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For Release: January 20, 2003
Contact: Elizabeth Upham Howell
802/860-1814
elizabeth@emilypost.com

Etiquette Experts to Appear at Sanibel Book Shop
Peggy Post & Cindy Post Senning
Friday, February 7, 12 - 2 p.m.

Sanibel Island—January 20, 2003—Etiquette experts and authors Peggy Post and Cindy Post Senning, Ed.D. will appear at the Sanibel Island Bookshop on Friday, Feb. 7 from noon – 2 p.m. to sign copies of their new book “The Gift of Good Manners: A Parent’s Guide to Raising Respectful, Kind, Considerate Children” (HarperCollins). The event is free and open to the public.

Can respect be taught? Are parents failing to teach manners to children? Can a 14-year-old boy be convinced that table manners matter? How can you help a child withstand teasing and bullying without becoming resentful? What to do when another parent’s or teacher’s rules vary greatly from your own? Was it easier to teach manners to children forty years ago?

Answers and solutions are found in the Post’s book. Cindy and Peggy (who are third generation family members of Emily Post) argue that manners are unquestionably essential for every child’s lifelong success and self confidence. According to Peggy Post, who writes a monthly manners column in Parents and Good Housekeeping magazines, “Manners education is inseparable from the other things a parent or primary caregiver must do to raise a responsible, self-sufficient child. It’s not a kind of add-on that be attended to after the schoolwork and the soccer, ballet and piano lessons are done. Instead, teaching and modeling good manners are integral to daily family life.”

The book is organized around three key principles: 1) it is best to model and teach manners virtually from birth to adolescence; 2) manners education is most effective when geared to a child’s normal development; and 3) Mannerly behavior gives both children and adults the self confidence to navigate daily life.

The book is divided into six sections, based on age, from birth through the high school years. In each chapter, manners and teaching methods are geared to children’s particular capabilities during those years. Each section of “THE GIFT OF GOOD MANNERS” is divided into five chapters that deal with core manners topics including:

• Values and ethics: For each age: how to model and teach the values you want to instill in your child—from empathy and truthfulness to sportsmanship and self-discipline.
• Respect for self and others: One of the fundamental principles of etiquette. It’s importance and how to teach it at any age. Building relationships with sibling, peers, family members, coaches and teachers; sharing; good sportsmanship; care of personal property, and taking responsibility for chores.
• Spoken and written communications: The art of conversation, listening and speaking skills, on the telephone, e-mail, writing letters and thank-you notes—the importance of the learning to be a good communicator.
• Table manners: from the mechanics of eating to the social aspects of dining, an age by age guide for teaching manners at the table.
• Out and about: For any situation outside the home: restaurant outings, in the car, on the school bus, attending parties, introducing people, shopping, going to a friend’s house or the library. Everything you need to know to teach your child to handle these situations.

According to Cindy Post Senning, the book’s approach is positive: “Rather than talking about problems that need to be fixed, we help parents teach kids to develop the right instincts and behaviors from the start. We believe kids—even teenagers—can and want to be respectful, kind and considerate.”

"THE GIFT OF GOOD MANNERS” focuses on understanding and modeling the principles and values that are the foundation of manners, and then shows parents ways to help their children take on these values and make them their own. The Posts also weigh in on topics such as children with special needs, the over-programmed child, etiquette for the new American family, overcoming obstacles in parent-to-parent relationships, dealing with problems at school and helping your teenager through the college application process. These sections, called “For Every Age” are found at the end of each section.

Peggy Post is the author of ten etiquette books and a monthly manners column in Parents and Good Housekeeping magazines. Her sister-in-law Cindy Post Senning holds a doctorate in education and is a former elementary school principal, teacher and registered nurse. “THE GIFT OF GOOD MANNERS” combines 80 years of Post family experience in etiquette and is the third Post text on the importance of teaching manners to children. Emily Post wrote “Children are People” in 1940 and Elizabeth Post wrote “Please, Say Please” in 1972.

About the Authors
Peggy Post is the author of ten etiquette books, including “Emily Post’s Etiquette” and “The Etiquette Advantage in Business.” She writes monthly columns in Parents and Good Housekeeping magazines and is the etiquette expert at WeddingChannel.com, the Internet’s most popular wedding resources for engaged couples. Peggy also contributes weekly etiquette quizzes to ivillage.com. Peggy conducts hundreds of media interviews annually and has appeared on programs including The Today Show, Live with Regis & Kelly, Oprah!, The View and Good Morning America.

Cindy Post Senning holds a doctorate in education and is a former elementary school principal, teacher and registered nurse. She is also director of The Emily Post Institute. She has spent years in the classroom, as a teacher, school nurse and health educator, reaching children in grades K-12. She developed and directed the Maternal Child Health Program for Vermont Home Health & Hospice and has taught childbirth classes as well expectant parents classes for more than seven years.