Parenting Newsletter Aspen Education Group

In this issue:
Winter in the Field
Teaching Teens Gratitude
Saying "No" to Your Teen

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Since 1981, SUWS has been giving children and their families hope for a positive and productive future. Combining the wilderness environment with experiential learning helps students learn to value themselves, access their own abilities and build upon their strengths.

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Turn-About Ranch is a place where old-time values such as hard work, honesty, respect, teamwork, and accountability are the standard. The objective of Turn-About Ranch is to provide a tough, hard-hitting, high-impact therapeutic program for troubled teenagers that will remold and turn around the lives of rebellious teens.

Winter in the Field: A Holiday Your Teen Will Never Forget

As the winter holidays approach, parents of troubled teens across the country are hoping "things will be different this year." Instead of worrying about how the holidays will go, if their son or daughter will create discord among family members, or if this holiday season will be as tumultuous as the last one, many parents of adolescents who are barely getting by in school or at home are taking advantage of the upcoming holiday break to enroll their teens in wilderness therapy.

Holiday in the Wilderness

Out of School, Out of Control
Like other vacation periods such as summer and spring break, winter vacation means more down time, which leads to less rules and structure and more opportunities for struggling teens to engage in delinquent behavior. "Young people tend to focus more on the social scene during school vacations," says Kathy Rex, Executive Director of SUWS Adolescent and Youth Programs. "Winter, even more so than summer, brings out school parties, which often come with underage drinking, substance use, and heightened emotions."

More down time also means more family time, which can escalate interpersonal conflicts and make evident problem behaviors that may have been less visible when school and work were in full swing, says Michael Ervin, Regional Director at SUWS of the Carolinas, a therapeutic wilderness program in North Carolina.

The holidays can be full of stress and anxiety for adults as well as teens. Add to the bustle of family gatherings a teen who is angry, defiant, depressed, or otherwise acting out, and many parents are pushed to their breaking point.

Learn more about the benefits teens gain from spending the holidays in the wilderness >>

The Gift of Gratitude: Helping Teens Learn the Difference Between Needs and Wants

Sitting on the ground in a six-foot circle outlined by rocks, a rebellious 16-year-old stares at a sign that reads, "If you own it, you can change it." From early in the morning until late in the evening, the young man's only assignment is to think about who he is and how he has arrived at this point.

This experience, called "impact circle," is how adolescents struggling with defiance, depression, low self-esteem, mood disorders, and other emotional and psychological issues spend their first few days at Turn-About Ranch, an adolescent residential treatment center on a real, working ranch in southern Utah.

At "Roundy," the area of Turn-About Ranch where teens transition from life at home to life on the ranch, most students start out confused, overwhelmed, and angry at their parents for sending them to the program. Some threaten to run away, some actually try - but all end up back in the circle, contemplating their choices and staring at that sign.

Saying "NO" to Your Teen

One of the first things we notice as parents is that teens don't respond well to the word "no." Our once perfect, sweet little children turn into complete monsters at the mere mention of the "no" word. It's almost as if the teen years are a horrifying repeat of the terrible twos, but without the relief of naptime.

Sure, there's always the child who seems molded out of Stepford robot clay who does exactly as mom and dad say, when they say it. This child, straight from an Invasion of the Body Snatchers movie, never appears to challenge authority. Although I applaud any parent who has produced such a child, I also find such children a bit unsettling.

For most of us, there is at least a temporary period where the word "no" raises a red flag right in front of the good common sense of any teenager. As a result, the teen will buck any authority she perceives as controlling.

Continue reading to learn the importance of saying "no" to your teenager >>

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