Teaching Responsbility (Part 1)

This is an important one and I have felt that this one could be taught by example and consequences for being irresponsible (natural and imposed).

I found a list of things that you can do to teach responsibility and I have held onto to it for years. I'll share it here along with my thoughts.

1. Establish family rules and make sure they are clear to everyone in the household. The consequences for breaking rules must be consistent. Examples are curfew, homework time and even friends.

2. Household chores should be assigned to our teens and we need to make sure they are done on schedule.

Now this can be a hard one when you have busy kids. I recently hired a housekeeper and literally just gave her the kids chore lists for the weekend (of course I added mine too). Be considerate of your kids time too. If you encourage sports, theater, volunteering, you should also understand that sometimes there just isn't enough time.

3. Help your teen get and stay organized with school work. - Now kids don't all naturally have organizational skills - Heck open their bedroom door (LOL). This will be easier with some then others. Some just lack the skills and need the guidance and will appreciate it. Others could care less about being organized and find it perfectly okay to search thr0ugh the backpack to find their crumpled homework.

4. Be a good role model by meeting your own obligations completely and on time. This is a personally challenging one for me because I am a last minute queen. I have the uncanny ability to do something in the 11th hour and make it look like I worked on it tirelessly. But, I am also extremely reliable and the kids father is extremely reliable. We do what we say we will do - Always!!

5. Ask for your teen's input when making family decisions. If there are problems, brainstorm for solutions. I think I just do this naturally, when we talk both my kids have no fear of sharing their ideas and my son makes darn sure everyone hears his opinion and truth be told there have been many times where I have said "that is a really great idea."

Ok there are 5 more. I will save them for another post.

The general idea here is establishment of clear expectations. I know that I have struggled with being clear and have had to pull out the "because I said so" card. That never goes over well and the whole family suffers when one of my teens is unhappy with an outcome. So, I need to learn to be more consistent with my expectations BEFORE I expect them.

Sometimes we just forget that their are many minds, many points of view in the house and not everyone thinks exactly the same way. So, if I am disappointed in someone's decision or actions, or lack of action, I honestly do try to think to myself and decide whether or not I was clear in my expectations. I have seen that I am not always clear. So, in that vain, sometimes we have to give our family members a break

Another important thing that I am working on is giving myself a break. Sometimes I beat myself up over my mistakes or lack of direction w/the kids. We all have to sit back and realize that if we truly are doing the best we can (boy that can mean a lot of different things to different people), If we truly are always acting in the best interest of the family, then let the mistakes go. Learn from them and move on. I'm working on it!