Helping Kids Achieve Their Dreams: Review You are Awesome by Matthew Syed

Helping Kids Achieve Their Dreams: Review You are Awesome by Matthew Syed

You Are Awesome is a fantastic book all about helping kids turn dreams into something they can really achieve. And who doesn’t want to be awesome?

Author Matthew Syed has filled this wonderful ‘how to’ book with strategies, hints and tips on changing your mind set and overcoming fears and anxieties to fulfil your potential. His aim is to challenge any beliefs that are holding children back and get them on track to achieving what they set out to do.

As a parent, do you ever hear this?

‘I’ve had enough’

‘I’m no good at it’

‘He/she’s bound to be better than me’

Then You Are Awesome looks at the importance of the right mindset and the role that this plays in helping kids achieve their dreams. By looking at a fixed mind set vs a growth mind set, Syed shows how to change the way your kids think about what they can do, even before taking action.

With chapters titles that include: From kid average to kid awesome, Your fantastic elastic (& plastic brain) and Small steps and giant leap, Syed not only gives kids strategies for overcoming anxieties and worries but provides real life examples from highly recognisable successful people e.g. Michael Jordan, Steve Jobs, Serena Williams and JK Rowling, all of whom have made lots of mistakes along their path to success.

You Are Awesome delves into these stories and the way that our brains operate and comes up with concrete things that can help kids over the initial hurdles and on the path to becoming positive about their achievements and keen to do more.

While this book deals with some big issues, it’s written in a witty and very accessible style and as a former table-tennis champion, author Matthew Syed speaks with first-hand experience about the importance of practice, determination and a positive attitude.

It may be of benefit to read this with your younger child so that you can talk through some of the strategies, but it would also be a good idea to mention it to your older children and then leave it out where they can pick it up and read it themselves. Ages 9+

Purchase a copy of You Are Awesome 

Matthew Syed is a leading columnist and feature writer for The Times and the host of the UK’s biggest podcast: Flintoff, Savage and the Ping Pong Guy on BBC Radio 5. Matthew also gives business talks to major international corporate clients. Before becoming a writer, Matthew was the England table tennis number one for almost a decade, three times Commonwealth Champion, and twice he represented Great Britain in the Olympic Games.

Matthew Syed’s first book, Bounce: The Myth of Talent and the Power of Practice, was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year. His second, Black Box Thinking, was a Sunday Times No.1 bestseller. He has also published a collection of his award-winning sports columns in The Greatest.

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    Matthew Syed
    About the author

    Matthew Syed

    Matthew Syed is a leading columnist and feature writer for The Times and the host of the UK's biggest podcast: Flintoff, Savage and the Ping Pong Guy on BBC Radio 5. Matthew also gives business talks to major international corporate clients including. Before becoming a writer Matthew was the England table tennis number one for almost a decade, three times Commonwealth Champion, and he twice represented Great Britain in the Olympic Games.Matthew Syed's first book, Bounce: The Myth of Talent and the Power of Practice, was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year. His second, Black Box Thinking, was a Sunday Times No.1 bestseller. He has also published a collection of his award-winning sports columns in The Greatest.

    Books by Matthew Syed

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