Parenting
Lyndsay Green, a mother of two daughters, and an authority on learning technologies, soothes fearful parents in the amused and calm voice of a Doctor Spock.
She has spent her 25-year career analyzing learning technologies and managing their applications. Described as an “information agent of the future,” her expertise has been sought by federal and provincial governments, international agencies, and private and public sector organizations. She was the co-founder and co-publisher of The Training Technology Monitor, a highly regarded technologies and workplace learning newsletter. Prior to establishing her consulting practice Ms. Green was coordinator of the Federal Women’s Film Program of the National Film Board of Canada. She published Babies Aboard (McGraw-Hill 1990) and has a chapter in Bringing It Home: Women Talk About Feminism in Their Lives (Arsenal Press, 1996).
Manuscript available
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Raising Teens
in a Wireless World
Reassuring advice from parents who’ve been there
For many parents the web is a scary monster, set to entrap vulnerable adolescents with a knapsack of temptations, The round the clock accessibility of porn, scurrilous blogs, and vicious gossip is often hidden from view. The myriad pitfalls of cell phones that photograph, and in seconds, spread the word on the internet, can lure kids into adventures that terrify and thwart caring adults.
Lyndsay Green organizes her guide to navigating this technological world into three sections. She opens with general principles of parenting—the stuff that doesn’t concern a computer, the web, or a cell phone with the latest features. Using examples from parents, it is a useful review of key items ranging from understanding your job, your teen, and your issues. There are discussions of creating a family mythology, and of engendering responsibility, respect and trust. And she reminds parents that they can learn from their teen.
The second section focuses on techniques, many of them not often discussed—such as encouraging multiple peer groups, involvement in the arts, and delivering just-in-time learning.
The third section is devoted to specific issues from on-line problems and sex, to bullying, tattoos, video games and depression.
Although danger lurks in the wireless ether, so does help. Lyndsay Green offers a plethora of great web sites and tips that are invaluable resource aids.
Family therapists who write books on raising teens see those at the extreme edges, but this book focuses on ordinary kids. Lyndsay Green offers peer advice that will reassure parents they too can survive and even enjoy the turbulent teen years.
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