Engaging Adolescents: Parenting tough issues with teenagers

Parenting teenagers can be tricky at the best of times. But when the tough issues arise — behavioural problems, unacceptable risk-taking, bullying, alcohol abuse — things can get extremely difficult and parents can struggle with what to do. Drawing on psychologist Michael Hawton’s 30 years of experience, Engaging Adolescents is a practical guide to help you steer your teenager through the challenging times with confidence.

The book covers the following areas:

• teenagers and what helps them develop personal control
• how to sort out behaviour so you don’t over react
• what we can learn from watching professionals who manage emergencies
• proven, practical methods for managing tempestuous teenagers.

Using case studies and based on universally accepted mediation principles, this is a highly practical, skills-based book that gives you the tools to resolve conflict and build better family relationships. Engaging Adolescents offers a clear, method-based approach to ease the distress of parents experiencing difficulties with their teenagers’ behaviour.

Table of Contents

Preface

Part One: The Teenage Landscape

1. Raising teenagers these days
2. What teenagers can and can't do
3. Mind maintenance for teenagers
4. The nature of difficult behaviour in teenagers

Part Two: Using Scripts So You Don't Flip Your Lid

5. Why scripts matter
6. PASTA for teenagers
7. Holding your nerve

Part Three: Case Studies and Worksheets to Use At Home

8. Three serves of PASTA
9. Advanced lessons in taming tigers
10. Instructions for using scripts
11. They won't know how to negotiate unless someone shows them.

Conclusion

Acknowledgements

Bibliography

Resources

Index

"At the end of it all you’ll know how to navigate tough conversations, learn the factors that contribute to a teenager’s ability to govern their own behaviour so that you won’t need to be as much of a director."
- PS News, June 2017