An approach which is more likely to encourage teens to learn from a poor choice is to ask them to write about it. One dad explained how he used this technique with his son, Tim. Tim had gone to the movie theater with friends but when they got there the movie was sold out so they decided to walk to a nearby park and hang out instead. The dad was upset because Tim had failed to update him on his plans and he was worried when Tim didn’t come home after the movie.
Instead of grounding him, the dad asked Tim to write about the situation answering questions like:
- What was the sequence of events that happened?
- What influenced your actions?
- What would you do differently next time?
- What type of amends do you think you should make for this situation?
Struggling to write down the answers to these types of tough questions can help teens learn from their poor choices. While they may be tempted to blame others for their actions, the goal of this exercise is for them to realize their own role in the situation and take responsibility for the results of their actions.
4 comments:
I am going to implement this one most certainly! Thanks, Kathy. You help me so much with my parenting skills!
Thanks for your positive feedback Laura! I really appreciate knowing these ideas help parents.
My husband and I are far from having teens right now but he actually agreed with this, where at first I thought it would be silly. But I think this is something that would be much more effective than grounding in several ways, it will cause them to think critically and more effectively get their thoughts onto paper, enforce them to look at the situation a little more and hopefully learn what made us so upset and also help them with writing for school. My husband is in the military and writing essays is something they implement a lot to the younger sailors, so why not with our kids?
Thanks for your comments Carlee. It sounds like you'll be well prepared by the time your children are teens!
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