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Raising "Easy" Teenagers
By Linda Miles of Fashion Green T Bags
Teenagers can be notorious rebellion machines seemingly totally focused on driving their parents crazy with attitude, defiance and rebellious behavior. If your teenager is already at this stage stay tuned: The following advice MAY help. I'm going to begin with a child's first ability to make decisions. As human beings, we all enjoy being able to make our own choices in life and mostly resent those who dictate to us with strict rules not allowing our input in the decision making. Of course there are times, especially in the lives of young children, where dictated behavior is mandated like telling children to "Stay out of the street", "Don't play with fire." etc. However most daily decisions aren't life and death issues and therefore can be left to the child to decide. Of course, if left totally open, decision making for the very young will be totally overwhelming and therefore is better with guidance built in. "Do you want to wear the red shirt or the blue shirt?" Sometimes we can even dictate our wishes to a child through the choices we allot him/her. "Do you want to stop yelling now and continue to play or keep yelling and go to 'time out'?" In such a situation, the choice may need to be repeated many times in order that the child understands the stated behavior/consequences. The key is to use the word "choose". "Do you want to choose to stop screaming and choose to continue playing or do you want to choose to scream and choose time out? If you choose stopping you CHOOSE to play and if you scream you CHOOSE time out." (Children will need to understand the concept of choice before this will work well but children can understand choosing at a very young age. At 2 1/2 my mother was running errands with my son whom she babysat during the day. She commented to him that he was being very pleasant and fun to be with. His response? "Of course I am Grandma. I've gotten plenty of rest and I'm CHOOSING good behavior!"
The words choose, choosing etc. teach a child that he/she chooses a consequence with every choice of behavior. The child grows to understand that the world is not "doing to them" but that they, to a great extent, are choosing what happens to them. Translated to teenager behavior: "If I choose to drive fast I choose to get a ticket, have an accident, hurt someone, etc." If I choose to drive carefully I choose to be safer with myself and others and choose not to be vulnerable to ticketing." An important guideline for choices is that the parent needs to predetermine what items are negotiable and which are not. If, for example, it is important to you that your child dress in a certain way you may choose to have him/her help you choose a couple of outfits before bed. You can guide your child to the choices you prefer but in the end, have 2 or 3 acceptable outfits ready for choice in the morning. You have exerted your wishes while at the same time allowed your child to feel some control and pride in decision making. Both of these are critical life skills and will teach your child to weigh consequences later in life. (hopefully) My daughter totally dressed herself when she was young. She often looked ridiculous but adorable as she proudly presented herself in what few adults would have chosen for her to wear. She made the choice totally because her choice only had aesthetic consequences. There were no safety or critical development issues at stake for her or for anyone else. I remember following her one day and thinking that she looked beyond silly but she was totally unaware that she did. She was proud of the way she looked and the decisions she made were her very own. She felt empowered and that is one emotion we all crave at almost any age. If you read this and decide that this decision and choice making model would benefit your child consider this: No matter what age, parents/significant adults can BEGIN this conversation at any age. The focus needs to be about what CHOICES there are to make and what consequence CHOICES accompany each decision. Again, we're still raising children who need guidance and sometimes our choices are not negotiable. You CHOOSE not to complete your homework, you CHOOSE the following consequences__________________ . You CHOOSE to complete your homework, you CHOOSE the following consequences: _____________________________ . Consequences should be the natural effect of a given choice and do not have to result in external rewards such as candy, money, etc. It is important for a child to understand that consequences are naturally occurring. When your child is grown and employed his/her employer won't be chasing employees with cash or candy to get a job done. The consequence may just be that one gets to keep a job. In the long run we have choices to make as parents.Among them being how to raise a thoughtful responsible person. A first choice is to be rather dictatorial when it comes to a child's behavior and help develop feelings of lack of control and resentment, lead with choices to help a child understand that he/she will control, to a large extent, his/her consequences in life and be able to make thoughtful decisions based upon well developed decision making processes. What are your parameters with your children? How can you guide them and have them take responsibility for choosing positive vs. negative outcomes?
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Contributor's Note
Based on Glasser's "Control Theory, Reality Therapy" http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=4&url=http%3A%2F%2Fraider.muc.edu%2F~schnelpl%2FControl%2520Theory%2520-%2520Overhead.html&ei=aCylSsL6INef8QaOn8XfDw&usg=AFQjCNHXs4AEU45ZpWQStv8jAZ7N3EJ3jA&sig2=3J2I2VG0WgGA38mnZIjY2A
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Great intel, Linda.
Thoughtful and respectful seem to be hard roads for parents to instill in their children today. You need to get more of this advise out there!
Thank you for sharing.
Best wishes.
Frederick
The copyright for this content entitled "Raising "Easy" Teenagers" has been specified by the contributor as:
Public Domain
The copyright for this content has been relinquished by the author. The content may be used freely by anyone.
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February, 2012
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