This book offers considerable help to both teachers and parents in supporting children at crisis moments in their development. Clues as to what is appropriate as the child wrestles with leaps in growth and consciousness that are demanding and exhilarating. Monica Ruef has compiled a comprehensive collection of what Rudolf Steiner has said and written about the nine year change and the three important ages of childhood: age 7, age 9, and age 12. Rudolf Steiner (1861 to 1925, Austrian) introduced and explained a unique and effective way to view child development, in seven-year cycles. Within the second seven years, ages 7 to 14, three significant "Rubicons" must be crossed: age 7, when a child loses milk teeth and grows adult teeth, with a first change of consciousness; age 9, when many children learn that there is no Santa Claus nor tooth fairy, and begin to feel their own competence and aloneness; and age 12 when puberty begins and the capacity for judgement and clear thinking are born. These "Rubicons" children must cross for healthful growth and maximization of capacities require from parents and teachers alike a gentle attentiveness to be handled well. Each child is different but the symptoms tend to be the same at each important threshold the child faces at these ages. This view of these significant changes in children is helpful and supportive for each child to feel increasing independence, social skill, and a sense of responsibility to others. To ignore these important steps and "crises" in consciousness each child must take is to risk incomplete development with lifelong issues of dependence. Freedom is the goal of every youngster: an ability to understand strengths and weaknesses and the gifts of every human being give each individual tools necessary for a happy, clear-thinking, and purposeful life. This book will illuminate in a new way, support and structure at critical points in a child's growing up. For every parent, guardian, or teacher responsible for children, this is a book that will carry rich rewards for new ideas in correct relationships from adults as important architectural supports for a growing child.