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Teen Discipline – The Bad
“What do I do with my teenager?” That depends on the behavior your teen is exhibiting. This is part three of a four part series entitled, “Teen Discipline – The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.” Part one is entitled, “The Basics.” Part two is “The Good.” This one is part three, “The Bad.” The last one is “The Ugly.”
Let’s define “bad.” For our purposes bad is equated with irresponsible behavior, passive defiance, back talk without cursing, rule breaking (though not law breaking), and generally selfish behavior. This is different from “ugly” behavior which consists of law breaking, back talk predominated by cursing, threats, and violence against self, others, or property. I include the “ugly” behavior here as well to help define the “bad” behavior.
“This is my kid” you say. First, read the previous two articles. These will provide information you need for implementing the rest of this article and tell you how to deal with the teen once the behavior improves. You may or may not want professional help with this child. Before seeking professional help, find some friends who have successfully dealt with the behavior you are dealing with and find out what worked for them. It may be helpful to you as well.
Next, determine what factors are influencing your teen’s behavior. Look at school, community, peer, family, and individual factors. This means that there could be things in each of these areas that are influencing your teen’s behavior and the more of them that are addressed the better.
If there are problems at school, overcoming these can lead to improvement. This could be anything from not fitting in, being bored, too much homework, difficult teachers, or a number of other things. Encourage your teen to work out these problems on his or her own if possible. If that won’t work, advocate for your teen and help them out. Homework problems can often be diminished by providing a set homework time with a specific place for homework that is quiet, well lit, and stocked with all the necessary supplies and resources for completing homework. One of those resources is help from you the parent.
How is your community? You may not be able to change things here but you might be able to help your teen cope better with the situation. Often there are resources, both free and for hire, that can help your teen before things get “ugly.”
Peers are a significant factor in teen behavior. Know your teen’s friends and their family. If your teen’s friends are leading your teen into trouble you may be able to get help from the friend’s parents. Before trying to restrict your child’s access to negative peers, increase positive alternatives. Make it more attractive to be with positive people or do positive activities. For example, provide funds or transportation for your teen to do positive things and be with positive peers. If you try to keep them from negative peers you have just added another area to fight about. Try not to have this fight until things get “ugly.”
How is the home life? This is another factor in a teen’s behavior. If there is stress at home or in the family it could affect your teen. This does not absolve your teen of responsibility, it merely lets you know that other things may need work to help your teen be responsible. One thing that is very important is the example set by the parent(s). Model the behavior you want and you are more likely to get it.
Individual factors are also important in a teen’s behavior. If the teen has ADHD, depression, learning disabilities, handicaps, drug problems, or any number of other things, these can affect their behavior. This does not excuse their behavior but it may mean that you will have to adjust how you deal with this teen to get acceptable behavior. Some of the things listed will require professional and/or medical intervention as well.
Once you have a good idea of the factors that are influencing your teen to behave negatively you can start intervening in these areas. Make it a point to notice and praise positive behavior. Make sure you have a clear set of written rules for your teen. This minimizes later argument over what the rule actually is supposed to be. Close all of the loopholes so that anyone coming into your home and reading the rule could follow it without further explanation from you. For example, if you have a rule about curfew make sure you include which timing device will determine the time for being on time or late. Without this you get into an argument over whose watch is correct. It is a good idea for these rules to reflect your values (instead of just your convenience) and the real world. Increase privileges for responsible behavior and following the rules.
Have clearly written consequences for these rules. All of the consequences need to be painful for your teen. This simply means that they don’t like the consequence, not that it causes them physical pain or harm. Start with the smallest meaningful consequence you can and build from there. For some teens the loss of just fifteen minutes of phone time can be really painful. Refer to the first article about privileges here. If you start out with the atom bomb you have nothing left to use and they have nothing left to lose. Start small and build. Save the atom bomb for “ugly” behavior.
Once you give a consequence, stick with it. This goes for positive or negative consequences. If you tell your teen he or she will get a certain thing for their behavior, make sure they get it. When rewarding, you can be just like the negative consequences, start with the smallest meaningful consequence. That teen may be overjoyed with fifteen extra minutes of phone time. If you start big with the positives you usually run out of things that are meaningful or you go broke.
As behavior improves go with the ideas in the previous articles. Don’t forget to read in getting help. There are many good books and many of them are reviewed in Epinions. Two that I will recommend for now are, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families by, Stephen R. Covey and Boundaries with Kids by Henry Cloud and John Townsend.