By Jan Kristal, M.A.

Once you understand the basics of temperament, you can use that knowledge to address children’s behavior challenges and improve classroom interactions. This is your practical guide to understanding and working with children’s individual temperaments.

You’ll start with a review of how temperament traits combine to affect behavior, and you’ll look at age-specific behavior patterns and temperaments typically seen in infants, toddlers, preschoolers, and school-age children. Then you’ll examine environmental factors that influence children’s behavior in five different settings: home, school, child care, health care, and mental health settings. Throughout the book, with the help of case studies and examples, you’ll find tips and techniques for

• addressing specific behavior challenges such as aggression, shyness, and noncompliance
  
  
• adapting the environment and adjusting learning tasks with sensitivity to individual temperaments
  
  
• creating goodness of fit between you and each child
  
  
• helping children develop peer relationships
  
  
• nurturing each child’s self-esteem
  
  
• encouraging children to learn self-management skills
  
  
• working with parents to help them understand their child and address his or her challenges

Guidelines on when to seek outside help are included, and two appendixes provide information on age-specific temperament questionnaires and further readings. Based on the author’s research and clinical work with more than 600 families and children at Kaiser Permanente’s Temperament Program and her private practice, this book has the practical guidance you need to transform knowledge of temperament into positive interactions and better outcomes.

Foreword, by Stella Chess, M.D.

Section I: Understanding Temperament

1. The Concept of Temperament: What Is It? Who Uses It?
   
   
2. Goodness of Fit: Getting Along with Each Other and the Environment
   
   
3. The Temperament Profile: Your Guide to Behavior

Section II: Looking at Temperament Through Childhood

4. Infants: Unique from the Beginning
   
   
5. Toddlers and Preschoolers: Energy, Expression, and Exploration
   
   
6. School-Age Children: Learning, Working, Making Friends

Section III: Using the Temperament Perspective

7. Working with Parents
   
   
8. Temperament and Child Care
   
   
9. Temperament in Educational Settings
   
   
10. Temperament in Health Care Settings
    
    
11. Temperament in Mental Health Settings
    
    
12. Beyond Temperament: When to Seek Outside Help
    
    
13. Temperament Stability and Future Directions

Appendix A: Temperament Questionnaires
Appendix B: Temperament Reading List
Appendix C: Temperament Resources