Austin Scholar #139: How to communicate with your kids without getting one word answers
& the stereotypes of teenagers
Hey, y'all!
This week from Austin Scholar...
Austin’s Anecdote: The stereotypes of teenagers
How to communicate with your kids without getting one word answers
Scholar’s Sources: What I’ve been thinking about…
What a week I’ve had.
Over this past weekend, I went to a multitude of sports events that, while exciting and fun, left me pretty behind for this week, so I had a pretty chaotic Monday and Tuesday catching up.
On that – I completely lost my voice Sunday afternoon and on Monday, I still could only croak out a few words at a time. Normally, this wouldn’t be that big of a deal, but, of course, with college, nothing’s ever that simple. On Monday, I had an in-class debate in which I wrote the introduction to our opening statement and would be required to speak for five minutes straight. And it’s worth 20% of my grade. Yikes. I did the best I could, though (I had, like, ten cough drops leading up to it), and hope I didn’t let down my partners too much.
On a positive note, though, at the figure skating event and hockey game on Friday, I got my figure skating team jacket!! I feel very cool wearing it :)
Austin’s Anecdote: The stereotypes of teenagers
Possibly the biggest stereotype of all time is the moody, petty teenagers who don’t talk to their parents.
In almost every TV show that features a teenager, they’re pictured to give one word answers when their parents ask them about their days and roll their eyes in every other sentence.
I’m sad to report that there was a time in my life in which I did the same. I couldn’t find the words to describe my days, and I was often so exhausted at the end of school that the very last thing I wanted to do was talk about it.
Because we didn’t have meaningful daily check-ins or updates, my parents and I grew to be kind of disconnected from one another, which in turn made it hard to communicate clearly.
My parents did want to connect, though, but they weren’t asking me the right questions, so I wasn’t giving them good answers.
Eventually, though, I talked to them about how I felt. I told them about the frustrations I had with the questions they would ask me and we found ways to work it out.
Now that I’m in college, I call my parents every single evening to tell them about every single detail of my day.
This reversal wasn’t easy, but it can be done.
Here’s how to communicate with your kids without getting one word answers
This whole article is based on a question I received after my previous newsletter. The whole idea of one-word answers immediately brought me back to seventh grade, when I wrote a full essay ranting about why I hate the questions “how was your day” and “how are you doing.”
Literally a full essay. Over 1,000 words. Titled, “Things I don’t tell my parents,” as a reference to the fact that I didn’t tell them the truth about my day or how I was feeling when they asked me those questions.
I thought about just sending you that, but I've matured in my thinking since then, so I decided to rewrite it – you're welcome.
I believe there are two key concepts when you want to communicate and connect with your kid after they get home from school:
Be specific
Listen
I’ll illustrate these concepts by bringing us back to the same question I raged against in seventh grade:
“How was your day?”