You know your child is gifted when ... A beginner's guide to life on the bright side. (Book Reviews).

Galbraith, J. (with illustrations by K. Vinton). (2000). You know your child is gifted when ... A beginner's guide to life on the bright side. Minneapolis, MN: Free Spirit Press (120 pp., $10.95, paper, ISBN 1-57542-076-7).

This is such a little book -- six inches by six inches, gaily illustrated with cartoons and stories and barely a hundred pages long -- that one would be tempted to give it short shrift. Judy Galbraith, who is the founding president of Free Spirit Publishing, is also the author of the popular and wise The Gifted Kids' Survival Guides. This book for parents is in the same tradition and has the same light-hearted way of packing a punch. It does not address any topic in depth, but it is incisive nevertheless. It does not seek to be comprehensive, but it deals with a wide variety of topics and introduces parents to multiple issues they may not yet have considered.

The book is organized around eight groups of characteristics of gifted children: advanced intellectual ability; verbal proficiency; curiosity; creativity; high energy; focus, passion, intensity; logical thinking; and sense of humor. Galbraith's two decades of teaching gifted children and youth, their parents, and their teachers shows up as she describes the children and offers parents concrete, focused strategies. As she describes each child-characteristic, she addresses parents' quandaries with down-to-earth advice that is as solidly rooted in research as possible, though you'd never know this from a casual reading.

About many characteristics of gifted children, for example, she lists the "good things" and the "not-so-good things." Speaking of verbal proficiency: "It's wonderful to have a child who can express herself clearly, colorfully, and eloquently ... a child you can really talk to...: but ... (she) might have trouble making friends with children her age, simply because other kids don't understand what she's saying. This might be a child who learns early to manipulate other people with words.... Plus what if she never shuts up?" (p. 18). Her advice to help your "chatty child" is to encourage her verbal gifts, learn new words with her, find friends your child can talk to, teach her to be a good listener, and preserve some nontalking times each day.

For whom is this wise little book? It is, indeed, for the beginners, not the intermediate or advanced parents of gifted children -- unless they are feeling tired of it all and need an "upper" or a quick review. A grandmother who knows she has a gifted grandchild might give it to her son or daughter by way of tactful introduction. A mother who knows her child is advanced might share it with a husband who doesn't yet "get it." A parent might share it with a teacher or principal (or school board member) who is resistant to the idea that gifted children are "different" but who has a sense of humor, nevertheless. A teacher might give it to parents who haven't recognized their child's difference. A psychologist who has tested a child whose parents are concerned about her school boredom might start with this one. And a college professor teaching a course on gifted children might assign it as a way of supplementing discussion of educational issues with an upbeat view of how gifted students look at home. Even "experts" might sneak a peak themselves!

Reviewed by Nancy Robinson, Professor Emerita of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Washington and former director of what is now known as the Halbert and Nancy Robinson Center for Young Scholars.