Do you know what your teen is texting?

Did you know that there are currently more than 2,000 texting abbreviations? (LOL, TTYL, NSFW)  And there are more created each day as students look for new ways to shorten messages and give them a cryptic code so there parents have no idea what they are talking about.

It is so tough to stay in the know about texting lingo amongst teenagers as well as all the other things that students are doing.  The Wall Street Journal just recently published this great article about the cultural world that is texting, twitter and the shorthand that has been created.  I recommend every parent reads this article.

Oh, and then for fun, LG (the phone manufacturer) is trying to help people out when it comes to translating text shorthand.  They have created  a website, http://dtxtr.com/, that allows you to type in a text shorthand, (PAW, POS, KUTGW, SWU) and get the translation into “normal” English.  You can also type in a phrase and it will let you know if there is a txting way to say it, like laugh out loud is LOL and talk to you later is TTYL.

So go have fun. And if you have a shorthand definition that doesn’t come up, you can add it!

Don’t text while driving…

No for real!  I know I have been guilty of it in the past.  But a new study from The Virginia Tech Transportation Institute revealed that texting while driving increased your chances of being involved in an accident by 23 times.

Click here to read the entire article

Middle School Sexuality

A survey by Seventeen Magazine and O, the Oprah Magazine has given us some very interesting insights into the sexual activity of middle school and junior high students.  Yes, that is what I said- middle school and junior high! Now understand we should be teaching our children the biblical concept of sex inside of marriage!  But sex is a huge battleground that a lot of our students are giving in to the pressures and it can cause all kinds of issues, both long-term and short-term.

Here are a few stats from the survey:

- Three-quarters of teen girls who have lost their virginity say they have engaged in sex without protection and that most moms are not even aware of it
- 14% of mothers suspected their teen daughter had engaged in oral sex; nearly 30% of teen girls 15-18 years old have engaged in oral sex
- By age 12, 12 percent of students have engaged in vaginal intercourse, many of which say that it has been done without protection.

Now let’s be honest-many of the moms reading this are scared to death. This shows how important it is to have open dialogue with your teenager…or even earlier!

Now here are some (sort of) positive stats to encourage you:

- 3 in 5 teen girls said that “the talk” with their mothers has influenced their sexual choices “positively”
- Girls who talk to their moms about sex are half as likely to get pregnant
- About one quarter of the teen girls that talked with their moms stated that the conversation has made them wait

Listen, the whole point is that your teenager is going to find out about sex.  Don’t be the last one to talk with them about it!

If you want to read the entire article about this survey, click here

Cross Current Time Change

Connection.  Dictionary.com defines connection as a circle of friends or associated or a member of such a circle.  Being connected can do so much for a person.  Take our church for example.

Being connected at Sycamore Creek Church lets you know that when things are rough, you have people there to help.  And when things are great, those same people will celebrate with you.  It’s relationships that go deeper than just attending church together.  It’s life. 

And we as a youth group, are missing that.  As I watch students interact, or in a lot of cases, not interact with others at youth group, it pains me.  These students need that connection. 

So starting Sunday Night March 8th, we will be adding a small group element to Cross Current.  And with that, we are going to be extending the time of Cross Current to 6pm – 8pm. 

Our prayer is that students will begin to develop life-long deep relationships with peers and adults that will help them as they navigate life’s journey.

So please make note of the time change for Cross Current.  it will now go from 6-8pm!

Abstinence is “Not Realistic at all”

Travel back in time with me to the recent past.  It was fall of 2008 and John McCain was the Republican Presidential Candidate.  He announced his vice presidential running mate, shocking the world with his choice- Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska.

Fast forward a couple of days, and it comes out that Sarah’s oldest daughter, Bristol, is pregnant.  Remember all those news stories?

In a recent interview with Fox News, Bristol is quoted as saying Abstinence is “Not Realistic at All”, but that she does encourage teenagers to avoid having sex.  Click here to read the article.

I would love to hear what you as parents have to say.  I have my own thoughts on this, and will share them in a day or two, but I want to give parents a chance to discuss by posting comments.

So do you agree?  Are you outraged?  Is there some sort of happy middle ground we should all be on?

Please leave a comment.  If you need to, leave it anonymously!

Teen Myth Busting

There is an interesting article from the New York Times about “The Myth of Lost Innocence”.  While I don’t necesarily agree with some of the information, I do see a trend that I should warn parents about.

We, as parents, need to be very careful to not push our kids to become adult faster than they are supposed to. Take a minute and think back to when you were your son or daughter’s age.  What kind of situations did you normally deal with?  Are they the same or different as the ones your teen is facing?

In most cases, our teens are dealing with more severe situations (some brought on by themselves) and we as parents need to remember to let our teens be teens.  And sometimes we have to be the bad guy to keep them from growing up to fast. 

After all, once innocence is gone, it is hard to go back!

Trends & Tudes

I am at this crossroads in my life when it comes to teens and cell phones.  On one hand, I always thought that cell phones were really unnecessary for teens who were not driving or not heavily involved in extra-curricular activities.  I have stated that my daughter will have no need for a cell phone until either she starts driving or gets involved in sports, theater, etc.

But I think I miss the social impact cell phones may have on teens.  Regularly I get the the Harris Interactive Newsletter so that I (as a person rapidly approaching middle age- ok, not really, but 30 is so close I can taste it) can learn and stay connected to the youth I try so hard to reach.

Well, this newsletter was all about cell phones and technology.  Let me share with you some of the interesting tidbits from teens about cell phones- (You can read the entire newsletter here- 4 pages long)

Things teens say about cell phones and technology:

- Cell phones are becoming a social necessity- 40% of teens surveyed say they would die without their phone and 45% agree that having a cell phone is the key to their social lives
- Owning a cell phone is more essential to a teen’s life than having an Ipod, TV, video games system, or portable gaming device
- 52% of teens say cell phones are the new form of entertainment- talk, txt, video, web, etc.
- The amount of texting and talking on a cell for teens is split 50-50
- 42% of teens say they could text blindfolded (we may have to test this one!!!)
- 57% of teens say that having a cell phone has improved their quality of life- most prominently through providing a sense of security while on the go
- 67% of teens still say that having the internet is valuable compared to just over half (54%) who say the same about their cell phones

But no matter how you view those numbers (good or bad), this is Good News: Teens surveyed still place much higher value on having good health, good friends and freedom.

Gee, I wonder where school grades rank on the list?

I can read! And now, we are choosing to…

According to a study released by the National Endowment for the Arts, for the first time in 25 years the percentage of people who read for fun has increased!

For years, those who spent free time reading – and when I say reading, I mean literature, poems, etc., not cosmopolitan magazine- has increased 7% over the last few years

In fact, there were 16.6 million new literature readers in 2008. 

So way to go parents!  Keep encouraging your kids to read.  May I suggest a great piece of literature – The Bible.  It’s history, it’s drama, it’s life.

You can read the entire article here from the National Endowment for the Arts

A Step beyond Cutting…

As parents of teens, there are so many things to worry about.  Even when your teen seems to be a happy content teen, you always worry about what they may be doing when you are not around. 

But this takes the worry to a whole new level…

For years, cutting or “self-mutilation” has been a concern for parents. Some teens deal with stress and anger by causing pain to their body.  They will cut themselves with pieces of glass or wire, or whatever else they could get their hands on.  And then they would cover it up by wearing long sleeves..

Well now a new wave or self-torture is on the rise- self-embedding.

Self-embedding is where teens force objects (nails, paper clips, glass, bits of rock) into there skin around their neck, arms, hands, feet and ankles, as a way to cope with disturbing thoughts and feelings.

Interesting  thought from the article
“It is often kept secret, but some studies suggest that 13 to 24 percent of high school students in the U.S. and Canada have practiced deliberate self-injury at least once.” 

 For those of us who need numbers, that’s close to 1 in 4 teens.

Now you may be thinking “that is not as common here in the Columbus, OH area as it is in other places.” Oh, yeah. 
The doctor who published this information is Dr. William Sheilds, the chief of radiology at Nationwide Childrens Hospital…here in Columbus.

So yeah, it’s another issue we are dealing with…

Tyra talks Sex…

Not a big fan of the Tyra Banks show, but I found this very interesting.

Over the summer, Tyra Banks surveyed 10,000 girls on her website on all kinds of social issues, including teen pregnancy, drugs, alcohol, violence, STD’s, and sexual habits. 

The results are kind of scary. Here is a sampling of the results of the survey-

52 percent of survey respondents say they do not use protection when having sex.

One in three says she fears having a sexually transmitted disease.

24 percent of teens with STDs say they still have unprotected sex.

One in five girls says she wants to be a teen mom.

Is that not enough info to get you concerned.  Listen to these quotes from the article:

“A lot of the guys, if I didn’t have unprotected sex with them, they would get mad at me and I still wanted that closeness with them,” one girl says during the show. “I was afraid if I didn’t do what they wanted, they wouldn’t be my friend.”

Another girl, a 17-year-old mother of a 7-month-old boy, says she lost her virginity on a school lunch break and deliberately planned her pregnancy by monitoring her menstrual cycle.

“I had helped teach a sex-ed class to a class of freshmen my sophomore year,” she explains. “We taught how … there’s a week [in] the month you are more likely to get pregnant than any other time of the month. I had calculated that out and I decided on two days I was most likely to get pregnant.”

You can read the entire article here