Kid Confidential: An Insider’s Guide to Grown-Ups, by Monte Montgomery, 149 pages.
It’s important for kids to understand adults – and that’s the purpose of this tongue-in-cheek insider’s “guide” to grown-ups, written for kids.
Let’s face it – adults have several advantages over kids. They’re bigger. They’re more experienced. They don’t have classes, teachers, homework and studying (usually). They get to make decisions … and they can embarrass their children without even trying!
How can kids get the “upper hand”?
Enter Kids Confidential. Young people can learn all there is to know about the characteristics, strange habits and mysterious behaviour of adults at home and elsewhere. They’ll learn to identify the various types and subtypes of adults, learn how they got that way, and discover “diabolical tactics and tricky strategies that will help to level the playing field between kids and adults”.
Kids will also learn the answers to puzzling questions such as “Why do adults drink coffee?”, “Why do grown-ups laugh even at jokes that don’t make any sense?”, “Why do parents always ask you “How was school today?” and “What do teachers really talk about in the teachers’ lounge?” They’ll discover the secrets and meanings of “adultspeak” - surely one of the most mysterious languages in the world.
What are some of the things that are almost certain to make adults roll their eyes, leave the room or “blow their stack”? Kid Confidential doesn’t fail to include this essential information.
Young readers will thoroughly enjoy Monte Montgomery’s hilarious, kid-empowering guide to the complex and mysterious world of adulthood. (If you’re lucky, they might even share it with the adults in their life!)
** Recommended for ages 8 to 12 years.
Dude, That’s Rude! (Get some Manners), by Pamela Espeland and Elizabeth Verdick, 117 pages.
Are good manners relevant, or are they simply a bunch of bothersome, outdated rules invented to make life miserable and complicated? Will you ever need to use them? Does anyone care about them, and why are they often so hard to remember?
Why do manners seem so important to adults … and so insignificant to kids?
The truth is that manners are still relevant. They are skills that you’ll use for the rest of your life, and good manners (or their absence) say a lot about you. Manners weren’t invented to make life miserable – instead, they exist to make life more pleasant.
Manners are important anywhere, anytime. When you have good manners, you know how to act in all kinds of situations. People will enjoy being with you. You’ll have more self-confidence.
Good manners are important to use at home, on the playground, and at school.
Believe it or not, manners should even be used in the school cafeteria. That’s right – despite appearances, it really isn’t the place for rude food. (Good manners in the cafeteria definitely do NOT include: food-throwing, noodle-slurping, putting straws in your nose, wiping your fingers on your friends, or worse.)
And here’s a secret: the more you use good manners, the easier they are to remember!
In a humorous but informative fashion, Dude, That’s Rude! will provide kids with the necessary do’s and don’ts of good manners, the reasons why they are important, and lots of effective “smooth moves” for sticky situations.
** Recommended for ages 8 to 13 years.
These reviews appeared in The Stratford Gazette on May 10, 2012. Written by Sally Hengeveld, Librarian.
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