Many people assume that psychologists spend all day telling people how to feel better and cope with life.  In fact, junior psychologists themselves sometimes make this assumption. They think they are supposed to be spending most of the time in session talking, giving advice and providing information.

Which means they completely freak out when they can't think of what to say.  I remember this feeling very well!  
While giving good advice, helping with strategies and providing good psycho-education IS part of therapy, it's not the most important thing psychologists do.  

If you've spent any time in or near a classroom lately, you'll have seen the amazing job teachers are doing trying to help students learn, while catering for a huge range of abilities, learning needs, emotional problems and physical skills.   Thirty young people, all with their own needs and a huge checklist of curriculum to cover - I've heard teachers describe it as combination of war zone/emergency room/therapy centre!  

Classrooms are incredibly busy places. 

This means our own children will not receive teaching in all the school and learning skills they need in those classrooms.  Whether we like it or not, even the most awesome teachers simply don't have time to "do it all", for every student.

As parents, we need to help.

I've worked as a psychologist specialising in kids and teens for 20 years.  I've seen hundreds and hundreds of families and young people.  I've read a lot of research.  I offer a lot of advice.  More than one client has said to me, "I just wish I could take you home so you can do this stuff at my house"

But just in case you think I've got my own parenting totally figured out, I offer you this little insight into what actually happens at my house.  Here are the parenting mistakes I make time, and time again.

Common sense tells us that when parents and teenagers get on well, and feel good about their relationships with each other, things go better.

But common sense is backed up by research which tells us specifically what a warm parent-teen relationship does.  Here are three key research findings.

When researchers ask teens to rate how warm and supportive their parents are, they find that:

When parents are rated as warm and supportive, teens are less likely to engage in risky behaviour (eg abuse of alcohol, risky sexual practices).

When parents are rated as warm and supportive, teens are more accepting of their parents monitoring their behaviour (ie knowing what they are doing across the week - at school, at home and with friends).    This is important because in previous studies, higher parental monitoring is associated with better school performance and other success indicators.

When parents are rated as warm and supportive, teens are more likely to tell their parents about the difficult situations in their lives.

Last week I had "one of those days" and nothing was going right.  Out of frustration, I harshly criticised my husband.  Later, when things settled down, I felt a strong sense of shame.

And unlike other times when I've been critical - times when I've been able to apologise and reach out - on this occasion, my strong sense of shame lead to me shutting down.  I felt sad, helpless, angry and unable to do anything positive towards fixing what had happened.

Eventually, I "unfroze", apologised and it got sorted out.  But it took a few hours.

This experience was a powerful reminder for me that shame does not help people act in positive ways.  
Shame freezes, it shuts down learning, stops positive behaviour and stifles relationships.

If we want kids and teens to change their behaviour, we need to do everything we can to avoid our kids and teens feeling shame.

Does this mean we avoid correcting children and young people?