And Now It Begins....Again

I know just how the kids feel. After having the summer off from teaching, I get back in gear next Tuesday.  I feel groggy, anxious, excited, and impatient, with just a touch of dread, knowing that class prep, exam and paper grading in combination with blog writing, speaking engagements and parent coaching is all in front of me!

The most fun your teen is having now is picking out just the right outfit to make just the right new impression for this new school year. Thinking about academics....not so much. You on the other hand are obsessed with who their new teachers are, what are their expectations of the students, how many clubs/athletic teams your kids will sign up for,  and are your teens using the agenda books the schools so generously gave to your teen to stay organized? You are full of goals for your teen: honor roll, good citizen of the year, most valuable player, early to bed early to rise, etc., etc., etc. They on the other hand, are wondering who their best friend will be, will they find a fun party to go to on the weekend, worries that they won't make the team, get a part in the school play, or win election as a class officer. Homework, grades, pleasing teachers, getting to bed early enough to get up on time are not taking up much space in the old noggin.

Asking a thousand questions at the end of each school day will yield scant results, and instead your teen will probably reward you with more of the "leave me alone" responses. Your teen is overwhelmed as this new year starts. As a new middle schooler, high schooler, 10th grader or whatever "grader" there are a new things that are expected of him/her. Be more mature, grades really matter, college is getting closer, what if no one likes me, what if I can't get a boy/girl friend are just a few of the things that consume him/her. Asking a thousand questions just makes them feel more overwhelmed. Be patient, you will get the answers to those questions, just one at a time, and in a more casual way. When you bring in their laundry maybe say "hey so whats the deal with tryouts, or that English teacher, or History class? Pick one area of interest, and in a non-desperate tone, ask your question.

But here is the thing, they do need your help in setting limits on themselves as it relates to homework and sleep. They have had a summer of excess, too much sleep, unlimited friend access,  and texting/video games/facebook time. Like all addictions, any limitations will make them a little crazy, but crazy they must get, cause limitations they must have.

An OMG Sexting Story

Now that your teens are heading back to school, having "matured" over the summer and excited for a new year of flirting with potential new crushes, I thought I would share a little bit of "joani live." In this video I share a story a parent came to me with looking for help. For teens, sexting has become the perferred mode of communication. The old-fashioned "hi, what's up" has morphed into "hey-you know what's up..you hot piece of a**!

If you happened to watch any of the MTV video awards and the performance of Miley Cyrus,(and I'm sure your teens did) you have to understand that sexually charged behavior, and sexually charged language does not bring a blush to anyone's cheeks anymore. I literally gagged watching Miley, your teens probably cheered her on! They need to hear from you on this topic. I hope this video gives you some help in that area.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptHBSymJBFo

Fall Back To School Tips

Yes, the summer is over, and it is back to backpacks and schedules, carpools and homework. For some parents this day could not come fast enough, and for others it is dreaded almost as much as their kids dread it. The good and bad news is that in a few weeks, it will feel like summer never happened. Tans will fade, girls will finally have to put on some pants that cover their tushies, and everybody will be in some kind of routine.

I thought today I would give you my own version of a back to school sale, as I try to "sell" you on some strategies that you can start with from the get-go in hopes of a smooth beginning to the school year.

Cellphones:

Do not allow your teen to take their cellphone to bed. How I wish teen drama happened between 8-10 pm, but the reality is, the real juicy stuff happens after 1 AM. Your teen has their phone on vibrate, and he/she never really hits the deep level of sleep that allows the brain to absorb the day's learning. Instead they lie in wait for their crush to text, or a best friend to text the days wrap up. This is why they are exhausted when they wake up. If you have been a good doobee parent who has not given your teen a smartphone, simply have your carrier shut it off when you and your teen agree on a time. Your conversation: "hey honey, I get how important it is to check in with your friends before bed, and I want you to have that time, but then we need to agree on a time that the phone will be shut off for the night. It is important for you to get a good night sleep. If you have already given your teen a smart phone, which you can't shut off through the carrier, you will say the same first part and then: " I will need to collect your phone at our agreed upon time. If you argue with me, and we get into a struggle about handing over your phone, I will need to switch out your smartphone for a regular phone, so that I can have it shut off and we won't need to argue. Your choice." And by the way, this goes for laptops, Itouches or any other device that can interfere with sleep. Shut your modem off if you have too. It is that important. Teens are already sleep deprived with the brain saying, "I'm not tired yet", and the school bus pick-up at a very early ungodly time. Your teen DOES NOT have the willpower to do this on their own, no matter what they tell you. Do not set them up to fail.

Homework:

If you have had a teen that has fallen into the homework hole, do not wait for it to happen. Anticipate that this might happen again.Things don't change that much over the summer. If you have a younger teen, 6-10th grade, you might consider hiring what I call a homework coach. This is a cool college student with a car, who picks your teen up either after school or in the evening, takes them to a library, and sits with them while they do their homework, and then takes them out to shoot some hoops get an ice cream or a coffee when they are done. This basically gets your teen on a homework schedule, and pairs the dreaded homework with someone and something fun. Not that you aren't fun, well, actually you probably aren't when it comes to homework. Twice a week is usually enough.

Make sure you have a 2 hour period when there is no cellphone, and social networking sites are blocked. See cellphone strategy above. You can do the same thing, have it shut off for a couple of hours or agree for them to surrender. Again, and I will keep saying this, cellphones, and facebook, twitter et al, are TOO DISTRACTING. Your teen will argue till they are blue in the face that they can handle their homework while texting, facebooking, twittering etc. The research is unequivocal here, they can not. The brain will pay attention to the most interesting stimulus, and you can bet that geometry loses to texting every time. Even if your teen has no homework and says they did it at school you should follow through on the 2 hour rule. All this stuff is hugely addictive, you are not doing them any favors by feeding this addiction. Maybe they will actually spend time with you watching TV, a fate worse than death. Your teen will be mad at you. SO WHAT!

Activities

All teens should be involved in something. Too much time on their hands can be destructive. School is usually out by 2 and that leaves them with hours to whittle away doing who knows what, and who knows where. You should have an expectation that you teen either chooses a sport, club, drama or a job, but they must have something to do at least 3 days a week. No activity, no job...no money! Some teens may be overwhelmed with the choices available at school, and might be too shy to join something. If you know your teen has a strength in some area, say art for example, you might want to go undercover and let the guidance counselor know about this. Perhaps they need artists to work on the newspaper or yearbook or drama production, and they might get the faculty involved to approach your teen, saying they heard that they were talented and could really use their help. Be creative. This is all about building self esteem and self confidence especially if academics is not your teen's area of strength.

Social life

Teen proof your home.

•  Lock up the alcohol and prescription drugs
• Make sure you supervise sleepovers (that means setting alarm clock to check on location and sobriety of your house guests.)
• Help your teen to think in advance about handling themselves in risky situations
• Supervise teens coming to your house to hang. Make sure your teen understands your no drinking or drug policy, and have a plan in place should your teen have friends who flaunt your rules. Remember it is unsafe and illegal. 

FIND WAYS TO HAVE FUN AND BUILD RELATIONSHIP

This is in caps and in bold because it is the most important. Do not let your relationship just be about checking up on your teen, as in "have you? did you? when will you? If this is the bulk of your conversation with your teen you absolutely need to build in some good relationship building time. This is what will get your teens to do what you want, not taking away their phone. Go to a movie during the week, take them out for a coffee, give them a day off when they feel stressed, and stay in your pajamas all day eating junk food. Let your teen know you get life can be hard sometimes, and that you don't always have to be the hard-ass!

It Wasn't My Fault...Everybody Was Doing It!!!

This is a wonderful article about teens an peer pressure. It gives scientific evidence for the cause of peer pressure. I like science because it takes it from the personal : Why can't my teen think for him/herself?" to a place of objectivity. Parents need objectivity, because so much of parenting a teen becomes personal! Teenagers, Friends and Bad Decisionshttp://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/03/teenagers-friends-and-bad-decisions/

 I love when articles confirm what I already know, but in a new way. It makes me feel so smart. This referenced a study that was done at Temple University looking at the effect on teens brains while they are making decisions when they are alone versus when they are with their friends. The experiment was so interesting. Ask a bunch of 14-18 year olds to do a simulated driving game for which they will be rewarded with cash if they finish in a certain time frame. Embedded in the game are choices to be made like running yellow lights to finish more quickly. However if you "crash" you get penalized and delayed.  Scores were compared with a group of college students and a group of young adults.  "Half of the time each person played alone, and half the time they were told that two same-sex friends who had accompanied them to the study were watching in the next room." The results, no change in game playing or risk-taking for college students and young adults when told about people watching their play, but for the teens they ran 40% more yellow lights and had 60% more crashes when they "believed" their friends were watching. Remember these "phantom friends" were not even in the room with them, they only believed that friends were watching. 

This is pretty powerful documentation of the effect of what we call "the imaginary audience", a term coined by Psychologist David Elkind that refers to the heightened sense of self-consciousness in teens. This occurs because of the newly developing and growing teenage brain that is working on overtime to make teens aware that not only do they have thoughts about themselves but that other people have thoughts about them. Think of this as opening night jitters that starts the second teens awaken and ends when they have posted their last facebook message of the day. What will I wear today, how will people see me? What will I say today, what will people think about what I am saying? and so on. The study supports the thinking that when your teen is on their own they are more likely to make responsible decisions (no imaginary audience) but give them a real or perceived audience and lets get on with the show! Because often times it is all for show, just like the teens in the study who took more risks when they thought their friends were watching. 

This would be a great article to read with your teen. Here is scientific documentation of all your worries. Let them know that you are not crazy, even the scientists can see that when you are with your friends you are more likely to put yourself in risky and potentially unsafe situations. Your job here is to use that power of understanding with your teen " I get how important it is to not embarrass yourself in front of your friends, but I know that sometimes you might make a different decision when you are alone than when you are hanging with your friends. Lets try to find some ways that you can both save face in front of your friends, but make sure that you are safe. This is the kind of conversation you might have every weekend just before your teen leaves the house. This is NOT something you can change about  your teen. It is literally chemistry, but you can make your teen aware of it and provide them with  strategies, scripts and alternatives to keep them safe. 

The Rush To Be Older

As the back-to-school shopping commences I thought I would share this article I read recently. For those of you with kids in middle school, this is for you. The rush to want to be everything "teen" as soon as possible is in the air. Sexy clothes, tight tees, short shorts, shoes with heels to high will all be available at the teen store you will soon be inhabiting. There is plenty of time for "sexy." Try to steer her to "cute"


http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/01/fashion/mini-me-with-high-heels-of-her-own.html?hp

Texting And Driving

Below is a link to a new documentary about texting and driving. This is NOT just for your teens, this is for all driving members of your family. Please watch it together for the greatest impact. The statistics are staggering for texting and driving accidents across all age groups. This is a family problem, not a teen problem. When your teen sees you take responsibility and ownership for your own bad cell phone habits, he/she will be much more likely to take responsibility and ownership for their own. This is a mom AND dad problem. I know its more moms than dads who read my blog, but please, get that man of yours on board with watching this documentary. I remember meeting with a couple once. The husband jokingly said; " do you think its bad that I text with one hand, drink my beer with the other, and drive with my knees." I wasn't laughing, and he wasn't really joking!

Developing good driving and cell phones habits or changing old bad habits takes ALOT of work. Change is hard, and repeating the message and teaching strategies is the only way. A parent I worked with shared this wonderful strategy. When a pre-driving teen chooses to sit in the front seat, no cell phone use is allowed. This gets your teen to disassociate sitting in a front seat with their cell phone. We want that to feel unnatural, so when its time to drive, it would feel unnatural to use a cell phone in the drivers seat. And most importantly, in the six months of permit driving, make them put their cell phone in the same place every single time they step into that drivers seat. Repetition-repetition-repetition!
Also there is a wonderful driving program that both you and your kids should take that teaches safe driving tips. http://www.driveincontrol.com/

1. Where is your phone, and your teen's phone when you step into the car
2. Where will you put your phone, where will your teen put their phone before the key goes into the ignition, so that there will be no temptation to pick up when you hear that delightful ping of a text message, or ring of a phone.
3. Model by pulling over and stopping before you check your phone to see what very important message was left!
4. Watch this documentary together:itcanwait.com

Teens and Denial

"What, it wasn't me!" "It isn't mine!" "I don't know how it could have gotten there!"Famous last words of teens. A great way for teens to avoid taking responsibility, and a sure fire way to frustrate parents to the point of apoplexy!

The truth is your teen absolutely does not care that their shoes are strewn all around the house...except when they can't find them, then of course it becomes your fault: "Where are my shoes? What did you do with them," they scream at their loudest decibel. Because of course, it is one minute before their ride is coming to get them, and they did not think about these shoes, jacket, etc until just that minute, and now that they are missing they obviously can't blame themselves, so you're up!

My best advice, don't bite!!! There is nothing you need to say, nothing you need to do, it is not your job to keep track of their things. Sometime, they will figure it out, but your lecture of "if you only put your things in their rightful place this would not happen every single god damn day!!"will definitely not change their behavior. Either they'll figure it out themselves or they won't. And eventually they will move out, and you will never have to deal with it again. Make yourself unavailable for the search and rescue. And when their crap is in your way, have a basket for each of your teens in which any stray item that is making you crazy gets thrown. Think of it as your family's lost and found. If they can't find something, they can always take a gander at the lost and found and see what's there. It will be like Christmas every day!