Don't Get So Upset: Help Young Children Manage Their Feelings by Understanding Your Own

In this book, Dr. Jacobson furnishes parents and teachers with a roadmap for understanding their own feelings and emotions to become more effective caregivers. Through reference to prominent Israeli psychologist Haim Ginott, Dr. Jacobson discusses the importance of fully understanding one's own emotions (e.g., anger, anxiety) as a prerequisite to fostering children's development. Dr. Jacobson also discusses the primacy of the relationship between the caregiver-child and cites this as particularly important for educational contexts. As a child psychologist, I am surprised to learn that teacher education programs do not more fully emphasize the relationship between the teacher and the student. Over fifty years ago, eminent U.S. psychologist, Carl Rogers, wrote about the importance of the relationship between the therapist and the client for engendering therapeutic change. Roger's book "On Becoming a Person" is credited with creating the person-centered approach to psychotherapy. This approach has been shown to account for the greatest proportion of statistical variance within studies that measure therapeutic change. It is a little known fact that within "On Becoming a Person," Rogers also wrote about the importance of the relationship between the teacher and student and cited this relationship as the most important aspect of promoting student learning. Although Dr. Jacobson does not reference Rogers in her book, she emphasizes a relationship-centered approach to pedagogical practice. Given the position of the teacher in the classroom, I am astonished that the field of teacher education lacks a coherent literature base that talks about the importance of unconditional positive regard within the pedagogical relationship. Dr. Jacobson's book deftly addresses this topic and should be required reading for all teacher educators.
Professor & Director, School Psychology Program