Estimated reading time - 10 minutes.

Because children like limits and want to know what they are, habituation, the next item on my list, is so important. Anything that you want done cheerfully in your house, that is, done without complaints, has to be done regularly. Structure and clear expectations are important.

This is true about Holy Hours, and it is true about school work. 

Habit, as Aristotle tells us in the Nicomachean Ethics, is a ‘second nature’. The formation achieved by habit is so closely united to the soul that it is as though it were the nature with which one began life. Actions that are hard initially become, once they are done habitually, easy. One sees that in the physical order. At first pressing ten pounds or walking a mile is hard. But if you keep doing the activity it becomes easy, and one can go on to more difficult actions. This is true in the spiritual and intellectual orders as well.

For this reason structure in your homeschooling is very important. Children, especially teens, need to know what is expected of them, and to do that they need to do the same things every day. If math is done every day, if history is done every day, if there is a consistent schedule, then the student is not wondering if this is a day when mom is going to make him do math, or history, or school itself. The student who has a regular structure can develop the habit of doing school work. And that makes the school work much easier.

If you want your teen to work, consistently and cheerfully, resist the temptation to call him away from school every time some other opportunity or need arises. Show how important you think what he is doing is by making sure that he has the time to do it.

Also, have a consistent starting time. It is often hard for adolescents to get up and get going in the morning. This is because they are truly tired; their bodies are changing, and they need sleep. But the answer is not to “sleep in” in the mornings. If they do that they won’t get school done, and they will feel bad about their lack of accomplishment. Unhappy children are more resistant. Instead, get them up in the morning and they’ll be tired at night, so they will go to bed.

From experience I will tell you: don’t wait for the first night they go to bed early enough to get them up. It could take all year. Start from the other direction. Get them up early, even though they are tired. Then they’ll start resetting their internal clock. Morning Mass is a help here!

Also, just as a note, when you are having a hard time with your teen, make sure that both of you are getting enough sleep and good food. We all do better when we are rested and well fed. Don’t ignore the obvious in evaluating your difficulties in relationships.

I have found that many of the families who enroll in our program after having done their own ‘thing’ for homeschooling for a number of years, do so at the instigation of the adolescent student. That’s because the student is beginning to think about the future. He wants to make sure that he is prepared for college, and for life. He knows instinctively that a schedule and structure are freeing, because they remove doubt and indecision. Further, he knows that to accomplish a goal you have to have a plan for its achievement; one may not always accomplish the entirety of the plan, but not to have a plan is to plan for failure. 

When you are making your plans include your teen in the planning. We are all more likely to work to achieve goals we have had a part in making. Now, there is a way to do this. If you say to your teen, “Would you like to do math?” and he says, “No,” you have a difficulty. So don’t frame your question that way. Instead, ask, “Would you like to do math first thing in the morning, or right after lunch?” Once your student picks one of those times, he has made a commitment, and is far more likely to do it. He has “ownership” of that decision.

 Inevitably, there will be times when there have to be consequences for bad behavior.  One needs to have clear consequences for specific behaviors. So if you have a curfew, make the consequences of breaking curfew clear and enforce them. We didn’t have a curfew, because the children went out to do specific things and came home when they were over. They didn’t go ‘hang out’ with friends. But if yours do, enforce your consequences. Nevertheless, we all know there are times when there hasn’t been a conversation about a particular behavior and consequences. In such a case I recommend you get the teen involved in the decision about what is an appropriate punishment.

As an example, you don’t expect your children to hit the bookcase in the living room with and therefore break their violin bows because they are angry with their practice results. You won’t have already outlined policies about the consequences of that action, most probably (you might have already defined consequences for displays of anger – in that case enforce those).  But if you, as in my house, weren’t expecting that behavior and hadn’t outlined the consequences, I recommend involving the teen in the conversation about the consequences. Explain that this is a big deal. One cannot react violently to frustration. Hitting and breaking are not ways to express oneself. What if you hit a person? This is a really clear example of lack of self-control; it makes you a slave to your passions and it has to stop. Then give some possible consequences that might help build up a better habit, but also ask the teen what he thinks would most help.

When this happened in my house, I offered several consequences involving self-control. I can’t remember what they were, honestly, but my teen came up with something better. He said he would practice his violin (after he bought the new bow with his money) before he used his computer time for the day. Then, if he got angry, he couldn’t play the computer, which he really wanted to do. I thought it was a brilliant plan and said so. So that is what we did. It worked really well for two weeks, and then my teen got angry again. I was able to say, “Oh, I’m so sorry that you can’t play the computer today,” and when he said, “What?” I could say, “Remember, honey, this was your idea. It’s a great idea, but it was yours and I am just helping you carry it out.” He didn’t play the computer and he did, over time, get a handle on his anger.

Since clear expectations and structure are both so important for the teenaged student, I recommend that you start Monday morning with your oldest children, going over the upcoming week’s work, and let the younger children either start with something they can do by themselves, or, if they are too young to do that, just wait to start later that day. That way the oldest children have a chance to ask about any assignments they want additional direction with, and you have a chance to remind yourself of what their week is like. On Thursday afternoons meet again, to go over the work done. This provides a checkpoint for the older children, a kind of deadline, which they find very helpful. Since you are meeting on Thursday, the students have Friday to finish up anything that is not yet done, and you will know what it is, so you can help them manage their time.

Also, along these lines, try to take time as well as the assignment into account. Students are far more likely to work well, and accomplish what they need to when they know that there is an end to the task. I have found that setting a time limit makes a difference, especially with older children, in getting math and Latin lessons done in a timely way. In fact, I’ve been amazed, in my own house, and with many of the people I work with, what a difference this makes. Tell your child that he only has to do one hour of math (or Latin). Set a timer. When the hour is up, stop. I introduced this in my house when I had decided to give up. I said to myself, “We will never get anything else done at this rate. I just have to make up my mind that this text is going to last two years - and hope it is not three.” Well, astonishingly enough, once the time limit was established, the lessons that had been taking two hours or longer, began to take only one. I realized it was because I had changed the goal to something that seemed do-able to the child. Thirty problems looked like an all day project, but one hour looked possible.

The planning that I mentioned earlier should include planning for college. Since the older child is beginning to think about the future, and even to worry about it, you will allay his fears if you make it clear that you have a grasp on what is needed to succeed in getting into college and to succeed in college once he gets there. This actually makes a big difference in the degree of cooperation you will get from your teen. An appetite for achievement is built into the human being. The adolescent student wants to do well, but doesn’t know how if he doesn’t know what the specific goals are. You need to provide those goals.

Get in touch with the colleges you are interested in. Find out what their requirements are and make sure you are meeting them. Call the admissions office and introduce yourself by name. Explain that you have a child who is interested in attending that college and that you want to make sure your student can get in. Find out the expected SAT and ACT scores, as well as the course of studies requirements. Then communicate that information to your teen. Then he knows you are on his side; he is not alone.

Outside feedback can help a reluctant student. As I said, the teenage student is concerned that he is equipped to deal with the future. He wants to make sure he is covering all the subjects and achieving all the skills he will need for college. He may not express that concern, but he almost certainly has it. Having another adult look over work that the student has done and provide evaluation can be both comforting and motivating to the adolescent student.        

Remember, too, that the adolescent is moved by the high and noble. He is ready to move out of the four walls of his house, in the sense that he is ready to consider the bigger questions and really think about his place in the world at large. In those conversations we talked about earlier, remember to discuss the life issues, the heroic actions of committed prolife people, apologetic work, and the beauty of living by the truth. You think those things; be sure you communicate them. 

What children of this age really need, to help them with their difficulties, is to focus on something other than themselves, something which is worthy of their energy, which they can see to be such.

I remember when, at several daily Masses, I was encouraged to see a number of teenage children of members of my parish. Not only were they there, day after day, but they were particularly prayerful. These were not the homeschooled children who are there every day with their parents. These were the children of good parents, who did not homeschool, but who clearly intended the well-being, especially the spiritual well-being, of their children. Over the years I had gotten to know a number of these families, and I was happy to see their children at Mass.

I said to one of the moms, “Oh, it is so good to see Mary here.” She said, “Laura, it is Tim Staples. He was giving a series of talks at another local parish and I dragged my three girls to his first talk. Then they dragged everybody they knew to the remaining five. They are so excited about their Faith, and now they are telling me all the things I’ve been trying to tell them all these years. They have even started a Share the Truth group!” Introduce your resistant teen to apologetics.

It is very, very important to tell your teen that you love him. Our first reaction to the statement that we should tell our children that we love them is always, “Of course, my child knows I love him. I sure wouldn’t be homeschooling him if I didn’t love him.” And I know that’s true. But he doesn’t always know that. He’s grown up surrounded by your love; that’s just the way things are. It’s like being aware of the air we need to breathe. We don’t usually think about it, we just breathe.

You let your child know that you love him by doing four things. Appeal to all the possible modes of learning. First, say “I love you,” while looking him in the eye, which establishes that you are really aware of what you are saying. Then he has heard the statement. If he is an auditory learner, that will get through. Second, establish physical contact, even with older, adolescent boys who are at the stage where they don’t want a hug. If a hug won’t do, a playful punch in the stomach often will. Someone who responds to the kinesthetic mode of learning will respond to touch. Third, make sure that there are visual expressions of your regard. Think about this child when you go to the grocery store and get him that brand of tuna he really likes. He can see that you love him. Here is a concrete, visible sign of your love. Fourth, and perhaps most importantly, spend enjoyable time with your child. Do things together that you both like doing. Make time for him in your life.

Part of the reason for this is so that you are around to have those important conversations we have talked about. One simply cannot ‘program’ important conversations. One can hardly say, “Johnny, I’ll schedule an hour on Tuesday for an important conversation.” In my experience, most “important conversations” happen in the context of daily life, where the topics are raised by shared experience. Then is the time to converse at length and with effect. Such occasions are difficult, if not impossible, to arrange beforehand.  But when children are home with their parents most of the time, such occasions naturally arise, and there is the shared experience and the time necessary for discussion.

Continued in Part Four: Rely On Your Teen's Gifts. Teens want to share their natural gifts!