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Working teens and setting priorities
The teenage years are a perfect time to start working and often this starts with a summer job. Work experience can offer many valuable lessons for teens and gives them a sense of accomplishment. They develop skills they will need to become successful in the adult workforce such as how to balance time, manage money, and work with others.
Getting a summer job can improve your teen’s self-esteem and self-worth. It can help your teen act responsibly, cooperate, and have the confidence to try new things.
Assist them with a job search. School counsellors, family friends, and other types of community networking can be excellent resources. Make sure that when your teen accepts a job, there will be enough time to fulfill academic, social, and family obligations. Is this a part-time job that can be continued when school begins again? Prepare them for the length of time they could be working and, if possible, help them consider ways to continue working when the summer is over.
Stress the importance of finding a balance. Help your teen set priorities and help them understand the need to schedule enough rest, eat nourishing foods, and getting regular physical activity while balancing their work schedule. This is a life-long skill and can be encouraged by parents.
Help your teen manage money. Have your teen watch and learn how you pay household bills, which demonstrates the need to budget for everyday expenses. Start a bank account with your teen to help them learn how to manage personal finances.
Remember – your teen still needs you!
Parenting a teenager can be both challenging and rewarding. Many teens have conflicting feelings about growing up and aren't yet able to gracefully manage these emotions. They can be inconsistent with their affections, argumentative, and at times even hurtful. As your teen struggles with becoming independent, it is natural for them to detach from you at times. Although your teen may not ever let on, your unconditional love and guidance are important and valued. The following suggestions may help you communicate with and support your teenager during a time of uncertainty and change.
• Stay connected. Go to your teen's activities. This tells teens that they are important and opens the door to communication.
• Give your teen responsibilities. Assign jobs around the house, such as caring for younger siblings, cooking one night a week, making lunch, and other responsibilities. Trusting your teen with regular duties helps build self-confidence and promotes a sense of accomplishment. A part-time summer job can help with this, too!
• Set clear rules. Remove emotion from discipline and focus on natural consequences. If you are firm, fair, and consistent about your rules, your teen will know what to expect. Also, doing this helps you to respond to problems appropriately. For example, if both you and your teen know the consequence of missing curfew, it will prevent you from reacting leniently some of the time and overreacting other times.
• Accept that your way isn't the only way. Recognize that your teen will likely approach tasks or situations differently than you. For example, your teen may do homework with a headset on while lying on the floor of an extremely messy room. You may view this as an undisciplined and chaotic environment that makes it impossible to concentrate. But focus on the outcomes. If your teen is doing well, accept that these methods work.
• Be flexible. Teens want and need boundaries with limits that fit their age and development. As your teen matures, change rules as appropriate to reward responsible behaviour. Also, realize that being fair sometimes means agreeing to bend the rules. Teens are less likely to resent a parent who discusses situations rationally and in an adult manner. Sometimes finding a compromise with your teenager is the most effective solution.
• Believe in your teen. Recognize that we all go through difficult phases. Although some teens struggle, most teens manage common challenges without major problems. Many teens develop a sense that they are not living up to an idealized view of how they should be. Accept that your teen is not perfect and will inevitably make some mistakes. Let your teen know your love is unconditional.
• Help your teen set goals. Teens learn how to think strategically when parents encourage them to set goals and help them develop a plan to reach them.
• Listen. It sounds so simple, but it is one communication skill that parents often have the most trouble with. Be sensitive to and alert for cues that your teen needs to talk. Don't be quick to offer advice—give it only if requested. Sometimes teens just need someone to listen to them. They often can find the right answers by themselves.
• Set an example. Strive to model your own beliefs and values in your behaviours so that your child can emulate not only what you say but also what you do. To encourage community involvement, for example, you could volunteer together with your child. As your teen nears adulthood, they will pay more and more attention to your actions.
Content provided by: Alberta Health Services
What is your child's SPARK?
A "SPARK" is what a person is really passionate about doing, and activity that unleashes their energy and joy! A spark can allow a child to express their personality and even make a contribution to the world. Sparks matter because when a young person knows their spark, and has an adult who supports it, they are more likely to grow up great!
For Parents
Share Power
One way to build connections with your child is to share power. What does this mean and how can you do that?
Treat Me with Respect and Give Me a Say
At its heart, “sharing power” highlights the ways we influence, learn from, and work with each other through our relationships. How we share power with our children constantly shifts as kids grow up. What’s exciting is that we discover new things about ourselves and each other when we share power and learn from each other (Search Institute). For simple tips, click below.
Expand Possibilities
Connect me with people and places that broaden my world
“Expand possibilities” focuses on helping children & youth learn and grow by connecting them with other people, ideas, experiences, and places. This helps them become their best selves (Search Institute). For simple tips, click below.
Express Care
You Matter to Me
Expressing care is the foundation of family relationships. SHOWING you care helps your child grow up great. This section invites you to explore how your family can express care to each other. Click below for more:
Challenge Growth
Push Me to Keep Getting Better
Many people look back on times they’ve been challenged to grow as being some of their best experiences and best relationships! But how we challenge each other to grow really matters. Some ways we push each other can backfire. They make us want to do less, not more. This section guides you to challenge growth the right way in your family (Search Institute). For simple tips, click below.
Provide Support
Help Me Complete Tasks and Achieve Goals
An important part of the parent child relationship is to provide support. We do this by helping each other navigate through difficult situations, building each other’s confidence, advocating for each other, and setting boundaries for each other (Search Institute).
For Parents
Focus on Positives
Being a parent or guardian can be very hard work—no surprise there, right? Most parents and guardians have things they love about their role as well as problems with their kids that they have to deal with. What might be surprising, though, is that one of the best ways to deal with problems is to focus on positives. Research shows that a more effective approach to raising healthy, competent kids is to concentrate on building Developmental Assets. These assets form the foundation young people need to make healthy choices and to succeed in life. The more assets your kids have, the stronger this foundation will be.
There are probably lots of asset-building things you already do for your children—even if you don’t call them that.
Here are some ways to be intentional about asset building:
➤ Post the list of 40 Developmental Assets on your refrigerator door. Each day, do at least one asset-building thing for each family member.
➤ Connect with other parents who are interested in asset building. Form relationships in your neighborhood, on the job, through a congregation, or through a parent-education organization.
➤ Regularly do things with your child, including projects around the house, recreational activities, and service projects. Take turns planning activities to do together as a family.
➤ Eat at least one meal together as a family every day
➤ Negotiate family rules and consequences for breaking those rules.
➤ Talk about your values and priorities, and live in a way that is consistent with them.
➤ Give your children lots of support and approval while also challenging them to take responsibility and gain independence.
➤ Learn as much as you can about what your kids need at their current ages.
➤ Recognize that children need more than just financial support. They also need emotional and intellectual support. Balance family time with other priorities like work, recreation, and hobbies.
➤ Keep all family members (including you) from watching too much television. Find other interesting and meaningful activities for your children to do—some with you, some with their friends, some by themselves.
➤ Don’t wait for problems to arise before talking with your children’s teachers. Keep in regular contact with them about how your children are doing and what you can do to help your children learn.
➤ Think of teenagers as adults in training. Teach them something practical, such as how to change a tire on the car, prepare a meal, or create a monthly budget.
➤ Be aware of differences in how you relate to your children. Are you more comfortable with one gender? If so, why? What impact does that have in your family?
➤ Talk to your children about the 40 Developmental Assets. Ask them for suggestions of ways to strengthen their assets.
➤ Do inter-generational activities with extended family and with other neighborhood adults and families.
➤ Be an asset builder for other young people in your life.
➤ Remember that you are not alone. Other asset builders in your children’s lives include coaches, child-care providers, faith-based education teachers, club leaders, and neighbors. Work with these people to give kids consistent messages about boundaries and values.
➤ Get to know your children’s friends, and the parents of their friends. Talk to them about Developmental Assets.
Parenting Web Resources
Understanding Ages & Stages
Websites
- Search Institute
- Parent Further- an online resource to help families strengthen relationships through shared activities. Family relationships provide the foundation from which young people can develop the motivation and skills to overcome challenges and thrive.