Inside: 7 of the most important questions to ask teens every week to strengthen your bond.
Sometimes, the best thing you can do for your teen is to establish an open communication ground. This can seem like a big thing to accomplish and a lot to achieve, but in reality, you get to this place by doing many simple small things.
Things like asking questions and showing up consistently. If you are interested in adding this to your parenting routine, then read on. I have created a list of the best questions that you can ask your teen. These questions will help ensure that your child is doing well and that you have a blossoming healthy relationship for the years to come.
Take a look!
1. Ask Your Teen – Anything new going on in your life?
Sometimes, the simplest questions are the most effective. Your teen may not be inclined to share what is going on in their life with you at any given time. It can be hard to connect with the rustle and bustle of busy life, and they know that. Your teen may not want to bother you with the little things that are going on in their life.
However, the little things will slowly add up to big things. Pretty soon, they won’t even tell you when the big things happen because they are so used to keeping their life private. Asking a little question like this just proves to them that what is going on in their life no matter how small, is important to you.
So you should ask them this weekly to keep up with the goings on and to stay connected with your teen as they grow older.
2. How is your Mental health this week?
Mental health is one of the scariest things that teens deal with. It is the leading cause of death amongst this age group(suicide), and it can have some serious domino effects as they go through life.
Though it might feel uncomfortable initially, you must establish open communication about your household’s emotions and mental health. If anything is stressing them out, or if they are simply not feeling as good as they normally do are just a couple of things that your teen should be comfortable confiding in you.
If you know how they are doing, and they know that they can confide in you without being judged, you are more likely to help your teen through some very hard and confusing things.
3. Is there anything you need my help with?
A simple question that holds a lot of weight. Sometimes you just don’t think to ask if your teen needs help. This is especially true as they get older. But the truth is that teens are still children learning to go through the world.
So asking them this question will show them that they can still count on you to help them with the things they haven’t quite figured out themselves yet. It can create a feeling of safety and foundation that growing children need.
It is your job to help your children navigate the world, and this question can help you to tune in on the ways that you can do that.
4. What can I do for you this week to improve your life?
Teenage life can be very intense. Simple things like a messy room, overdue homework, and new responsibilities can add up and quickly result in a big crash. In order to avoid this, you can ask your teen what you can do this week to help improve their life. I am not talking about buying them the new iPhone because they want it, but rather helping them with a school project or sitting with them while they clean their room.
Our children are more intuitive than we may think, and they will know(for the most part) at least one way that you can help make their life better. Isn’t that what being a parent is all about? Helping to improve your child’s life? This is one of the greatest questions to ask teens.
This question is also great because it established this sort of internal check-in that your teens can continue doing with themself weekly as they go through their adult life. This can be helpful as they create routines because it teaches them that they can improve their lives with little things.
5. What are three things you want to work on this week?
Another important thing to ask your teen is what they want to work on this week. This allows for some inner contemplation and goal work. It also allows them to shift focus from the outward standard goals(such as school work and clean rooms) to inner goals like picking up a new instrument and incorporating a new thing into their morning routine.
If you do this every week, I think that you will find that your child is motivated, clear-headed, and on the path to greatness. Keep in mind that this question can also be turned into a back and for discussion where you also share your goals of the week. This is why this is of the greatest questions to ask teens.
6. Is there anything stressing you out?
As a teenager, you have more changing hormones in your body than in any other phase of your life(besides pregnancy, of course.) So any stressor that seems small to an adult will feel exponentially larger to a teenager.
Asking them if anything stresses them out not only opens up communication for you to connect with what they are going through in their life at that moment, but it also shows them you genuinely care, which can take off some of the stress by itself. You can either just listen or, if they seem open to it, off up some solutions and ways that you can help minimize whatever is stressing them out.
7. Fun Questions To Ask Teens – What is your favorite song today?
This is perhaps the simplest of all seven questions, but it can be one of the most important. It can be hard for teenagers to open up about what is going on in their life, their feelings, and their stressors. Sometimes you just want to shut it away and pretend it’s not happening. But regardless, your child wants to be seen by you.
If you want to cultivate a relationship where you can openly talk about the questions above without it being forced or weird, then you can start with something like this. Asking what their favorite song of the week will show them that you don’t only care about their grades, their friends, or their clean room…but about their likes and interests.
So give it a try. Add it to your weekly routine, and I think that you will find that your relationship with your child will improve drastically. This simple question is one of the best questions to ask teens.
So there you have it, the seven best questions to ask teens every week that will help strengthen your relationship, teach them valuable internal lessons, and make them feel seen in a way that is unique to you.
I hope you found these helpful. Remember, raising a child is hard, but raising a teen is a special kind of challenge. Not just for you, but for the teen as well.
The fact that you even read articles like this should just prove to you that you are a good parent, doing the best they can. Pat yourself on the back, and your teen too.
I am Natalie, the eldest sister of two teens. I hope to bring not only a fresh outer perspective but an internal one as well when writing here.