.
Adapting Your Family to Accommodate Your Middle Adolescent’s Individuation of Core Nature.

Helping Adolescents Through Crisis.
Burning Question: What Is the Best Way to Handle Peer Groups?
Becoming a Woman, Becoming a Man.
Chapter 9: Nurturing the nature of your adolescent of nineteen and older.
Preview of Essential Developmental Tasks.
Information Essential to Nurturing the Core Nature of Your Late Adolescent.
Natural Differences Between Young Men and Young Women.
Identifying and Helping Young Men and Young Women Who Lack a Mission in Life.
Burning Question: Why Are Young People Maturing So Much Later Than We Did?
The Mission in Life.
Epilogue.
Appendixes.
A: Principles of Nature-Based Families.
B: Tracking Your Child’s Core Personality Through Genetics: How to Draw and Understand a Genogram.
C: More Help with Food, Shelter, and Clothing: A Discussion Starter for Parent Groups.
Notes and references.
Bibliography.
The gurian institute.
About the author.
Index.