Written for parents of children from birth through to adulthood (ages 0-25), this book helps you examine your role as teacher to your child, as guide, advocate, and perhaps most importantly, as a human being who doesn’t always have the right answers. While your child’s brain, body, emotions, and social abilities develop over time, I write in Imperfect Parenting about how your skills as a parent can develop too, provided you put your energy into practicing relationship fundamentals such as acceptance, positivity, social support, boundaries, respect, self-care, and gratitude.
Published in September, 2021, this is the third book in the Being Smart series by Dona Matthews and Joanne Foster. Being Smart About Gifted Children was published in 2004. It won several awards and sold over 10,000 copies, and was followed by Being Smart About Gifted Education in 2009, which also received rave reviews from parents, educators, critics, and others interested in supporting kids’ gifted learning needs.
In a stress-filled and fast-paced world, it is more important than ever that parents know something about the coping skills their children will need for resiliency and success across the lifespan. Beyond Intelligence provides that knowledge. It’s a book that I wrote with Joanne Foster for parents and teachers interested in helping children and teens become the strongest, most confident, most fulfilled, and most successful people they can be.
"This is far and away the best parenting book I have ever read, and I have read hundreds of them. Imperfect Parenting has a solid science base, but it’s not for eggheads; it’s for real parents who have real kids. Dona Matthews’s message reassures anyone who is a parent or hopes to become one: Building a relationship with your child will bring you the confidence to face any parenting challenge, and your love for each other will just keep on growing. Your child will thank you."
"Imperfect Parenting is brimming with life-changing insights. Dona Matthews, with compassionate and incisive expertise, distills the latest research into understandable tips and tools that can help any parent. But perhaps more important, she outlines a new approach to parenting that will make us more effective as parents and strengthen our relationships with our children. Dr. Matthews does this by combating the punishingly perfectionistic culture around parenting today, that tells us that unless we’ve checked every box on the “good parenting checklist,” we have failed. Imperfect Parenting instead empowers parents to embrace imperfection constructively, and approach every challenge with renewed confidence and hope."
“The writing is absolutely masterful – vibrant, rich, warm, smart, accessible. The “Our Secrets” section is brilliant. Beyond Intelligence is, well, beyond excellent!”Felice Kaufmann, PhD, Creativity expert”
"Parents everywhere will be edified and empowered by this inspiring book.”
“By presenting exciting new work on mindsets, as well as recent research findings on expertise and cognitive neuroscience, these authors show the importance of habits of mind in cognitive development. This book will prompt re-examination of many long-held beliefs!”
“Being Smart about Gifted Learning is a brilliant book that empowers and enlightens parents with essential information about optimizing their child’s educational, social, and emotional experiences. Drs. Matthews and Foster have a winning formula: helping children and teens discover the right combination of safety and challenge to support life-long resilience and creativity.”
Photo by Krista Fogel Photography
I love working with parents and kids as they think about how to live the lives they want to lead. I also love the mental challenge of putting their experiences—and mine—into words that others can use as they work out how they want to live their lives, in ways that align with current research findings on the brain and human development. I’ve published widely on child and adolescent development, with a focus on encouraging exceptional children’s strengths and interests, and I write a blog for Psychology Today where I explore parents’ questions about divorce, sleep problems, behavior issues, giftedness, stress management, mindfulness, and lots more.