RELATING TO ADOLESCENTS: The most important information in this book is

CHAPTER 1

PHENOMENON OF ADOLESCENCE

Teenagers affect all people around them. Some adults don’t like to work with teenagers because their attitude and thinking. Adults should understand the phenomenon of adolescence to know what they can do to help and guide them. Some researchers give us the difference between teenagers and adults. It´s located in the front part on the brain or frontal lobes. This part helps us reason, control ourselves, formulate sound judgments, and make good decisions. We can say that the frontal part is mature o adults because their experiences.

An investigation proved that teenagers are always looking for acceptation from others. But at the end this is their task: to discover who they are and who they want to be. The adults´ job is to understand what they going through and to help them make sense of their journey.

CHAPTER 2

ADULTS IN THE HOT ZONE: WORKING IN THE TEENAGE WORLD

Teenagers go to school to learn but notice that they spend lots of time there. School is where teenagers socialize with friends, fall in love, get their hearts broken, and discover who they are connecting to the world. For adults, school is work, not life, or at least that´s supposed to be.

Adults who work in the teenage world exist in the hot zone of the phenomenon of adolescence and invariably it affects them. Adults can understand themselves using their relationships with teens, which it turns helps them be more affective in their work in the teenage world.

CHAPTER 3

THE SEVEN GROWN-UP SKILLS

To deal effectible with teenagers adults most practice seven grown-up skills.

The seven grown-up skills are:

1. Self-awareness

2. Self-control/ self-mastery

3. Good judgment

4. The ability to deal with conflict

5. Self-transcendence or the ability to get over yourself

6. The ability to maintain boundaries

7. The capacity for life-long learning

Those skills can be learned by all adults in order to deal with the feverish and infectious aspects of adolescence.

CHAPTER 4

THE FIVE THINGS TEENAGERS NEED FROM GROWN-UP

There are five things that teenagers need from adults.

They need adults to:

1. Distinguish between their needs and wants. This is Needs vs. Wants

2. Respond to them but not react with them. This is Responding vs. Reacting.

3. Relate to them but not identify with them. This is Relating vs. Identify.

4. Be friendly with them but not be their friends. This is friendly vs. Friends.

5. Focus on their needs and not on our own. This is Other vs. Self.

Need 1: Needs and Wants

Teenagers must understand the difference between needs and wants it will help them to prioritize things in their lives.

There are three questions we can ask ourselves that will help us clarify the issue when we´re confused about teenage needs and wants. They are:

1. Does the issue t hand support learning?

2. Is it safe?

3. Is it developmentally appropriate?

Need 2: Responding and Reacting

In this need we focus on self-control and self-mastery. Or our purposes, responding is our ability to approach situations in a reasoned manner, without reacting with a knee jerk.

Need 3: Relating vs. Identifying

When we relate to teenagers, we practice the grown-up skills of self-awareness, self-control, good judgment, and good boundaries. When we identify with teenagers, we blur the boundaries between our own experience and theirs, and our grown-up skills get left by the wayside.

Need 4: Being Friendly vs. Being Friends

The relationships between us and teenagers can never be equal. The adults must establish respect with teenagers. It doesn´t mean that adults can´t be friendly with them. The only relationship that can exist between adults and teenagers in school is student-teacher relationship.

Need 5: Serving the Others vs. Serving the Self

Teenagers need adults to model self-care. All of us have days when we prioritize our own needs, when this happens, it´s a sign we should rethink what we´re doing.

Teenagers need us to respond o the with dispassion; to separate our own experiences from others; to relate to them I a friendly way without confusing this with being their friend; and to take care of ourselves so that our work can ultimately be in the service of others.

CHAPTER 5

DO´S AND DON´TS FOR ADULTS IN THE TEENAGE WORLD

There are so many things that adults should know in order to establish a good relationship with teenagers. In this chapter the author gives us a list about do´s and don´ts.

Here are the lists of do´s and don´ts:

1. Don’t do anything you wouldn´t want your principal to know about.

2. Don´t touch or have sex with students, and don’t with students about sex.

3. Don’t talk about your personal business with students.

4. Don’t communicate with students via personal email or phone, text or instant message, Facebook, or your home.

5. Don’t lend or borrow personal things from students.

6. Don’t spend time with students after hours.

7. Don’t consume or discuss alcohol or drugs in the proximity of students.

8. Don’t talk with students about colleagues.

9. Don’t go beyond the scope of your role.

1. Do understand and follow school policies, procedures and best practices.

2. Do seek assistance when you get overwhelmed in your relationships with teenagers.

3. Do establish ties with colleagues.

4. Do support the grown-up tem within the school community.

5. Do get a life.

CHAPTER 6

FIVE GUIDELINES FOR ADMINISTRATORS: THE A-TEAM

The five guidelines that support administrators on their role as supervisors of adults in the teenage world are assistance, transparency, education assessment, and management. Together they form the A-TEAM.

1. Assistance: this first guideline means giving help and getting help whenever possible.

2. Transparency: administrators for transparency in most aspects of their work as it relating to dealing with teenagers. The more transparency the better.

3. Education: Teachers need to be educated about the teenage world adolescent psychology and development, and experimentations for grown-up behavior, among others topics.

4. Assessment: administrators must be able to assess adult behavior and evaluate how adults function in relation to adolescents in the teenage world.

5. Management: Administrators are responsible for managing the school community as a whole and for setting the tone of school culture.

CHAPTER 7

THE EIGHTFOLD PATH OF ADULTS SELF-CARE

The most important in this chapter is to know the eightfold path of adult self-care.

When we follow the practices on the eightfold, we contribute to our own well-doing and promote the health of everyone within purr school community.

The practices on the eightfold path of adult self-care are:

1. Right view

2. Right intention

3. Right speech

4. Right Action

5. Right livelihood

6. Right effort

7. Right mindfulness

8. Right concentration