Course Syllabus

Course Description

How to Live with a Teenager tackles subjects from discipline to sexuality and everything in between. Learn how to develop better communication skills that will help the relationship you have with your child as well as discover new techniques for handling unfortunate situations.

This course speaks to the "typical" teen but appreciates that no two teens are alike, no two parents are alike, and that's okay because parenting is a deeply individual experience. This course should help you better determine how your child feels and thinks while empowering you to keep your sanity through these very bumpy years. Through the use of examples and resources, you can distinguish between healthy development and causes for concern as well as how to navigate your way through tricky topics like sex, school, money, and more.

Perspective

When sarcasm drips from his tongue or she bursts out in full defiance, it may be difficult for a parent or caregiver to know what to do. When children are younger, so much of their sense of self is based on what you as a parent have taught them. Unfortunately, for you as your children grow older and enter the dreaded teen years, it may not always seem as though you have any impact in their choices. Moreover, it becomes harder for you to control your responses to the outburst of a 16 year old than the outburst of a five year old. Few parents look forward to doing years of battle with their teenager but do not want to just give in either. In fact, the reason that you are seeking out advice and information on how to have a successful parent-child relationship already indicates that you want to be an active, engaged, and informed parent.

Many of these lessons focus on how to help you better exert authority over your teens while still allowing them some freedom and independence to learn the lessons they need to be learning at this age. Dealing with sex, money, peer pressure, and everything else is difficult but the hardest lesson you must learn is right now:

When your child defies you or breaks the rules, you must keep perspective and understand that it is not about you.

What does that mean? When it comes to teenagers, picking your battles is an absolute necessity to maintain your own sanity (as well as that of your child). Moreover, you have to understand that normal and healthy teenage behavior includes some rebellion. While you will delve into understanding the psyche of a teenager in a later lesson, it is pertinent now that you are able to understand that the choices your child makes and the rules they choose to break are a reflection of their own development and personal issues. As much as it may feel personal when they lash out or defy your rules, generally speaking, it has nothing whatsoever to do with you or how your child feels about you. That is not to say that they get a free pass; in fact, consistent discipline is crucial to your survival as the parent of a teenager. However, putting it in this perspective should help you, as a parent or caregiver, to remember that their behavior is not a reflection on you.

Obviously, keeping the behavior of a teenager in perspective is certainly a challenge. Because teenagers are almost adults, their personalities are often willful while the consequences of their choices may be life altering or even deadly. Unfortunately, the world that we live in is not equipped to provide feelings of safety and security for either teenagers or their parents. Drug use, gang association, sexual intercourse, drinking, poor school performance, and so on can have dire consequences. Thus, parents often feel increased pressure to ensure that their child is safe and on the right path for a healthy and sustainable future.

Unfortunately, parents simply do not get to make these decisions anymore. Through the following lessons, you will learn about how to discuss these issues with your teens and utilize some of your resources to help guide them. But part of maintaining perspective is recognizing that your child will make mistakes. In fact, your child will make many, many, many mistakes. And while you may feel very passionately about your child not making the same mistakes that you made, it is nevertheless critical that these young adults learn how to make mistakes, repair the damage caused by mistakes, and develop a plan of how to prevent those mistakes in the future. As the adult, it is your responsibility to make the judgment calls as to what scenarios are too risky to leave up to your teen and what scenarios may be hurtful for your teen to go through but will ultimately teach important lessons.

The second most important lesson for parents of teenagers to learn is to abandon your preconceived ideas and expectations of their behavior. You may have little say in some of the choices your child makes. At some point, you may have to deal with an unplanned pregnancy or difficulty getting into college, and so on. How you respond to these situations will be the primary determinant of how your child responds.

Let us examine the scenario of the daughter that does not want to go to college and instead wants to become an auto mechanic. If you are unable to see past your own desire for your child to attend college and are overlooking her desires, you are likely to end up with one of two possibilities. Most likely either your daughter will attend college, hate it, and hate you for making her go, or she will simply enroll in mechanical school to follow her dreams and hate you for not supporting her. Either way, what you have taught your daughter is that your dreams for her are more important than her dreams for herself. That is not to say that you should allow your children to do whatever they want. Rather, it is to say that your expectations, some of which you may have had since you found out you were expecting a baby, may not become the reality and that is okay.

More than anything, keeping perspective and abandoning your expectations are going to be the key to emerging from your child's teen years with your relationship (and hopefully sanity) intact. If you are also able to get your kids out of high school without becoming pregnant, being arrested, becoming addicted, and causing or sustaining a serious physically, traumatic event, you will have done better than the majority of parents out there. And frankly, even these events do not have to be the end of the world as long as you and your child are committed to putting the pieces back together again.

Completely Online
Self-Paced
Printable Lessons
Full HD Video
6 Months to Complete
24/7 Availability
Start Anytime
PC & Mac Compatible
Android & iOS Friendly
Accredited CEUs

Universal Class is an IACET Accredited Provider

Learning Outcomes

By successfully completing this course, students will be able to:

Describe child development, the teen years.
Summarize teaching virtues and instilling values.
Identify rules and consequences.
Describe communication techniques when dealing with teenagers.
Summarize how to convey and encourage academic success in teenagers.
Recognize friendship, bullying, and socialization in teenagers.
Describe ways of approaching and dealing with dating and sexuality in teenagers.
Summarize work and money matters for teenagers.
Describe some methods of addressing sexual assault with teenagers.
Identify teenage issues with drinking, drugs, and gangs.
Demonstrate mastery of lesson content at levels of 70% or higher.

Assessment Guide

Assessment	Points
Lesson 1 Exam	10 points
Lesson 2 Exam	10 points
Lesson 3 Exam	10 points
Lesson 4 Exam	10 points
Lesson 5 Exam	10 points
Lesson 6 Assignment	2 points
Lesson 6 Exam	10 points
Lesson 7 Exam	10 points
Lesson 8 Assignment	2 points
Lesson 8 Exam	10 points
Lesson 9 Exam	10 points
Lesson 10 Exam	10 points
Lesson 11 Assignment	2 points
Lesson 11 Exam	10 points
Lesson 12 Exam	10 points
The Final Exam	35 points