Book Review: What’s My Tween Thinking? by Tanith Carey

Book Review: What’s My Tween Thinking? by Tanith Carey | AD

As a parent of a tween I’m very excited that What’s My Tween Thinking? by Tanith Carey has been published now. I loved reading Tanith Carey’s previous books – What’s My Child Thinking? and What’s My Teenager Thinking? – and am really happy that she’s now covered this important stage of childhood too. All three books have been written together with clinical psychologist Angharad Rudkin as consultant editor.

The younger year group and the teenage year group get quite a lot of attention in books and other media, while the tween group tends to get less attention even though there’s a lot going on for a child at this age too. Sure, they don’t need quite as much help as a younger child, but they still need support and guidance. They’re not quite going through puberty yet and all that brings but things have started to change and they are becoming more grown up. It all happens quite quickly and tweens need their parents support to grow into resilient, happy teens. This is where a helpful book like What’s My Tween Thinking? can be an excellent tool for parents.

What’s My Tween Thinking? is an easy-to-use parenting handbook for parents of children in that tricky in-between phase, around 8-12 years old. The book takes you through 75 real-world scenarios which is a such a great format for a book like this. You can read the book from cover to cover or look up scenarios as you come across them when parenting your tween.

The book takes you through each scenario, what you as the parent might be thinking, what your tween might be thinking, and how you could respond in the moment and in the long term, gently guiding you through difficult moments and discussions.

At the start of the book you’ll also find a few helpful pages that cover tween development, your own tween years for reflection, and prompts to think about your family values. The rest of the book has the 75 scenarios, split into two main chapters: “Your 8-10-Year-Old” and “Your 10-12-Year-Old”.

What’s My Tween Thinking? is a great book for parents of tweens, or parents about to enter this stage of parenthood. The tween years can be very challenging for both parents and children, and, prepared with this book to guide them, parents can confidently guide their tweens and support them so that they have the tools that they need to become emotionally healthy teens when the time comes.

Buy your copy of What’s My Tween Thinking? here.

Collaboration. This book was kindly provided for reviewing purposes. As always, all my reviews are 100% honest and all thoughts and opinions are my own.