I was excited to see that my local museum had invited a parenting author to give a dinner lecture for an audience of fathers. It seemed like something I should attend since it's my job, although the $40 price tag was way out of my budget. But then my soccer team coincidentally gave me $40 pre-paid credit card as a gift, and what better way to spend that money than to attend something that will help me to be a better parent?

Some of you come from the business world, so you may have been to these types of lectures and are comfortable with these suit and tie functions. I'm from the world of catering (as serving staff) so I am at least familiar with it, but I still felt very awkward being in a room with people checking their blackberries and being non-fiction versions of the characters on TV's The Office.

I've already gotten off track here, so while I'm at it let me mention the food. Like I said, I'm a bit of a catering snob as I have worked events for the last seven years. General tip for those planning an evening engagement that includes dinner and a $40 price tag: don't have a buffet line of croissant sandwiches and salad. At least have a hot meal. I will say that there were bottles of beer at the center of the table, and that made me feel better.

Michael Gurian, the author and guest lecturer, describes himself as a social philosopher. He uses research of neuro-science as a way to explain differences between boys and girls, and how we raise them. Think of him as the John Gray (Men Mars, Women Venus) of parenting.

His books include- The Mind of Boys, The Mind of Girls, and his latest Nurture The Nature, which he focused on during the lecture.

The basic premise of his research and theories is that children have fundamental social traits genetically imprinted from birth (such as personality, temperament, and learning styles), and that we as parents should ignore the social culture that pressures us to over-stimulate them. You should be thinking of Baby Einstein and all of that crap that is shoved down insecure parents' throats, but he is also talking about the other things that over-stimulate adolescents like overloading on activities and sports.

At this point, I was surprised that he didn't talk about television and video games in his lecture (he did address it in Q&A). I mean, at least the other stuff is over-stimulation with good intentions. Shouldn't the first thing we eliminate be the electronic clutter? Then we can concentrate on our Toddler LeapFrog books. Am I right?

The most interesting part of his lecture was when he showed comparative brain scans between boys and girls. The girl brains were much more active than equivalent brain states of boys. The reason for this is that girls have much more blood flow and oxytocin running through their brains, and they are functioning in most cases from the verbal and emotional half of the brain. Boys, on the other hand, have brains stimulated with testosterone, and they are mostly functioning from the spacial and active side of the brain.

All in all, I really liked him as a speaker. I think he steered in the wrong direction when he started using his own family montage videos to explain a few of his points, and I would have liked him to talk a bit more on how these sex differences manifest over the different stages of development. I'm sure that he was saving some of the info so that people would be intrigued enough to buy the book.

I do think that Mr. Gurian would be a good lecturer for the At-Home Dad Convention, which is hopefully being planned and organized. His concepts could easily be adapted for full-time Dads. We'll just have to remind him to leave the family albums at home if he is ever invited. :)