MYSTIC, CT – Written in response to the highly controversial Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua, Carol Cooke, a career American educator, offers what she terms an “American parenting model.” Her book, America’s Answer to the Tiger Mother, How to Raise Successful, Happy Children (ISBN 1475053916) presents a model that sharply contrasts Chua’s Chinese style of parenting. Suggesting Chua would agree, Cooke describes the deterioration over the past three to four decades in the “motivation, performance, behavior, and moral compass” of America’s children creating a crisis which now extends well beyond just the field of education. Cooke believes it would be an understatement to say that education and the direction in which youth are headed in America today are in crisis. While she sees this as a concern Amy Chua no doubt shared, her strategies for teaching “self-motivation, self-discipline and self-reliance” are in sweeping contrast to the Tiger Mother’s methods.
As a result of her observations throughout her years of work with students, parents and teachers, Cooke concluded that it was not the American educational system replete with its more highly educated teachers, better equipped facilities, extensive resources, special programs and community services that was the primary source of the problem. She concluded that the greater contributing factor was the other most significant influence on children’s lives: their parents, more specifically, unskilled parents. She asserts that all parents want to raise their children to be both successful and fulfilled. Their problem simply is that they don’t know how. “It became apparent to me that throughout our history, we have neglected what is probably the most critical area of education for a society: teaching our citizens to be good parents,” says Cooke.
This book is designed to appeal to parents and parents-to-be of all ages, races, cultures, and socio-economic levels. Using her multi-faceted experience, the veteran educator presents parents with what she calls an American style of parenting to teach young children critical attributes, such as self-respect, character, integrity, self-discipline and compassion, as well as skills like goal setting, higher level thinking, and the art of making friends. Cooke’s work focuses less on how we should treat our children, and much more on what we should teach them.
America’s Answer to the Tiger Mother, How to Raise Successful, Happy Children is available for sale online at americasanswertothetigermother.com, amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com, and other channels.
About the Author:
Carol Cooke has had extensive experience within the field of education in positions ranging from classroom instruction and curriculum coordination to administration, teacher evaluation, and professional development consultation. Her goal has always been to help children become the best that they can be. She has worked with parents and children to improve relationships, to promote self-disciple and to enhance learning. She created a program to assist teachers in improving the self-image of children and has written resources to assist teachers in incorporating higher level thinking activities into every subject in the curriculum. Cooke has trained teachers and administrators from various states and has spoken at national conferences.
