Teen Responsibility: Path to Success

What responsibility does your teen have? Teen responsibility is one of the most important tools in preparing for a successful life. In infancy and childhood, children learn to identify what they need (e.g. food, toys, kisses) and they learn to ask for it. It is the parent’s responsibility to supply it to them. During adolescence, teens continue to learn what they require in life but at this stage they should start learning how to satisfy some of their own needs. The best way to teach this is by assigning age-appropriate responsibility to your teen. The adolescence stage should be used as a weaning period where teens learn how to fend for themselves. By the end of the teenage years, they ought to be self-reliant.

While communication is extremely important with your teen, frequently talking to your teen about responsibility will not necessarily prepare them to be responsible. In addition, excessive discussions can turn against you. Instead, it is the job of a parent to gradually introduce tasks, duties, and other obligations into children’s lives so that they may gain hands-on experience of what responsibility really means (this goes beyond the responsibility of household chores). Assigning responsibility means that you also need to clearly lay out the consequences; explanations of what happens when duties are or are not completed as agreed upon. By doing this you send the ball back into your teen’s court. The teen learns that if consequences occur it is due to his or her own choices and decisions. This process is extremely important for teaching your teen how to take 100% responsibility for the events and outcomes in their lives. Once they learn to take responsibility for their life they will soar.

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