Helping teens cope ...

Here are a couple of newer texts offering suggestions on helping teens get through the school year:

ANYTHING BUT MY PHONE, MOM! is written by Roni Cohen-Sandler and as the subtitle, “Raising Emotionally Resilient Daughters in the Digital Age,” makes clear, this text is geared towards parents. Cohen-Sandler, a licensed clinical psychologist, draws on her many years of experience counseling teenagers and adults (she quotes both mothers and daughters) in order to provide some solid advice especially on newer issues like social media, cyberbullying, school safety concerns, and the lingering impact of COVID-19.  Cohen-Sandler adopts a conversational tone, and readily acknowledges that “although raising a daughter can be one of the most deeply gratifying and meaningful experiences, it is rarely easy. … Accept that you won’t always know the ‘right’ thing to say or do.” She splits the text into three sections: first, looking at “cultural forces” and their impact on girls and their families; then, a focus on skills and habits that daughters need; and, finally, a discussion of applying strategies to everyday challenges (there is an entire chapter devoted to homework). I can readily imagine a parent returning to this text time and again, especially given Cohen-Sandler’s patient, common sense, and research-based suggestions. Library Journal described ANYTHING BUT MY PHONE, MOM! as “a must-read for parents of teenage girls.”

ATTENTION HIJACKED by Erica B. Marcus, a former English teacher and now full-time mindfulness instructor, is her attempt to “offer perspectives, awareness activities, and practices that can help you shift toward the relationship you want with technology.” She is a strong advocate for “Using Mindfulness to Reclaim Your Brain from Tech” and begins by exploring both the pluses and minuses of technology use. From there, she moves on to describing mindfulness and how it can be applied, especially relative to technology use by teens. Booklist gave a starred review and recommended ATTENTION HIJACKED for high school students, but I am not sure that they are going to be willing to devote time to reading it. Instead, I think getting copies to Social Workers, Guidance Counselors, and Health teachers could be much more productive.  That would allow these adults to sift through Marcus’ many recommendations for journal prompts, visualization or audio exercises, and other resources and to then choose those which would work best for their specific teen audience. Repetition and practice is key with mindfulness, especially if tackling tech addiction in some form. Over the years, we have developed a large collection of books on mindfulness, and a personal favorite is Learning to Breathe which relies on research and develops a B-R-E-A-T-H-E strategy for participants. Prior to COVID, we spent a year working on this program with advisories, but much more could – and should – be done.