Gail Reichlin

She knows firsthand that raising children today is often quite challenging and that all parents can use some tips, compassion and humor to ease their occasional feelings of anxiety, guilt and incompetence when things don't go as planned. She and her co-author, Caroline Winkler offer exactly that in their best selling book, The Pocket Parent-an A -Z quick-read guide for parents of 2-to 5-year-olds.

Reichlin is a dynamic, experienced, keynote speaker who incorporates humor and true stories into her presentations. She teaches an approach to discipline that preserves the child's self-esteem while at the same time sets clear and consistent limits. She offers both parents and teachers a philosophy of better ways to discipline kids while remaining sane in the process.

Reichlin is also a freelance writer on family issues and is well known for her wit and wisdom relating to positive discipline and communication skills that are effective during the early years. Her parenting articles and interviews have appeared in numerous publications, including the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun Times, American Baby Magazine, Parenting Magazine and Work and Family, the national corporate newsletter. She has also been interviewed by Deborah Norville as well as by many local radio and TV personalities for her views on raising children today.

The Pulitzer-Lerner Newspapers selected Reichlin as a candidate for citizen of the year in her hometown of Skokie, IL for her many years serving her community through The Parents Resource Network (PRN). Since 1984, this non-profit, all-volunteer organization, has provided avenues of support and education focused on strengthening families with young children. Gail is proud to have facilitated more than 800 parenting lecture/discussions in a number of Chicago communities, featuring noted childcare experts from around the world as well as local professionals.

Additionally, she established a telephone help line called The Parents Resource Network Warm Line, welcoming parents to call for help before a true crisis occurs (therefore, different from a "hotline"). With today's technology, the warm line has extended from its local Skokie base into vast "cyberspace" allowing parents throughout the world to ask questions and receive answers and "verbal hugs" of support via e-mail. To date, The Parents Resource Network has helped tens of thousands of moms and dads feel more confident as parents as they are encouraged to filter the "expert" advice through their personality and parenting style and use what makes good sense for their families.

Because Reichlin recognized and understood that busy parents craved easy access to sensible child rearing information, she developed and published the PRN Lecture Library, consisting of thirty-five, 90-minute, audiocassette tapes featuring experts addressing a variety of parenting concerns. These tapes catered to the needs of the parents on the go. The PRN Lecture Library received accolades from Library Journal and can be found in more than 800 public libraries, hospitals, schools, organizations, and corporate human resource departments throughout the world.

Her book was designed to meet the same need by presenting hundreds of fast answers organized in an easy access A-Z format, helping today's often frazzled parents make good choices in communicating more effectively with their children. Peppered with compassion and humor, The Pocket Parent offers instant relief as well as long-term understanding to both mothers and fathers facing the everyday challenges their children present.

Reichlin is also a 30-year veteran preschool teacher. She began her teaching career as one of the first bilingual Head Start teachers in the Pilsen community, a Spanish speaking sector of Chicago's inner city. She then spent the next twenty years teaching a variety of classes in nursery schools located in Chicago's North Shore suburbs. She especially enjoyed working with the children and their mothers in her Moms and Tots classes.

In 1999, she and Caroline Winkler hosted a call-in cable TV show called "The Bottom Line for Busy Parents''. Each week they invited a guest to address a worrisome issue for parents of children aged 2-12. Their goal was to help parents feel more confident raising their children by offering expert opinion, discussion, compassion, and humor. This was their same objective in writing their best selling book, The Pocket Parent.