Mental health is a crucial part of every teen's overall well-being. As teens transition into young adulthood, they face complex emotional challenges that can affect their mental health. Much like physical health, mental health needs care and attention, making it essential to provide teens with the tools to build resilience and maintain emotional well-being.

Teens between the ages of 15 and 19 are going through many transitions, including increased academic demands, evolving friendships, and forming their identities. These changes can be overwhelming, and teens can find the changes difficult without proper tools to manage emotions. Your guidance as a parent or someone in a parenting role is crucial in helping them learn how to maintain mental health and build emotional resilience.

In some cases, intense stressors such as family mental health issues or trauma can impact a teen’s mental health. If you or your teen has experienced such difficulties, seeking external support from professionals is important. However, the steps outlined here can help your teen develop everyday skills to navigate mental health challenges and build resilience.

Whether it's your teen feeling anxious about an upcoming test, overwhelmed by social dynamics, or dealing with low self-esteem, attending to mental health is essential. In the short term, teaching mental health awareness skills can foster:

● Increased confidence in managing emotions and maintaining balance

● Better connections with family, friends, and peers by improving communication and understanding

● Greater self-awareness and emotional regulation

In the longer term, your teen can develop:

● Emotional awareness and the ability to understand and articulate their feelings

● Resilience in facing life's challenges and stressors

● Healthy coping mechanisms to manage stress, anxiety, and other mental health concerns

This five-step process[1] will guide you and your teen through strategies to support mental health, increase emotional resilience, and build lifelong skills.

Tip: Intentional communication[2] and actively growing a healthy parenting relationship[3] will support these steps.

Engage your teen in a conversation about their mental health. By asking open-ended questions, you give them the opportunity to reflect on their emotions and experiences. This process promotes self-awareness and encourages them to identify areas they want to work on.

Questions to Ask:

● “What emotions have been the hardest for you to manage recently?”

● “Can you describe times when you feel[4] anxious or overwhelmed?”

● “What do you do when you’re feeling down or frustrated?”

● “What do you do when your emotions feel out of control?”

Active Listening: Practice active listening by paraphrasing their feelings to show understanding, e.g., “It sounds like you’re feeling overwhelmed when...

As a parent or someone in a parenting role, you play a crucial role in your teen’s success. There are intentional ways to grow a healthy parent-teen relationship, and growing skills in reading is a great way to do it.

Reading is essential for your teen’s success in school. Reading also plays a critical role in your teen’s

● social and emotional development[1]

● language competence

● executive functions like working memory and self-control ^1^

● connection to you

● empathy and understanding of others

● imagination (ability to “see” the story) ^2^

● ability to choose healthy behaviors (preventing high-risk behaviors and unhealthy choices)

Researchers have found that social, emotional, and cognitive development cannot be separated. They directly and indirectly impact one another. ^3^ Teens exercise their responsible decision-making skills and moral development as they reflect on their favorite characters’ choices and outcomes.

Teens ages fifteen to nineteen are in the process of learning how to read larger, more complicated texts and extracting meaning from them. They are required, in school, to think abstractly about their reading and to decipher metaphors, symbols, and cultural themes. Your teen will establish critical learning habits through reading that will extend throughout their school years. Reading is best learned with parents, grandparents, and other loved ones. In fact, “The single most important activity for building skills essential for reading success appears to be reading aloud to children.” ^4^

Parents tend to stop reading aloud as children age and become more competent readers. However, even high school and college students (and adults) benefit from collaborative reading or reading aloud. In reading together, you deepen your caring connection (relationship skills). You are imagining together. You are making meaning of words and worlds. You and your teen gain insight into characters’ inner lives (thoughts and feelings) in a way that no other source can allow you access (social awareness). And with that exploration of others’ experiences, you learn more about yourself (self-awareness) and what you value (responsible decision-making).

In addition to reading aloud together, there is value in reading on your own together. Older teens can pause and reflect with you about the complexities of what they are reading. Those discussions can deepen your intimacy and their social awareness and understanding of the text, in addition to exploring the feelings and symbolism they may encounter.

Yet, anyone can face challenges when it comes to establishing a daily reading routine. Families today are busier than ever, with more demands on their time.

Teenagers are highly entertained and stimulated by technology, so it may take more encouragement than past generations to start reading. But once you get into a routine and make it a joyful experience, it can enrich your family life and deepen your intimacy while promoting valuable skills for school and life success. The steps below include specific, practical strategies and effective conversation starters to support family reading cooperatively.

Becoming intentional about a daily reading routine, looking for ways to incorporate reading into your family time spent together, and considering the quality of the experience of how you read together can all contribute to a teen’s development.

Today, in the short term, reading can create

● greater...

Trust is an essential foundation for every healthy relationship. As a parent or someone in a parenting role, you play an essential role in your eighteen-year-old’s success. There are intentional ways to grow a healthy parent-teen relationship and understand how to promote trust in your teen.

Teens and emerging young adults ages 15-19 are in the process of exerting their independence and spending more time with peers. They are working on understanding and predicting others’ thoughts and feelings. As they do, they also may seek to hide the truth, particularly if they fear harsh judgment from respected adults or peers. They are also testing boundaries and taking more risks socially and academically. Often, that risk-taking can lead to mistakes, misbehaviors, or even failure. Teens may be tempted to cover up their failures or want to take risks their parents may not permit.

Though younger children cannot distinguish between the subtleties of deception, teens and emerging adults can understand the differences between honest mistakes, guesses, and exaggerations, as well as sarcasm and irony. As part of their cognitive and moral development, a full understanding of lying and its consequences continues to develop throughout childhood and adolescence.

The key to many parenting challenges, like raising teens who learn the value of truth-telling, is finding ways to communicate to meet your and your teen’s needs. The steps below will prepare you to help your teen learn more about your family values, how they relate to lying, and how you can grow and deepen your trusting relationship.

Whether it’s your fifteen-year-old lying about where they went after school or your seventeen-year-old lying about failing a test, your teen’s ability to tell the truth can become a regular challenge if you don’t create plans and strategies.

Today, in the short term, honesty can create

● greater opportunities for connection and enjoyment

● trust in each other

● a sense of well-being for a parent and teens

● added daily peace of mind

Tomorrow, in the long term, your teen

● builds skills in self-awareness

● builds skills in social awareness, perspective-taking, empathy, and compassion

● builds skills in self-control

● develops moral and consequential thinking and decision-making

This five-step process helps you teach your teen about honesty. It also builds essential skills in your teen. The same process can also be used to address other parenting issues (learn more about the process[1] ).

Tip: These steps are best when you and your teen are not tired or in a rush.

Tip: Intentional communication[2] and a healthy parenting relationship[3] support these steps.

You can get your teen thinking about honesty by asking them open-ended questions. You’ll help prompt your teen’s thinking. You’ll also better understand their thoughts, feelings, and challenges related to honesty so that you can address them. In gaining input, your teen

● has the opportunity to become more aware of how they are thinking and feeling related to lies and truth

● can begin to formulate what it means to be in...