To help celebrate all things Dad, here’s Tim Atkinson, from the Bringing Up Charlie Blog and our Parent Panel, with an interesting post on why it’s important to understand that every child is different. Read on to see how you can win a copy of Tim’s new book Fatherhood:The Essential Guide.

It’s a cliché to say that children don’t come with an instruction manual. They don’t, of course and even if they did we’d probably have to throw it away, throw it across the room or even throw it at them (while missing them, of course)! Children are unique; each one of them is different. Ok, so they mostly have a head, two eyes, a nose, a mouth, hands, arms, feet, legs. Most of the time, that is. But apart from that, your child is as different to mine in as many different ways as you can think of.

Of course there’s a very good evolutionary reason for this. We’re all just that little bit different from each other so that – in the event of some catastrophe like the one that did for the dinosaurs – somebody, some small body of representatives of our species, would be able to adapt and survive. If you don’t believe me, try this simple experiment. Tell a group of people – any group, of almost any age but those with most (apparently) in common tend to be the most fun – to quickly write down the first ten words they think of when you say something random to them, like the word ‘set’. Then ask people to compare their words with the words of the person next to them. In most cases, you’re unlikely to get more than two or three out of ten words in common. Because we all think differently; we all have different associations, memories, experiences and outlooks. And so do all our children.

That said of course, there are certain lessons you can learn from other people and from other people’s children. Why make the mistakes yourself if you can learn from other people’s? I’ve certainly made a few of them in the last three years at home with Charlie. So when I was asked to write an ‘owners manual’ in order to help dads get the most out of their own children, I put aside my initial sceptism and put pen to paper. The result is a handy ‘how to’ guide that I hope will be useful to a few more dads than me. Fatherhood: The Essential Guide is out now (just in time for Father’s Day!). Not only does it deal with everything a dad should know – from first thinking about a family to the first three years – but it will also give mums a useful insight into what we men might be thinking and feeling about the process of having and then looking after children.   

Tim is hosting a Fatherhood Festival on his blog all week where he’ll be posting something relevant to fathers and fatherhood, being a dad and doing a better job of it. There’ll also be daily prizes, giveaways, links and other goodies. http://www.bringingupcharlie.co.uk/

For your chance to win a copy of Tim’s book Fatherhood:The Essential guide (courtesy of www.need2knowbooks.co.uk) please answer this question in a comment below: 

If you had to give just one piece of advice to a dad or dad to be what would it be? 

Entries by midnight on Weds 15th June please.Winner will be announced on Thursday 16th June.

UPDATE 16/16/11 Well done to Simon D, a copy of Tim’s book is on it’s way to you!

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