Raising Kids Who Will Make a Difference: Helping Your Family Live with Integrity, Value Simplicity, and Care for Others

by Susan V. Vogt

Book Overview

As a mother of four children ages fifteen to twenty-seven, author Susan Vogt knows intimately what it is to feel vulnerable and unsure in parenting. In her unique and thoughtful guide to raising... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0829417923
• ISBN13: 9780829417920
• Release Date: September 2002
• Publisher: Loyola Press
• Length: 296 Pages
• Weight: 1.16 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.9" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Powerful and straight forward

Cracking the Parenting Code: 6 Clues to Solving the Mystery of Meeting Your Child's Needs This book really made me think. Really enjoyed Susan's insight!

Raising Kids Who Will Make a Difference

This is a surprising book! I usually don't like books that tell you how to raise your kids. I end up feeling guilty about all the things I did wrong that the author did right and I hate books that give a formula for parenting perfectly.Vogt's book does just the opposite. She acknowledges that her parenting was less than perfect and her suggestions allow for a wide variety of approaches. Best of all the author has put together a unique book that includes her ideas and principles on twelve different topics, observations from seasoned parents and reactions from their chlidren. She also puts in resources, exercises and great stories that kept my attention throughout.I received this book as a gift and started reading it with reluctance but it just go better and better with every page. I especially like what Vogt's own kids had to say about the way they were raised and while they resisted some of their parent's idealism they turned out ok. Their daughter who wrote some of the funniest stories in the book is now serving in the Peace Corp.Raising Kids... would make a great book on parenting and teaching values but it would also be a great read about how generations interact and approach topics from very different perspectives. I kept reading whole sections aloud to my wife while she was trying to read her own book.This may be the best book I have ever read on parenting and sharing values with children.

A gift for grandparents to pass on

My own children are grown with children of their own but I'm still a concerned parent and grandparent and Raising Kids who will make a Difference gives me hope. So much of what I read and see on TV disturbs me these days and I tell my adult children that I think it's a lot harder to be a parent today than it was a generation ago. I think Raising Kids Who Will Make a Difference can help. It combines the practicality of Dr. Spock that guided my parenting with the inspiration of spiritual leaders like Jesus and Gandhi and wraps them all up in age old values and wisdom that Vogt somehow manages to convey with a modern and accessible tone. I think ordinary parents will find they can relate to it, It's not just written with "super-parents" in mind. I felt consoled to know I did a lot of things right in my own parenting and that even my regrets are shared by other good parents.Even though my active parenting days are over, I want to give this book to my children and the other young parents I know to help them get a good start. As Vogt says, "Start young....it's a lot easier to limit TV to an hour a day when the child is a toddler and gradually allow extensions than to announce to a preteen that the family is going to cut back on TV. If the rule has always been that everybody pitches in to clean house on Saturday, it won't meet with the resistance that some parents experience when they try to implement new policies that they picked up from a parenting class or from reading a book such as this one. If you're too late for the start young approach, approach your family gently and include everyone in the decision-making process." It makes a parent want to stretch but without guilt.

Raising Kids Who Will Make a Difference

This is one of the most insightful and practical books on parenting I've ever read. The blend of the Vogt family stories, as well as other families' perceptions make this book delightful and engaging. The honesty, sincerity and wisdom with which Susan Vogt writes present us with pragmatic, intentional and caring ways to "be" family. As a parent of young adult children, it was refreshing to be reminded that none of us parent perfectly! Linda Moses Co-President, National Association of Catholic Family Life Minsters

A realistic and comforting book

I sat down in my favorite chair in the living room intending to spend only about 15 minutes with it because that's all the time I had, and I couldn't put it down. Finished reading it later when I woke up with insomnia. It was a comforting book, one I wish I had had years ago. The realistic tone is a gift. Most intriguing were the end-of-chapter comments from the author's children.