Take Charge! - Smart Choices for Your Cox Digital Home

Want more insight on promoting better family communication? Here are additional bits of advice from the experts:

Build Mutual Respect

“You don’t want to create an authoritarian dictatorship,” says Fern Halford, LCSW, from The Parenting Center at Children’s Hospital in New Orleans. “If you haven’t had respect in the past, you can start now. You can’t control a teen’s behavior and values but you can positively influence them by showing respect.”

Communicate Constantly

“Try to talk to your kids all of the time,” urges Heather Renz, a fourth grader teacher at Vern Patrick Elementary School in Redmond, Oregon, who already sees many nine and ten year old students desensitized to violence on TV. The mother of a 13 year old daughter uses a “think out loud” strategy to convey her opinion during conversation with her child. “Even if it’s a two minute blip on TV, it’s worth talking about.”

Understand What Kids Think About

“Kids today are afraid,” observes Halford. “They want to talk about their feelings, their parent’s feelings, world events, the big “why’s,” what parents were like growing up, and more. Children are concerned about what goes on within their family and how they are included in that.”

Use Mass Media Effectively

“Putting TV’s and computers in kids’ bedrooms is an invitation for things to be out of control,” notes Bill Rosenbaum, PhD, LMFT, LPC. “You lose supervision and it breaks down communication in the family.”

“We have to put the same high expectations on Internet usage as we would if a child was going into a library and checking out a book,” says Rae Darlington, the Associate Superintendent of Prince William County Schools in Virginia and a 2004 National Principal of the Year Finalist. “Ask your child questions about how they use the Web, sites they visit and sending online messages to friends.”

“Talk to your kids about what’s real on television and what isn’t,” advises Midge Pierce, the Vice President of Programming for WAM!, the first and only 24-hour commercial-free TV channel dedicated entirely to providing kid-friendly, socially responsible entertainment to tweens and teens. “Kids need to understand that everything on TV is constructed for a purpose.”