Question:
My 14-year-old son recently racked up $200 in cell phone charges for browsing and downloading games, music, and video to his phone. We have since put a block on his cell so that he can no longer do this, but what would you consider to be reasonable punishment? It seems that we always resort to "grounding", which means that I have to listen to him whine and waste my time at work to make sure he's doing what he's supposed to. Frankly, it's not working. And he doesn't seem at all sorry for what he has done. Instead he spends his punishment time complaining, not doing his chores, and saying everything is stupid.This isn't the first instance of his running up charges. About six months ago he ran up $250 in cell charges for text messaging. His excuse: he wasn't aware that it wasn't covered on our plan since all of his friends had free text messaging (and about $200 of the charge was from text messages he was getting rather than those he was sending). We grounded him for two days, gave him the benefit of the doubt, and made him give up the phone until we added text messaging to our plan. He also ran up $200 in iTunes charges on his iPod last summer, and in that case we sold his iPod to pay for the bill. He has since saved enough money to purchase another iPod.
He is obviously not learning from the punishments we have enacted and I'm not sure where to go from here. Any advice?
Answer:
ParentingTeensOnline expert Trisha Snidersich, LCSW, is a licensed clinical social worker who specializes in work with children and adolescents. She provides individual and family therapy in addition to facilitating parenting skills groups. She answers:
Effective consequences are about helping a child to learn self-control. “Discipline” is not synonymous with “punishment”. Discipline involves encouraging a child in what they do well and helping them to set limits and understand why one type of behavior is favored over another. This helps a child become disciplined, meaning that they are able to make better choices on their own, when a parent is not present to guide them. In this case, choosing consequences for your son should be geared towards teaching him how to budget usage and manage finances.
As it stands, it is more favorable for him to text and make iTunes purchases without restriction. That’s because you are the one who, literally, pays the consequences- you foot the bill. When your son is an adult, if he couldn’t pay for his cell phone, he would have to do something to earn money or the service would be disconnected. The same rules should apply here. He doesn’t necessarily need to be punished in the traditionally thought of way of being grounded because it may not teach a clear lesson. He needs to pay a consequence that matches his actions.
As far as the cell phone goes, you may want to consider getting some type of pre-paid phone. It may not have all the features your son wants, but it might help him better gauge his usage. As far as choosing a consequence for his previous cell phone bill, I would recommend having your son pay you back. If you give him an allowance, you might “garner his wages” until the bill has been covered. If he doesn’t get a regular allowance, you may consider figuring out dollar amounts for chores and errands and keep track of how much he earns by doing the tasks. For the iPod, it may be somewhat more difficult to limit use, but use consequences that support and reflect a lesson you want him to learn. You may have to close his iTunes account or create a password that only you know and supervise his usage. If he saved up money to buy another iPod, he should then be able to save up money to purchases songs and videos.