Generation Text: Raising Well-Adjusted Kids in an Age of Instant Everything

By Michael Osit

Book Overview

For today's kids, technology such as computers, the Internet, cell phones, and satellites is an assumed presence. Between texting, e-mail, gaming, instant-messaging, and online commerce, their world... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: B002YX0FME
• Release Date: July 2008
• Publisher: AMACOM
• Length: 288 Pages
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.9" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

great advice

Very good advice that is very well explained. I think all parents should read this book.

A "Must Read" for Teen Parents

Informative and insightful book for raising teens today. It definitely opened my eyes to the dramatic differences between our generations. I had not really stopped to contemplate all the major technology changes in our culture since I grew up and how it has impacted our youth. While technology is making everything better, faster, and greater, those "improvements" are hampering our children's ability to function successfully in society today. This is a "must read" for any parent who struggles to raise a normal, balanced child in a world of excess!

Unplugged Parenting in our Plugged-in World

If you've ever wondered how to deal with the constant challenges of excess and technological access while raising your kids, you'll want to read Generation Text: Raising Well-Adjusted Kids in an Age of Instant Everything. As the title reveals, this generation's challenges are vastly different from those of former generations. Kids can shop, socialize and entertain themselves 24/7. Gone are the test-screen moments when they simply couldn't watch TV. Even if they don't get many channels, they can always tune in to TV via the Web. Dr. Michael Osit faces the challenge by addressing current parenting issues in a digital age. Generation Text offers parenting advice with some common sense suggestions such as gadget-free family meals, TV and PC-free bedrooms and limits on cell phone usage and the like. He also highlights the unprecedented benefits of technology, thereby addressing the upside of some computer games and applications. Simply put, kids still need limits in order to feel safe, and parents need to understand current dangers to make sure they are setting the right ones. Because I am writing my own book about our relationship to time, I found this book to be of particular interest from an 'instant everything' perspective. Our children's time perception is very short. As Dr. Osit writes, have you ever felt "the need for speed in order to compensate for the distraction delays" our gadgets bring? What was most interesting in the book were the case studies of children and teens who had an overblown sense of reality - screaming into the phone, demanding your mom's credit card number to buy yet another expensive hockey stick online? The mother complies merely to allay her own guilt for leaving her kid home, again. It's an amazing world in which we live. It is a place in which instant gratification isn't fast enough. Thankfully Dr. Osit's very readable Generation Text helps us parents navigate the quagmire with humor and resolve. Christine Louise Hohlbaum, author of Diary of a Mother: Parenting Stories and Other Stuff and Sahm I Am: Tales of a Stay-at-Home Mom in Europe, is a freelance writer living near Munich, Germany, with her husband and two children.

A Must for Parents of Teenagers

I recommend this book for parents, teachers and anybody involved in the lives of young people. Dr. Osit has done a terrific job packing a ton of valuable content into a book accessible for busy parents and educators. The writing is clever and direct, funny, and full of legitimate examples of situations and genuine dialogue. I have two teenage children and feel that what this book offers is truly helpful and the strategies suggested will truly work. Any parent of teenage children will appreciate this book immensely. Parents of teenagers need to alter their parenting styles to be better equipped to handle today's matters and Dr. Osit's book can help. Thank you!

Remarkably Well Written, Smart, and Unique

Dr. Osit has managed to capture every frustrating thought surrounding the massive generational gap that technology has created, and not only narrate it with incredible ease, but provide logical and sound explanations and solutions to problems created by this extraordinary phenomenon. The writing is smart, fluent, well thought out, and entertaining. Dr. Osit creates the right balance of humor and intellect to provide a smooth read for any individual who is curious to know why they simply "cannot reach their teenager nowadays." His insight is very profound, and he has finally shed some light on all the questions that parents of today have about their children. Questions ranging from, "How did he learn to type so fast?" to "My daughter says she has hundreds of friends, so how come I've never seen her get together with any?" are all answered in Dr. Osit's "Generation Text: Raising Well Adjusted Kids in an Age of Instant Everything." The writing is witty and smart, the message is clear, and the answers are finally starting to make sense. My recommendation? Buy this book. 5 Stars, hands down.