Which book for emotional skills?

seeker

Mon, Dec 10 2018, 2:54 am

I'm looking specifically at these two new releases that I saw in a store and looked really great, but I am open to other suggestions as long as it's not too overwhelming and making it even harder to choose Wink

I'm looking for something to help a child (middle elementary school, independent reader) who struggles with emotional coping. The child hates talking or being talked to about emotional ideas so I like the idea of giving them a book to see if something sinks in that way. I think both of these books could be useful but I want to choose just one to buy for now.

1 - https://www.feldheim.com/as-st......html
"As Strong as Can Be" by Chaim Walder.
I like that this seems to include a lot of different emotions and skills, and very solid CBT principles to deal with them. But on the other hand, I'm concerned it could be too much to take in usefully. It's a big book so I didn't have a chance to look at it very well in the store, so I'm wondering if anyone has a more personal review of it. One big plus is that it has comic strip stories in it, but on the other hand most kids would probably just jump to the comics and there's a lot of text that looked important. Anyone who has this book, can you say whether the comic stories actually teach the skills or at least make you interested in reading more about whatever the comic was about?

2. https://www.judaicaplace.com/m.....3511/
"Mindsets and Me" by Rifka Schonfeld
Opposite to the other book, this focuses on one specific skill which can be a good thing. And it's a skill that is very impactful across many areas. I looked at it in a store. First it has one page per month with a scenario from the fixed mindset kid's view, and then it has the same from the growth mindset kid. So basically 12 scenarios, depicted by a picture and a paragraph of the kid's thoughts (e.g. the first one was something like "Oh no, I woke up late, now the whole day is going to be a disaster because...and I'm always going to be late") And then at the end there's a cute feature where it gives a few scenarios of the negative thinking and the kid is supposed to think about what they could say instead, and then there are "decoder glasses" to read the positive thought. It looked very cute and fun, though a little disappointing that there seemed to be only one page of that. It was also a little confusing to me that they first give all the wrong ones, then all the right ones, instead of alternating so you can contrast them side by side. I'm sure it was a deliberate choice, but it's an interesting one.

Anyone familiar with these books and can recommend one over the other?