A Day with Stanley is an endearing story for young children to help parents and teachers open up a dialog to help children recognize bullying and to begin learning how to deal with it. There are many kinds of bullying:

• Physical, where children, push, trip, beat up or hurt a child physically.
• Emotional, where children deliberately taunt other children, make fun of, tease, make faces at, or hurt a child emotionally.
• Gossiping, whispering, etc are other means of emotional bullying.
• Relationally, is where a person deliberately influences others to be hurtful to another person (ie. Telling others to exclude or not play with another child).
• Cyberbullying, using a computer to hurt another person or their reputation, or threatening that person.

Using Stanley, the good guy, and the mean old fox, the bully, I have told a story about how Stanley stands up for the ducklings when threatened by a bully.

Bullying is an age old problem among children. It can lower the self esteem of children and stunt them socially, leaving scars for life. Parents and teachers need to talk to kids about acceptable behavior and discourage bullying. By teaching a child how to recognize a bully and how to deal with them as well as helping and counseling the child who is the bully can decrease the incidents in schools and neighborhoods. Hopefully books such as “A Day with Stanley” can open up the door of communication with kids.

Milly Balzarini grew up in Negaunee Michigan and graduated from the Negaunee High School. She frequently stopped at the beautiful Negaunee Public Library to read, use the view master, and check out books to take home. She loved childrens books such as The Bobbsey Twins, Robinson Crusoe, and Lassie Come Home among many others. Although she lived in a small town she could live vicariously through the books she read. Many of the stories about nurses and their experiences as in “Cherry Ames”, were inspiring to her.

As a student at Northern Michigan University she took a class in childrens literature where she studied childrens authors and read many childrens books. The books ranged from first grade reading through adolescent books. This class inspired her to write her own childrens book and dedicate it to her five grandchildren.

Milly is a graduate of Northern Michigan University, and the author of “The Lost Road Home”, a book on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and how it has affected Combat Veterans and their families.

She worked at Northern Michigan University as a secretary in the Student Activities Office for four years. She then married and took 12 years off to raise her three daughters before returning to NMU to finish her education. After graduating from NMU she worked as an Adult Basic Education Teacher for the Ishpeming-Negaunee-NICE Community School Program teaching literacy classes and English Second Language Students.

Other Works

Milly has also authored "The Lost Road Home", a book about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and the psychological effects of war on Veterans and their families.

Michael Talo, a talented local artist, currently lives in Ishpeming, Michigan. He is talented in many aspects of art but wood carving is his favorite art medium.

Mike is originally from Wayne County Michigan. He has free lance work for WCW Corona, Joe Cool Fashion and Design, and created the company "Aqua Air" pool painting out of Daytona Beach Florida.

Working with Mike on "A Day With Stanley" has been a very enjoyable experience.