Your Nine Year Old Thoughtful and Mysterious

What happened to that sunny outgoing child of eight? As parents of nine-year-olds often discover, nine is a tricky age. Children are more distant from Mother and Father; they're more independant and rely on friends for companionship, or they have a tendency to spend time alone. Some nines are boisterous and wild, others thoughtful and withdrawn. Helping parents learn how to cope with the unpredictable nine-year-old is the aim of this practical guide from the Gesell Institute. Nine-year-olds are hovering on the brink of adolescence, and this in part contributes to their up-and-down nature. Dr. Louis Bates Ames and Carol Chase Haber paint a vivid picture of the child at this age and offer useful advice to make life easier for parents and children alike.

Louise Bates Ames (1908–1996) was a lecturer at the Yale Child Study Center and assistant professor emeritus at Yale University. She was co-founder of the Gesell Institute of Child Development and collaborator or co-author of three dozen books, including The First Five Years of Life, Infant and Child in the Culture of Today, Child Rorschach Responses, and Your One-Year-Old through Your Ten- to Fourteen-Year-Old series.

Carol Chase Haber is a school psychologist in the Hamilton County, Ohio, school system and is a trained and qualified Gesell Examiner. She is the coauthor of several books, including He Hit Me First, Your Seven-Year-Old, Your Eight-Year-Old, and Your Nine-Year-Old.