Think for Yourself: A Kid's Guide to Solving Life's Dilemmas and Other Sticky Problems

by Cynthia MacGregor, Paula J. Becker (Illustrator)

What if you find out that your friend likes to shoplift? What if a buddy suggests that the two of you say mean things about a classmate anonymously online? What if a classmate wants you to help him cheat on a math test? None of these situations is easy to deal with. Rather than tell them what to do or not to do, Think for Yourself offers realistic advice on how to make smart choices that kids can feel good about. The author uses examples of difficult situations which most kids will face; predicaments might involve friends, family, and grown-ups. With the confidence and problem-solving skills readers will gain, they'll be able to handle dilemmas now and in the future.
This New Edition contains new dilemmas (including issues like internet safety and online etiquette), a new cover, new interior illustrations, and 48 pages of new content.

144 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2003

About the author

Prolific author Cynthia MacGregor has had 54 (at last count!) books published conventionally and another over-50 published as e-books. A full-time freelance writer/editor, she works from a home office In Palm Springs FL, just outside West Palm Beach, where she writes books, ghostwrites books for others, writes “almost anything if the price is right” (web copy, catalog copy, advertisements, business materials, and lots more), and edits books, magazines, websites, and “whatever else needs editing.”

She loves writing so much that it’s even one of her hobbies. For example, she writes all the plays produced by the Palm Springs Players, a South Florida community theatre group, for which she gets “no money but lots of enjoyment.” She also enjoys wordplay with an online punsters group, PUNY, and when possible travels to the annual O. Henry World Championship Pun-Off, a wordplay event held every May in Austin, TX, where she has appeared some years as a competitor and other years as a judge.

Cynthia is site owner of both www.TheSoloParent.com and www.ThePublicApology.com and is producer and host of Solo Parenting, a weekly TV show seen in South Florida, whose audience is single parents, whether divorced, widowed, or never-married, custodial or visitational, moms or dads.

Loving her career, Cynthia believes herself truly blessed and says, “There is no one in the world whom I’d want to trade lives with.”

Reviews

[Lori · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great dilemmas: friends, family and grown ups to really get kids to think about solutions: some that may work, and others that could make things much worse. I plan to use a few as class discussion starters, and others as story writing prompts. Perfect for students in grades 3-6.

[Kellie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A useful guide that helps young people deal with problems. It provides a good framework for coming up with solutions -- questions to ask, possible outcomes, why some solutions may be better than others. I really appreciated the fact that it presents dilemmas that kids may face when dealing with adults, and not just their peers.