Book Review: Parenting Teenagers

STEP Guide Book Review for Parents of Teens

Dec 13, 2007

Parenting teenagers can be challenging and rewarding. Here's a look at the Systematic Training for Effective Parenting (STEP) book and program "Parenting Teenagers."

Parenting Teenagers is a book that is part of a larger system of parenting known as STEP (Systematic Training for Effective Parenting) which started in 1976, growing from a book called Raising a Responsible Child. The STEP program is currently the most used parenting guide program in North America, with over thirty years of experience in educating millions of parents.

STEP/Teens Program

The focus of the overall teen parenting program known as STEP is building blocks: how parents can handle issues involving their teens such as misbehavior, discouragement, discipline, as well as problems facing every parent-teen relationship. A more intensive approach that reaches beyond the Parenting Teens book, the STEP/Teen program helps parents deal with everyday problems such as messy rooms, moods, and meals, in addition to more complex issues-drug use, sex, gangs and depression.

The book consists of 154 pages and seven chapters, including: Changing Your Response to Your Teenager, Using Consequences to Build Responsibility, and Developing the Courage to Be Imperfect. The authors recommend taking a week for each chapter to fully absorb the many issues in each. Chapters feature a sidebar list of things to be learned in each chapter. For example, Chapter One is called “Understanding Yourself and Your Teenager” and the sidebar specifies that some things you will learn include “How to help your teen be confident, responsible and independent,” and that “respect is important for a positive relationship.”

This book is extremely helpful for parents who are beginning to undertake the new world of raising a teenager, or for parents who have reached a challenge in parenting a teen. The book is written in a way like a textbook, but is never dry, boring, or condescending; it uses an easy-to-read format, cartoons, and humor as well. It is a book that can be picked up in short sessions of acquiring new and creative ideas for approaching the teen years in a positive way. The book offers reinforcement to parents who have perhaps become frustrated or drained in the process of guiding their teen out of the childhood years and into the stage of young adulthood. The transition is often not easy, and is absolutely made easier by experiencing the expert advice and guidance in the book.

“Few teenagers will believe in themselves if we don’t believe in them.” [Parenting Teenagers, p.58]

Words of wisdom like this, and many more, make Parenting Teenagers a helpful must-read for parents of teens.

The copyright of the article Book Review: Parenting Teenagers in Parenting Teens is owned by Mary McCarthy. Permission to republish Book Review: Parenting Teenagers in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.