Whew! I’m home from the annual Texas Counseling Association Conference in Galveston. I presented a half-day workshop for some very devoted school counselors. TCA scheduled me to teach my most-requested topic: “Keeping Our Teens On Track: What Recent Research Teaches Us.” I always love sharing this information…there’s so much that is so rich, practical and exciting!
My colleagues share my serious concern about many of our youth.
My research and materials show that we DO KNOW what our teens need and we DO KNOW the methods. I share some of the very best in the nation.
Here are my top recommendations:
Iron John: A Book About Men by Robert Bly; the great metaphorical legend on boys and men.
The Gurian Institute
Boys & Girls Learn Differently, The Wonder of Girls (includes the Cinderella legend), The Wonder of Boys, The Minds of Boys: Saving Our Sons from Falling Behind in School and Life by Michael Gurian. gurianinstitute.com
The Heroic Imagination Project
http://heroicimagination.com/research/social-fitness/
Project on the Parenting of Adolescents by A. Rae Simpson, Administrator of Parenting Programs at MIT. See: hsph.harvard.edu/chc/parenting
Helping America’s Youth. US Government Resources and National Programs findyouthinfo.gov
National Clearing House on Families and Youth. US Department of Health and Human Services. ncfy.com
Sax, Leonard. whygendermatters.com Girls on the Edge: leonardsax.com/girls.html boysadrift.com singlesexschools.org
The Search Institute.
Search Institute’s 40 Developmental Assets®. What Teens Need to Succeed by Peter Benson, Judy Galbraith and Pamela Espeland is a How-To book written for teens – but is just as useful for their parents and mentors. search-institute.org For parents, see http://mvparents.com/
The Total Transformation Program for parents for managing challenging child behavior. thetotaltraansformation.com
4-H, USDA/Army School Age & Teen Project, and www.4-h.org
West, Diana. The Death of the Grown-Up: How America’s Arrested Development is Bringing Down Western Civilization. New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2007. dianawest.net
Is this all there is?