Some teens today are emerging from social isolation back into the school system. Whether kids caught Covid or not, they were still faced with a massive disruption in their lives that they could never get back.
This alters young minds and makes them more resilient and ready to tackle a new world where caution takes precedence. You can help your teen feel more supported during the school year to equip them for life after high school.
Encourage Character Strengths
Honing in on the strengths your teen possesses can make them feel powerful. Acknowledging their strengths and recognizing their weaknesses so you can work on them together is a vital tool to help your teen succeed. Teens are more likely to be motivated when they feel valued and important among their peers.
Social-emotional development is lacking in schools, but you can remedy them at home. Ask your teen to take a character strengths quiz and focus on one strength at a time while you navigate their high school years together. Character strengths can help your child deal with stress and identify their passions for their journey into young adulthood.
Challenge Your Teen
Teenagers are pretty well known for how lazy they can be. Without proper guidance, teens can become complacent and comfortable. This mentality won’t do them any favors after high school.
Try to connect to the purpose of your teen’s learning and challenge them to further their education. Assure your teen that there are reasons for pushing them and be transparent in your explanations.
Sheltering them at this age may do more harm than good since you want to prepare them for independent living. Are they learning to broaden their horizons to make their mark on the world? Are they simply learning to regurgitate information on tests? Does your teen know that knowledge is power? Ensure they know to get anywhere in the world; they must become educated, at least on the avenue they choose for their future.
Be Their Rock
Be the support your teen needs to grow and develop into the person they want to be. Listen to them and provide feedback that encourages independent thinking and problem-solving. Try not to use your life experiences as examples when they aren’t entirely relevant. Let them come to solutions on their own with just a little guidance.
This helps them think critically and sets them up for success. It is the same concept as not giving them the answers but showing them how to arrive at the right solution. Kids require structure and stability; this doesn’t change as they age. It only evolves and looks a little different than before.
Daily routines and structure provide stability for your teen that will help them in all areas of their lives. They will retreat to safety when their world gets overwhelming and complicated. Routines they set at home can be a marker for their safe space and provide them with the tools they need to overcome obstacles.
Communicate With Them
As teens become their own essence, they deal with hormones and school and social pressures. This can be a lot for anyone, let alone a teen just learning how to deal with all these things at once. Approach your teen with understanding, even if you may not completely get where they are coming from.
Wisdom can speak volumes to a teen just searching for some semblance of normalcy about what they’re experiencing since it seems so foreign to them. Teens often push boundaries like toddlers do to cope with emotional regulation and new ventures and assert independence. Ensure your teen feels like their emotions are validated. This is essential to open lines of communication with your teen.
They have to feel like their feelings are valid, no matter what they are, or they might not open up to you again for a while. There is no right or wrong way to feel. There are only correct and incorrect behaviors to act on those feelings. Ensure your teen knows they can talk to you about anything. They most likely will cherish this connection as they age and respect how well you navigated the parent-friend boundaries and developed such a bond.
Ensure Their Free Time
Teens are developing new interests in high school and may not have enough time to wind down or relax after school if you overwhelm them with chores. Amend their chore charts and responsibilities based on extracurricular activities and homework levels. You should require your teen to do tasks and help around the house, but ensuring they have enough chill time is also vital to their success.
You know how it is when you constantly juggle work and home life and feel you don’t get a minute to relax. Teens feel these pressures too. Their scale is much smaller than ours, but to them, it feels bigger.
Remember that this is all new to them and that understanding is the way to acceptance and formal learning. Compromise with your teen and let them choose when they do their house duties. Perhaps your teen will do extra chores on Saturday to have more free time during the week for friends or homework. Let them have a voice and respect their limitations.
Support Your Teen This School Year
Although your teen is most likely craving independence, their support system is essential to their academic and emotional growth. Be your teen’s biggest cheerleader and advocate while still enforcing rules for them to live and learn by. It’s all about finding balance.
