The breakthrough years : a new scientific framework for raising thriving teens / Ellen Galinsky.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Blending cutting-edge research with engaging storytelling, The Breakthrough Years offers readers a paradigm-shifting comprehensive understanding of adolescence.

"Just wait until they're a teenager!"

Many parents of newborns have heard this warning about the stressful phase that's to come. But what if it doesn't have to be that way?

Child development expert Ellen Galinsky challenges widely held assumptions about adolescents and offers new ways for parents and others to better understand and interact with them in a way that helps them thrive.

By combining the latest research on cognitive neuroscience with an unprecedented and extensive set of studies of young people nine through nineteen and their families, Galinsky reveals, among other things, that adolescents don't want to separate completely from their parents but seek a different type of relationship; that they want to be helpers rather than be helped; and that social media can become a positive influence for teens.

Galinsky's Shared Solutions framework and Possibilities Mindset show you how to turn daily conflicts into opportunities for problem-solving where both teens and parents feel listened to and respected; how to encourage positive risk-taking in your child like standing up for themselves, making new friends, and helping their communities; and how to promote five essential executive function-based skills that can help them succeed now and in the future.

The Breakthrough Years recasts adolescence as a time of possibility for teens and adults, offering breakthrough opportunities for connection.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Introduction (1)
• 1 Message 1: Understand Our Development (13)
• The Breakthrough Years Study (13)
• How Did We Get Here? (16)
• Reflections on Message 1 (18)
• The Adolescent Years Are Breakthrough Years (20)
• A Learning Spurt (27)
• From Developmental Liability to Developmental Necessity (38)
• How We Think About the Adolescent Brain (46)
• Rethinking Adolescence: From Negatives to Positives and Obstacles (53)
• 2 Message 2: Listen and Talk with Us, Not at Us (56)
• Reflections on Message 2 (58)
• Parents as Brain Builders (60)
• Parenting Strategies: Listening, Understanding, and Creating Shared Solutions (71)
• Adolescence as a Time of Recovery (81)
• Skill-Building Opportunities: Transforming Challenges into Opportunities for Learning Skills (93)
• Possibilities Mindset (100)
• Friendships (113)
• Positive Risks (122)
• The Digital World (136)
• Working Toward a Kinder World (150)
• Rethinking Adolescence: From a Portrait to a Landscape (159)
• 3 Message 3: Don't Stereotype Us (163)
• Reflections on Message 3 (165)
• Are Adolescents Stereotyped? (170)
• The Impact of Teenism (175)
• The Disruptive Effects of Discrimination (182)
• Everyday Discrimination: Hidden in Plain Sight (189)
• Rethinking Our Conceptions of Adolescence: From Averages to Individuality (194)
• 4 Message 4: We Are Trying to Understand Ourselves and Our Needs (198)
• Reflections on Lesson 4 (200)
• A Radical Idea (202)
• Need 1: Caring Connections: The Need for Belonging and Support (207)
• The Need for Belonging (207)
• The Need for Support (220)
• Need 2: Agency: The Need for Autonomy and Respect (228)
• The Need for Autonomy (229)
• The Need for Respect (241)
• Need 3: Mastery: The Need for Challenge and Competence (258)
• The Need for Challenge (258)
• The Need for Competence (271)
• Need 4: Identity: The Need to Explore Who I Am (288)
• The Need to Explore What Am I Like / What Are We Like (295)
• The Need to Explore What I Do / What I Will Do (305)
• The Need to Explore What Story I Tell Myself About Myself (309)
• Need 5: Purpose: The Need for Purpose and to Contribute (320)
• The Need for Purpose (320)
• The Need to Contribute (327)
• Rethinking Adolescence: From "How Are They Doing?" to "How Are We Doing?" (338)
• 5 Message 5: We Are Drawn to Learn Life and Learning Skills (340)
• Reflections on Message 5 (343)
• Foundational Executive Function Skills (344)
• Life and Learning Skill 1: Setting Goals (357)
• Life and Learning Skill 2: Perspective-Taking (370)
• Life and Learning Skill 3: Communicating and Collaborating (384)
• Life and Learning Skill 4: Problem-Solving: Meaning-Making, Creative Thinking, Relational Reasoning, and Critical Thinking (402)
• The Life and Learning Skill of Meaning-Making (405)
• The Life and Learning Skill of Creative Thinking: From "What Is" to "What Might Be" (411)
• The Life and Learning Skill of Relational Reasoning (424)
• The Life and Learning Skill of Critical Thinking (429)
• Life and Learning Skill 5: Taking on Challenges (434)
• Executive Function and Life and Learning Skills in Programs (456)
• Six Principles for Promoting Executive Function Skills (458)
• Executive Function / Life and Learning Skills in Schools (461)
• Rethinking Adolescence: From Skills That Benefit Us to Skills That Benefit Us and Others (472)
• Conclusion: A Letter to My Grandson (475)
• Acknowledgments (479)
• Appendix 1 Breakthrough Years Study (485)
• Appendix 2 Researchers Interviewed (487)
• Notes (491)
• Index (535)

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Publishers Weekly Review

In this superb guide, Galinsky (Mind in the Making), president of the Families and Work Institute, expounds on how parents can support their children through adolescence. Listening to the concerns of more than 1,500 nine- to 19-year-olds for a study, she discovered five main messages teens want adults to know, including "listen and talk with us, not at us," and "don't stereotype us." Drawing on academic research to explore each message, Galinsky helps parents "understand our development" by explaining that the teen brain's reward center is more active than adults', which can motivate risk-taking but also seeking new opportunities. The research yields practical advice, as when Galinsky notes studies showing that recognizing teens' need for both agency and guidance when solving problems helps them feel more confident. To embrace this style of caregiving, Galinsky recommends parents share their perspective while providing their child with choices on how to move forward. The astounding amount of research touches on how to promote executive function skills and teens' belief that they have the power to effect positive change, among myriad other topics, and it's to the credit of Galinsky's lucid prose and sensible organization that it never feels overwhelming. Overflowing with insight backed by scientific rigor, this is an essential companion for parents of adolescents. Agent: Jim Levine, Levine Greenberg Rostan Literary. (Mar.)

Kirkus Book Review

A fresh look at adolescence. Nearly 500 pages on this topic may seem excessive--except to the harried parents of teens. Two centuries of experts have used personal experience, religion, ideology, and tradition to describe how to raise children. In this massive compendium of research on teenage brain science, Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute, author of Mind in the Making, Ask the Children, and The Six Stages of Parenthood, presents the results of a lifetime of her own study of parenting and child development, offering countless useful, concrete facts often missing from similar books over the decades. The author emphasizes that young people are not adults; assessing them using an "adult yardstick" sets them up for failure. Since 1904, when the first study of adolescence as a distinct developmental stage appeared, it's been described as a time of "storm and stress." With the use of high-tech scanners, modern-day scientists have revealed that the brain's reward system develops more quickly than its control system. This seems to explain teens' risky behavior, but Galinsky maintains that they never stop learning. An ongoing theme is that "challenges" (i.e., poor behavior) are an opportunity to teach, and adolescents need to feel they have a choice over how they live. In Galinsky's autonomy-supportive approach, adults don't solve problems; they engage children in learning to provide their own solutions. While there is no shortage of homilies, testimonials, and anecdotes, the author does not dispense the wisdom of a master healer a la Doctor Spock. She writes as a veteran scientist, usually preceding advice with the results of a study or an expert's analysis. Dense with bullet points, lists, and tables, it resembles a textbook more than an advice manual; like a textbook, it rewards careful study. A deeply researched parenting guide with more than the usual emphasis on the facts. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.