Parenting Teens Online

Answer:

ParentingTeensOnline expert, Martha R. Roper, M.A., discusses "How can schools encourage teens to be more ethical?". Martha has been a teacher since 1970, and a nationally known health and sexuality educator for 25 years. She has a B.S. in Education from Texas Christian University, and a Masters Degree in Family and Community Relations from Columbia University Teachers' College in New York. She answers:

Educators are wondering why the parents aren’t doing something to clean up kids’ language! There is no easy answer for this one except to not tolerate it in your presence. That is so much easier said than done, since, as you said, parents are using some of the language themselves. There has been a shift in tone in what is acceptable in the public airwaves. If you let your kids watch TV, use the internet, play video games, listen to their own music on mp3 players, go out with their friends and on sleepovers, then you know that the topics and the language used has changed significantly over the years. What you can do is let your kids know how you feel about each word and why you feel that way as the words come up in daily conversation. In my classes, the most common thing kids tell me is that they don’t understand why words mean so much. They say they resent being punished for using words when they are just WORDS. I tell them I get what they are saying, and that each person perceives words differently based on their experience. It is impossible for us to know why others are offended by certain words, but they are. People like teachers, grandparents, police officers, and youth group leaders are truly offended, and they have a right to not have to hear words that upset them. Life is a series of trade-offs. The “right” to swear and use vulgar language is not worth the damage it does to relationships. You could make a deal that you will not talk about things they don’t want to hear about if they will clean up their language. At school we send the student to the office for a talk about respect. At home you can create consequences that get your teen’s attention. Finally, you can confront your own use of language and tell your teen that you are going to be working on yourself to improve your own way of communicating so as to not offend others. Communication is always a challenge and always interesting if we try to see it as a function of adolescents trying to express themselves in a new and different way than their parents. Kids like to get a rise out of their parents. Sometimes they like to divide and conquer their parents and get them angry at each other. Parents need to talk about and agree about how to handle the ongoing discussion of the words kids use.