EmpoweringParents.com

Last week, the story of 17 teen-age girls in Gloucester, Massachusetts who agreed to a “pregnancy pact” made international headlines. Whether the pact is truth or fiction (some are now saying no such promise was ever made) the fact remains that seventeen teen-agers who are all 16 years of age or less are about to become parents, and that these young girls saw pregnancy as the only answer to the question of what they were going to do with the rest of their lives.

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This question came in on the blog from a reader named Dawn, and I thought I’d share it with you all. She’s wondering about using the timer on the XBox to limit her kids’ video game time. Has anyone else out there used it?
Here’s Dawn’s question:

“My son (12)also has become a “basement vampire” for about 10 hours a day, if I let him. He wants GTA - the new one and I said no. I have read the ratings and I talk to the guys in the store. My philosophy is that all of his friends have the games but at my house I keep it to No strong language and No nudity at all. There are M rated games that he can watch as long as he is killing aliens or some other nonhuman thing. I read every game before he buys it. I call the parents of his friends and say no GTA. My newest thing is that XBox has a timer. I haven’t used it yet. Has anyone else - some thoughts?”

Here at EP, we’re also wondering how other parents set up video game time in their homes–do you set limits on the time your kids spend playing, or do you take away video games as a consequence for bad behavior? And would anyone out there be interested in a resources page on Empowering Parents that would help you navigate the maze of video games, online concerns and technology? Let us know!

Could Red Bull and Amp be behind some of your teen’s behavior? A new study from Kathleen Miller at the University of Buffalo links energy drinks to risky behavior, including substance abuse, unprotected sex, and violence. Miller was careful to point out that the drinks don’t cause the bad behavior, but that teens and ‘tweens who consume them are “more likely to take risks with their health and safety.” (The study, by the way, focused on teen athletes, energy drinks, and risky behavior. Her team coined the phrase “Toxic Jock” during the course of their research, which was reported in the Journal of American College Health.)

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This speech, also known as “The Eleven Rules of Life,” has been widely attributed to Bill Gates, but it’s actually part of educator Charles Sykes book, Dumbing Down our Kids. We’re posting it again here during this season of high school and college graduations.

RULE 1
Life is not fair - get used to it.

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Has anyone out there ever sent their teen to a boot camp, and if so, was it a good experience for your child? I’ve heard good and bad things over the years, myself. My friend’s son had a great experience at wilderness camp, and really turned his life around. Another friend’s teen-age son also had an incredible experience at a similar type of camp, but in his case the life-changing part only lasted about 2 weeks, according to my friend, when he reverted to his old ways once home. So far I haven’t personally known anyone who has been injured or hurt at camp, but I’m curious to hear if any of you have. Read more »

I came across this article on Internet Safety and thought I’d pass it along, since we’ve been talking about this topic a lot on EP and in the blog. Some good info in here for parents of tech-savvy kids.

And by the way, if you have any other good Internet Safety tips, please pass them along!

Grand Theft Auto IV is now on store shelves–until it sells out, that is. The wildly popular video game series, which takes the gamer on a rampage of car theft, murder and brutal beatings across a NYC-like landscape, is predicted by many to break all sales records.

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A day with a child who has Oppositional Defiant Disorder is a series of battles. It starts when they wake up, continues at breakfast, intensifies when they have to get dressed, and doesn’t end until they fight with you over bedtime.

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If you hear your kids talking about “420″ (pronounced “four-twenty”) prick up your ears–they may be referring to the annual pot-smoking “holiday” on April 20th.

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Recently, some more teen-agers took explicit photos of themselves—one girl was topless, and two teens, a boy and a girl, were engaged in a sexual act—and sent them, via cell phone, “to a few friends,” a practice known as “porn swapping.” Now the police have been called and are going to prosecute anyone at the kids’ high school found with either of the photos stored in their cell phones. You see, the kids who did it are underage, which means—you guessed it— those images now constitute child pornography. Of course, the police didn’t get there before the pictures went viral. Both have been sent from phone to phone, and most probably have found their way onto the Internet by now. Read more »