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That it is not easy to speak and understand a teenager is nothing new. Communication with teenagers can be tricky, especially for parents who are in a new situation sooner than many would like.
Parents must understand that in order to communicate with a teenager, it is critical to recognize that the situation is changing. Adolescence is a very important period in people’s lives, and it is necessary to adapt to understand what is happening.
the parents’ disappointment
It is normal for parents to feel some frustration when their children start to grow up, as they begin to want to lead their lives independently and plan their free time without counting on anyone but their friends. Suddenly, it seems that they are raising an insurmountable wall and stop talking about topics that were once the reason for long conversations.
In addition, teenagers begin to speak their own language, dress differently, listen to different types of music, and watch different types of movies.
All of a sudden, parents realize that they can no longer make plans for them, and that it doesn’t matter what they want or think. A father’s opinion no longer counts.
All this disappoints. Of course! The parents have dedicated their lives to modeling perfect children, in their own way and it seems that everything is going downhill from there.
But we must not fall into the trap of thinking that, as parents, we are expendable. Our kids love us, but like any other teenager, our “little ones” also want to assert their independence and feel competent on their own.
How to Connect and Communicate with a Teenager
Many fathers and mothers complain because they can’t talk to their children, because they can’t get them to tell them what happens in their daily lives. But the problem is that most of the time we don’t ask the questions properly.
To get a teenager to open up to a conversation with an adult, it’s important to ask the questions in a way that encourages interaction.
ask open-ended questions
Rather than asking closed-ended questions that only allow you to answer yes or no, it is much more effective to address a teenager to ask an open-ended question.
That is, if we want to know how your day went, instead of asking you, “Was everything okay at school today?” or “do you have a lot of homework to do?”, it will be more effective if you ask him for something concrete about something that interests him, for example “what did you do in physical education class?” or “what did the teacher ask on the literature test?”
ask specific questions
Faced with general questions about broad aspects, it is much more effective to start a dialogue right away to ask teenagers about people or events that are important to them, even if they are about topics that, as parents, we do not understand or are not interested in.
Our kids value that we care about their tastes, especially when we ask them really interesting questions that encourage them to express themselves.
Show sensitivity and know how to listen
It’s no use asking if we don’t listen carefully to what our children tell us, and if the only thing we care about is what we’re going to say next, or if we’re going to use the answer they give us to get something that interests us as parents.
If we use our children’s responses to manipulate them or to scold them, we will only get them to shut down more and more. And we will never be able to meet them or understand them, let alone help them when they need it.
Knowing questions about personal tastes
It is very positive to take advantage of certain situations or circumstances to ask our children about their personal tastes. For example, we can ask about where they would like to travel or what they would like to see after seeing a film that shows a different culture or place, or take advantage of a family event to ask them about their expectations about life. But without trying to influence them, just with the intention of getting to know them.
We can propose a game with family or friends that consists of asking innocent and fun questions that one person asks and everyone must answer. In addition to being fun, this game allows children to meet their parents and parents to let themselves know.
It happens that we often complain about how our children don’t communicate with us, that we don’t know them, but we forget that maybe they think the same about us, and that a change of attitude on our part can favor and improve our relationship with they.
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