Encouragement for Teens

Episode 17 of the Time to Practice podcast is out this week with a new once-a-month episode that will feature tips and ideas that I often share with teachers and families about practice and the process of learning a musical instrument. This month we’re talking all about ideas for encouragement for teens in our lives.

You can listen to the audio version of this article about encouragement for teens, by clicking the podcast player link below or looking for the Time to Practice podcast in your favorite podcast platform.

When our children are young, it can be more obvious what they need from us in order to help them with music practice. That might include:

helping structure the practice itself
reminders to practice
scheduling practice in the family schedule to begin with
reminders to stay on task
reminders to be sure to cover all of the assignments the teacher has given from the lesson
sometimes we’re helping our younger students with focusing on quality practice rather than rushing through their practice.

As our children get older and they can take care of many of these scheduling and executing practice details themselves, we can begin to wonder if we’re needed in the process anymore.

And I would say the answer to that varies a lot depending on your child and their specific needs, but it may be that you are less and less needed for the actual practice to take place.

Maybe your child goes into the music room or their bedroom or wherever practice happens, and they just take care of the details of practice (on their own). You may not be needed in daily practice sessions anymore to see that the details of practice are done, and done effectively and carefully.

Here are three ways your role is still important if you are the parent of a teen studying music:

Logistics: this may include getting our students to lessons and performances. It may be making sure they have all the materials they need.

2. Helping create a musical and motivating environment for our children both within our families and through the other activities they participate in.

3. Encourager (that is what we’re focusing on today).

Teens still need: Help with Logistics, A motivating, Musical environment, and encouragement. - Christine Goodner, Episode 27. White writing on a dark blue background with gold border.

I wanted to share some specific things that we can say and do to provide encouragement for teens in our lives, because I know as a parent, with two kids in their twenties now, having raised two teenagers, sometimes they didn’t always appreciate outwardly show me they appreciated my encouragement. Often I would find out later it was important to them.

Having some ideas of the kinds of things that can be encouraging to the teens in our lives can be really helpful.

Let’s start with a few ideas of encouraging things to say.

I do think it’s important to be authentic and to really believe what we’re saying, as words of encouragement. I think it’s also very important to be specific. If we just say “good job”, I think that can sometimes come across as less meaningful than if we are giving encouragement in a more specific way.

So here are some suggestions

· I’m proud of you.

· I love hearing you play.

· I see how hard you’re working.

· Growing up is hard.

· You’re still learning.

· It will get easier.

· I can see you or hear you improving.

· I’m so impressed that you are making time to keep playing or keep practicing.

· Your dedication inspires me.

· How can I help?

· It takes a lot of guts to get up there and play.

Definitely change your language, to (make it) feel like something you would actually say and what your child is needing for encouragement. Whether it’s getting up and performing, or just being reminded that we can see the hard work they’re doing, or we see that it’s taking an effort to make time, to keep participating in music or keep practicing, and we are proud of the effort that’s going in.

I think it can always be an effective strategy to praise the effort and the hard work, rather than just the outcome or some kind of perfectionist ideal.

If I could give one tip, I would say, praise the effort, praise the hard work that you see happening in front of you, and let your child or students know that you see them and you see the hard work they’re putting in.

In addition to things we can say to be encouraging to our teens, I also wanted to share a few ideas of things that we can do.

Here’s a short list of suggestions.

· First. I think one of the big things we can do is help our teem get to their rehearsals and their lessons on time, help arrange transportation if anything comes up, and just make sure they get where they’re needed so they can keep going with their work on their instrument.

·You can leave your child a note of encouragement. I think this is sometimes what I would do. Sometimes I would write a short note and stick it in my daughter’s backpack or leave it in their room. And just a short note of encouragement can go a really long way.

·Take your teen to see live performances. That’s becoming more possible again these days, as things open up. There’s a number of wonderful performances that could be streamed in the living room and watched as a family. Performances can be such a great motivator and helping provide opportunities for that for our musical teens is great.

· Be your teen’s biggest fan: show up at their performances and give lots of positive feedback every chance you get.

· Help your teen find recordings of great music to listen to.

·Talk to them about their goals! Recently Chenoa Murphy came on the podcast and talked about her mother, talking to her about her goals with music and what she was going to do before going to college. And I think whether or not our child is going to be a professional musician, finding out what are their goals . . . maybe they want to play in an orchestra at their college. Maybe they want to play at their church or place of worship. There could be all sorts of goals with music that don’t include a career in music. And having those conversations is a great way to encourage our child’s interests and see what they might be interested in doing with their music in the future.

·Compliment your child on what they’re doing well. Often it’s very easy to get messages from media, peers, all over the place, as teens, that are less than positive or that unfortunately cause us to compare ourselves to others. And I know from my own experience as a teen and speaking to many teens, sometimes it’s really easy to feel like we don’t measure up somehow. And so having encouraging adults in our lives, pointing out all the things that are going well is really important for teens.