You Are My World: How a Parent's Love Shapes a Baby's Mind - Hardcover

Together, the pictures and words of You Are My World lend a whole new meaning to the phrase “baby talk.” By pairing lovely black-and-white photographs of infants with captions that reflect reality as seen through their newborn eyes, the book celebrates the continually miraculous interaction that occurs between babies and the most significant people in their young lives—their mothers and fathers.

Children’s minds are molded by experience, and science tells us that the way a parent touches, holds, looks at, and responds to a baby has a lifelong impact on the way that this brand-new person will come to see the world and his or her place within it. You Are My World gratefully acknowledges the profoundly shaping influence that a parent’s love and attention have on a baby’s mental and emotional development.

“Your love is my first teacher,” says one of the adorable infants portrayed here. Like each of the book’s captions, this simple but poetic statement captures and illuminates every baby’s desire for, receptivity to, and sheer delight in a parent’s love. Featuring a die-cut frame in which parents can place a photo of their own child, You Are My World will become a treasured family keepsake. "You Are My World ... evokes the powerful reality of how the parent-infant relationship sculpts the minds and brains of our children.  Amy Hatkoff has offered us an exquisite tour of the intimate human connections ... from which our deepest sense of self emerges.  What a wonder-filled gift to help all parents ...  Bravo!"
Daniel J. Siegel, MD
Author, The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are; The Mindful Brain: Reflection and Attunement in the Cultivation of Well-Being;
Co-Author, Parenting from the Inside Out: How a Deeper Self-Understanding Can Help You Raise Children Who Thrive
  
“You Are My World captures the subtle nonverbal behaviors of babies that express a far wider range of emotional experience than is often recognized or responded to. The photographs ... convey the power and importance of nonverbal communication and bring us closer to the best in humans and in ourselves.”
         Joshua D. Sparrow, M.D.
           Assistant Professor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
           Supervisor of Inpatient Psychiatry, Children's Hospital, Boston
           Associate Director of the Brazelton Touchpoints Center
           Co-Author of eight books with Dr. T. Berry Brazelton
       
“You Are My World should be mandatory reading for every parent.  Parents new and seasoned cannot afford not to read this book.  If every family began a tradition by passing this book on to future generations, just think of all the happy and healthy children in our world!  You Are My World is BRILLIANT!!  Kudos!”
Ross Ellis
                Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Love Our Children USA
 
 
 
 
" This book is a treasure.  It is a wonderful, concise treatise on the abilities of the newborn.  It supercedes Ashley Montague and Frederick LeBoyer and their approach.  It brings you right into the heart of the newborn, giving them a strong and clear voice of what it takes to become the ‘possible human.’  A remarkable, beautiful piece of work.”
Barbara Harper
Founder /Director, Waterbirth International
 
 
“You Are My World is a wonderful resource for displaying parental empathy. The value and beauty of nurturing children is so eloquently displayed in this book. I highly recommend it as a resource for parents and parent educators.”
Stephen J. Bavolek, Ph.D.
Founder, Nurturing Parenting Programs and Adult-Adolescent Parenting Inventory 
  
“You Are My World is a brilliant piece of work.”
Peggy Kaufman
Director of The Center for Early Relationship Support at Jewish Family & Children’s Services
  
“Like the babies it features, this little book is a mini-miracle.  One part information, one part inspiration, one part love, Hatkoff’s You Are My World is a gift of a book ...  It is a spoonful of sugar helping state-of-the-science knowledge go down ever so smoothly, energizing grown-ups for the good responsive care that all little ones need.”
            Rebecca Shahmoon Shanok, LCSW, PhD
Executive Director, Institute for Infants, Children & Families
Co-Founder, New York Zero-to-Three Network
 
 "You Are My World is a beautiful book that every new parent should have in their library."
Harold S. Koplewicz, MD
                Founder and Director, NYU Child Study Center

AMY HATKOFF is a parenting educator, writer, filmmaker, and advocate and has been working with parents and children of diverse backgrounds for more than 20 years. In 1999, at the request of then Vice President Al Gore, she created a plan for a National Parenting Education Program to make support services and information on child development easily available to parents. She is co-producer of the award-winning documentary Neglect Not The Children and co-author of the book How to Save the Children. She lives in New York City.