Cribsheet
"With Expecting Better, award-winning economist Emily Oster spotted a need in the pregnancy market for advice that gave women the information they needed to make the best decision for their own pregnancies. By digging into the data, Oster found that much of the conventional pregnancy wisdom was wrong. In Cribsheet, she now tackles an even great challenge: decision making in the early years of parenting. As any new parent knows, there is an abundance of often-conflicting advice hurled at you from doctors, family, friends, and the internet. From the earliest days, parents get the message that they must make certain choices around feeding, sleep, and schedule or all will be lost. There's a rule -- or three -- for everything. But the benefits of these choices can be overstated, and the tradeoffs can be profound. How do you make your own best decision? Armed with the data, Oster finds that the conventional wisdom doesn't always hold up. She debunks myths around breastfeeding (not a panacea), sleep training (not so bad!), potty training (wait until they're ready or possibly bribe with M&Ms), language acquisition (early talkers aren't necessarily geniuses), and many other topics. She also shows parents how to think through freighted questions like if and how to go back to work, how to think about toddler discipline, and how to have a relationship and parent at the same time.
Stats for nerds
9recommend
13mentions
13people
2019–2025years
69% recommend31% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- One factor that has been studied has having a major impact on quality especially in younger years is teacher to student ratio, the less student per teacher, the better the quality. It usually also helps with retention :). I do think that retention is a good element, when looking for my son's school, I read the reviews on Glassdoor and on https://www.internationalschoolsreview.com (paid site) to get a better idea of what teachers thought of the school.
If looking at Montessori, check for certifications. Are they AMI or AMS certified? Those are the two most serious qualifications. If they are not certified, then I think you should be sceptical. Not being certified doesn't mean that the school is necessarily bad but there's a lot of school that trade on Montessori just for marketing purposes and it doesn't bode well for the quality of education when the owner is willing to mislead parents by claiming they're Montessori when they don't try to become certified.
Within alternative schools, Regio Emilia can be good but, from my experience, it's even more dependent on the teacher since there's less structure and it falls on the teacher to take children's input and guide the class toward interesting discussion and group projects. My son went to a Regio Emilia pre-nursery (2 to 3 years old, 2 hours a day) and didn't like it as much as he likes his current Montessori kindergarten. He complains anytime there's a public holiday because he would like to go to school.
I recommend against Waldorf because even though they have some aspects that look good (nature, play based), the underlying philosophy is bat-shit crazy.
Resources if you're interested: - Montessori: The Science behind the Genius by Angeline S. Lillard. Rather academic discussion on the different elements of Montessori education and what studies and research supports it. It's interesting if you're interested in education. I do think that sometimes the author is a bit biased and tries to stretch the meaning of studies to fit her preconceived notion that everything Montessori related is the best thing since sliced bread. In particular, within Montessori there's a weird belief that fantasy elements (like stories with talking animals, etc) are not suitable for children below 6 because they can't reliably distinguish between fantasy and reality. It's something I personally disagree with and the studies that she tries to use to support that point are not really that convincing. - Cribsheet by Emily Oster has a chapter on picking pre-schools that can be useful (and I think applies well to Kindergarten). (I don't always agree with that writer but I do feel that she sometimes has useful points of view)
- It says that there is like a 10x risk of SIDS in the first four months of life with tummy sleeping.
I don't agree with her on everything, but Emily Oster's chapter on SIDS (in the second book I think, Cribsheet) I think does a good job outlining the data on it. And my brother just had a kid who also would absolutely not sleep on his back. Once he could roll he just sleeps on his tummy (but once they can roll SIDS is not really an issue)
- I would recommend reading Cribsheet by Emily Oster. She is an economics professor who got obsessed with figuring out what advice people give actually has solid evidence supporting it, and what is bullshit.
I've also used this site https://www.whattoexpect.com/first-year/month-by-month/ which gives you a decent idea of what to expect from your baby each month.
Also for me, the first 4 months were pretty rough. Lack of sleep for everyone, and wife still recovering from birth both mentally and physically. But after 4 months it got a lot better, and has actually been a lot of fun. Hopefully things will get better for you and your family too!
- I've got a few that I read most, if not every time they hit my inbox:
Slow Boring by Matthew Yglesias: https://www.slowboring.com/ - Daily column of moderate/rational takes on politics and government.
ParentData by Emily Oster: https://emilyoster.substack.com/ - She's an economist who writes about parenting by just reading the relevant studies. If you've got kids or are planning to, start with her book Cribsheet.
Jatan's Space by Jatan Mehta: https://blog.jatan.space/ - Pretty high-quality space-related stuff.
Astral Codex Ten by Scott Alexander: https://astralcodexten.substack.com/ - I'm guessing the HN crowd is already largely familiar with Alexander and Slate Star Codex/Astral Codex Ten.
Patent Drop by Nat Rubio-Licht: https://patentdrop.thedailyupside.com/ - A regular look at some interesting patents that have been filed recently.
- I was in this same spot couple years ago. I read this book that was recommended in this very same forum. It's called Cribsheet: A Data-Driven Guide to Better, More Relaxed Parenting, from Birth to Preschool. It's by Emily Oster. It was helpful.
- I'm sorry to tell you this, but everything in life cannot be algorithmically driven. As others have said, generally speaking your baby is YOUR baby and you have to learn as you go and adapt. Take it a few days at a time, tackle the current issues, and repeat.
On the data driven side, Emily Oster and her prenatal (Expecting Better) and postpartum (Cribsheet) books are great resources, but they hardly prepare you for parenting. Those books can help you make some macro decisions for sure, but overall parenting is an experience which will likely be the most mentally challenging thing you've done, barring any exceedingly traumatizing events.
