Top Students Top Parents by Kathleen Burns

If you have young children, you probably want to do all you can to help your child be an academic success. Kathleen Burns in Top Students Top Parents offers a whole lot of advice on helping you help your child(ren) be a success.

Burns begins Top Students Top Parents by sharing her experience as a teacher and a mother and grandmother. She divides this book in to three sections: Laying the Foundation for Success In Infancy and Above, Reading and Writing, and School Success. As the sub-title states, Good Students are made at Home. . .Not at School, according to Burns. Throughout this book, she shares advice and activities to do at home to help your child be a success in nearly every area. She encourages parents to start while the child is quite young. She backs up her advice with findings and research that she has gleaned from.

Top Students and Top Parents would best be read by young parents in order to get the most benefit from the book. However, there are helpful hints, tips and advice for all ages in the book. I think if you have a "normal" child, you will benefit most from this book. I say that because some of the research she shares in this book doesn't quite fit with my son who is high-functioning autistic. With more children being diagnosed with special needs every day, I do wish she had a section that applied to them and their parents. I did still find a lot of helpful advice. We have had our child in public school and have home-schooled and this book would be helpful for parents doing either one. I liked how the book was organized and that it was so easy to follow. I also liked the list of fun books to read to children in the back of the book. Also, Burns includes a fun section full of dinosaur jokes which would be a lot of fun for younger children and parents. Again, I would most recommend this book to parents with young children. Most of  the advice is geared to parents with children that are infants through grade 6 so that you can build a good, solid educational foundation.

I received a copy of this book from the author and publisher. All opinions are my own.