Understanding Teenagers

15 Ways to Help Teeangers Feel Like They Matter.

Chris — Sun, 21 Aug 2011 09:40:03 +0000

In the previous post I discussed how important it is for teenagers to feel like they count and what might happen when they don’t. Central to the adolescent journey is the daunting task of discovering and owning an adult identity. Our identity is made up of many facets. Some of the most significant are; knowing [...]

When Teenagers Don’t Count

Chris — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 07:10:36 +0000

My lounge room and the streets of London are literally a world apart. But this week 2 events that were a world apart reminded me about the basics of living and working of with teenagers. On Tuesday night I sat down and completed the national census form so that I could be counted amongst the [...]

3 Ways to Kill Communication With Your Teenager: Part 3

Chris — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 22:00:08 +0000

In this short series on how to kill communication with teenagers we have looked at how parents sabotage their own efforts to establish and maintain open and healthy communication patterns with their teenagers- sometimes without even knowing they’re doing it. So far we discussed how ‘invalidating’ a teenager and his/her feelings will damage communication, and [...]

3 Ways to Kill Communication With Your Teenager: Part 2

Chris — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 20:00:41 +0000

In the previous post we began a short 3 part series on how parents often make the task of communicating with their teenager much harder than it needs to be. No one does this knowingly or on purpose (at least I hope not), but still it happens, and it happens quite a lot. If you [...]

3 Ways To Kill Communication With Your Teenager: Part 1

Chris — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 06:17:32 +0000

It is the lament of many parents with teenage children, “They don’t talk to me. I don’t know what is going on.” Teenagers drive their parents to despair as the steady stream of information about what has happening in their life slows to a discouraging trickle of grunts and whatever’s. There are of course several [...]

The Teenage Brain & Peer Pressure

Chris — Sun, 17 Jul 2011 05:01:32 +0000

Peer pressure is one of those things often associated with adolescence. When you think of common issues encountered by all teenagers peer pressure comes up right alongside the usual suspects acne, hormones, first love, and pop music. Peer pressure is often used as the reason or excuse for why ‘good’ kids do stupid things. We’ve [...]

Teens, Technology, & Defensive Parenting

Chris — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 11:37:50 +0000

Earlier this week I read some interesting research about parents who have iPhones (I posted the article on Understanding Teenagers Facebook page) and it got me thinking about the way technology is shaping the practice of parenting. There has been a lot written about how technology is shaping this generation of teenagers, but mostly this [...]

Top 10 Blogs For Parenting Teenagers

Chris — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 07:18:56 +0000

This week I thought I would share with the readers of this blog who it is that I like to read. It would be a somewhat long winded and cumbersome post to list all the online sources I subscribe to, so I will restrict this post to my top 10 sources for information about Parenting [...]

Digital Boundaries For Generation Z

Chris — Sat, 18 Jun 2011 09:34:22 +0000

I have written previously on this blog about the issues of teenagers getting enough sleep. So it will come as no surprise to those who are regular readers of this blog that the following research about Generation Z and sleep caught my attention recently. Lisa Matricciani, a researcher from the University of South Australia, has [...]

Teaching Generation Z – Embracing Digital Learning

Chris — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 07:27:31 +0000

Recently I have been working on courses to help teachers connect more effectively with today’s teenagers. In the process I have gone down numerous tangents, with varying degrees of relevance. One of the most relevant tangents is how technology is shaping the way teenagers think and relate. This is not a new field of enquiry [...]