Hey, homeschoolers! This weekend I met a fellow homeschooler who was down about her homeschooled child’s rebellion. She wondered if homeschooling had even been worth it because of what was happening. I did my best to encourage her because I have been there. Because I haven’t addressed this topic on the podcast before, I wanted to share what I told her and even more if I had had the time.

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Introduction

Before I start by sharing three key do’s and don’ts for teen rebellion, I want to say that I’m sorry if you’re experiencing this. Few things can be more demoralizing to a homeschool mama. I remember the day my normally compliant teen walked into homeschool gym class, eating a granola bar. I said, “You know we can’t eat in the gym. Go to the breakroom to finish that.” And right in front of my homeschool friends, he smirked and continued to eat it right where he was. Don’t worry if your teen’s behavior is far worse. That wasn’t the full extent of my teen’s rebellion, either.

Rebellion hurts our feelings for sure. Before this day, I had a great relationship with my child. But in addition to hurt feelings, we are also terrified about the potential consequences of serious rebellion like lying, stealing, drinking, using drugs, having sex, refusing to cooperate, being violent, or rejecting Christ. We’ve all heard the horror stories, so when our teen defiantly eats a granola bar in the gym for all the homeschool world to see, it can feel like we’re going to be someone else’s cautionary tale.

If and when your teen rebels, I believe God will guide you. I didn’t know the mom or her daughter, so the counsel I gave had to be generic. That is the case on this podcast too. If something I say feels right, wonderful. If it doesn’t, dismiss it. You won’t hurt my feelings. With that caveat, let’s dive in.

Don’t Blame Yourself

My first DON’T is don’t blame yourself. All loving mothers take too much responsibility for their teen’s choices, but homeschool moms take this to a whole new level. That first bite of granola bar after I sent my teen out of the gym was evidence of my failure as a mom. We only studied obedience as a separate unit study once. We should have done more! We should have memorized more Scripture! I hadn’t used enough consequences or the right ones. And on and on.

What is funny to me is that my strong-willed son takes after his father, yet I didn’t blame my husband. I blamed myself. I’m not suggesting that we pass the buck. But why (if we are co-parenting) do we tend to think it’s entirely our responsibility to raise godly kids?

That aside, the problem with blaming ourselves is we feel like failures. We can get depressed. We may want to quit homeschooling. We may surrender to the rebellion and fully expect the rest of our children to behave likewise. And they just might if we blame ourselves.

The worst problem with blaming ourselves, however, is that we take the burden of responsibility from our teen–where it belongs. Imagine if you stole something from a store and the store owner chased you down to say that it was all her fault for not making it clear that stealing wasn’t allowed or making it too easy for you to steal. You would be astonished! But that is the insanity we engage in when we take the blame for our teens’ poor choices. Now, I’m fully aware that parents are usually blamed in our culture for kids gone wrong. It hurts when that blame is misplaced. But our focus must be on helping our teen, not worrying what others think.

DO Give Your Teen Responsibility

The first DO is to make it clear to our teen that he or she is fully responsible for the choice they made. Despite anyone else’s behavior or the circumstances, they made the choice and they will own it. The mama I spoke to wanted to know how old a teen has to be to be fully responsible. While the Bible doesn’t give an age of accountability, 13 is the age of accountability by Jewish custom and 20 is the age of maturity given in Scripture. But some 12-year-olds are accountable whereas some 16-year-olds may not be depending on special needs. I will say that I would err on the side of saying your teen is responsible.

When a police officer on On Patrol Live (a new favorite show of mine) pulls a driver over, one of the first things they say is what they were doing wrong. You didn’t stop at the light. You were doing 40 mph in a 25. You were crossing the center line. That’s what we want to do with our teen. Calmly state what the misbehavior was. Unfortunately, many of the drivers on the show On Patrol Live will deny they did anything wrong, will make excuses, or will verbally attack the officer. If your teen behaves this way, stay calm and restate what they did wrong.

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DON’T Go Full Authoritarian Mode

Many times parents panic when they see signs of rebellion. All privileges are revoked. No socializing is permitted. The teen is essentially in solitary confinement. This might be called for in cases of chronic rebellion, but not for a first offense. It is especially common for parents who have done little disciplining in the early years to respond this way to rebellion. But in this case, the approach could be called too much, too late. I didn’t go authoritarian on the granola-bar incident, but I did go authoritarian later on.

There are three problems with an authoritarian approach to teen rebellion. Teens are learning about life just as you are learning about parenting teens. If they test the boundaries and discover that they can create chaos with one misstep, they will want to do some more experimenting–not less. If our teen lacks attention, excitement, or a challenge, they’ve discovered a powerful new way of getting it. If you haven’t been paying as much attention to your teen, now your child can act out any time she wants to be the star of the show. If your child is bored, telling friends and even other family members about your draconian response to a minor infraction and seeing your reaction can be very entertaining. If you have a strong-willed child, adding new rules will be a challenge this child cannot resist. If you have an especially smart strong-willed child, you will be exhausted trying to block every exit from your solitary confinement.

DO Talk To Your Teen

Ask them what led them to the choice they made without the angry, hysterical tone. The officers with On Patrol Live generally ask calm questions like, “Where were you going? Why were you in a hurry?” Although they are often lied to, officers usally respond calmly with an accepting attitude. With teens, we can respond in kind with “Okay,” and a restatement of what they’ve said.

Stage two of the officers’ conversations with drivers is to say, “Honesty will go a long way. Am I going to find anything illegal in your car?” In the same way, we can encourage our teen to tell us the truth for a more lenient response. After getting a response and doing a search, the officers take some time to make a decision on consequences. Minor infractions are allowed to go after a stern warning. Moderate offenses earn a ticket. We want to respond likewise to our teen. Take some time to think, pray, and discuss potential responses. I prefer logical consequences. For more on this, check out the book Parenting Teens with Love and Logic.

DON’T Spy On Your Teen

The On Patrol Live officers let drivers who haven’t committed serious crimes go. They may follow them a little way, but they don’t follow them all the way back to their house or pull them over every time they see them out driving to give them a breathalizer test.

There may be situations where spying is warranted. But as a rule, this approach is destined to fail. Tailing your teen is exhausting. How long will you be your teen’s security detail? Will you continue when they’re in college or living in their own apartment? Your teen will sense your mistrust and may begin to internalize the idea that they aren’t trustworthy.

Spying also fosters more rebellion. Your teen will be motivated to be even more secretive and to break more rules. Your teen can also easily get friends and extended family on their side as they relay your intrusiveness.

The mom I talked with mentioned not wanting her teen to make the mistakes she and her husband made. Her husband had had us laughing with tales of his high school antics. This fear that our kids will rebel in the same way we did is a key driver of spying. However, we want to remember there are differences between how we were raised and the way we raised our kids. There are differences between our faith as kids and our teens’ faith. It isn’t fair for our teens to be suspects because of our poor choices.

DO Coach Your Teen

A coach uses influence and teaching to help people make better choices. A coach doesn’t spy on her clients. She expresses her belief that her clients can and will be successful. We want to do this too. What a coach does not do is take full responsibility for clients’ choices.

To coach a rebellious teen, we want to help them consider the consequences of various choices. Teens generally lack the maturity to consider how their actions may affect them in the future. Helping them acquire this skill protects them in every situation, where rules and consequences can only manage limited situations.

Let’s consider a teen who wants to attend a party. You may want to have the address and talk to parents to make sure there will be adult supervision before you say okay. But understanding that teens have a way of making poor choices despite supervision, you might ask your teen: “What will you do if you are offered alcohol?” Most likely your teen will parrot back the required response that they won’t drink it. You can warn your teens that they should only drink beverages that they have prepared and kept in their possession so drugs and alcohol cannot be added without their knowledge. Then you can say, “Let’s say you decide to have a couple of drinks. You feel the effects much more than you expected. What will you do?” You can lay out the options and potential consequences, while sharing what you are willing to do to help your teen. For example, you could say that if your teen ever asks you for a ride home, they will not be punished. It’s that important to you that they are safe. I am not saying you have to adopt these principles. I’m only using them as examples.

Coaches use stories to warn and inspire clients. Use them liberally with your teens. Tell your own story, the stories of people you know, and stories you have read. I have shared the story of a friend’s relative going to prison for killing someone after driving under the influence and the story of George Mueller, a rebellious teen who ended up caring for 10,000 orphans through faith alone.

As your coach, I encourage you to read the story of Samson in the book of Judges. Samson was a rebellious teen who gave his godly parents grief. While he experienced severe consequences for his foolish actions, he also led Israel for 20 years and was listed in Hebrews 11, the faith hall of fame.

My rebellious, granola-bar chomping teen was surprised when I said he wouldn’t be joining us at the trampoline park later that day. I made sure he knew what he had done, and I don’t think the consequence was draconian. Over the next couple of years, we did a lot of talking, and we did a lot of coaching. That teen is now a grown man and while imperfect like us, the positive impact of our homeschooling and our coaching on him is obvious.

The last thing I said to the mama with the rebellious teen was to pray and trust God. We are not in this alone. God is giving our teen the responsibility for choices, is talking with our teen (even if he or she isn’t always listening), and is coaching our teen through the Holy Spirit (even if they haven’t yet made a profession of faith). After all, her husband who was a rebellious teen himself, is now a committed Christian and a homeschool dad. There is hope.

Thanks again to NOW Programs for their support of the podcast. If you have a friend with a rebellious teen, please share this episode with them. You can find it and the books I mentioned at homeschoolsanity.com/rebellion.

Have a happy homeschool week!

The post Do’s And Don’ts Of Teen Rebellion appeared first on Ultimate Homeschool Podcast Network.