Need help understanding the DRAMA!

What is going on with my students?
The DRAMA!

 The goal of the below information is to guide you in understanding the developmental stage of adolescents. The highs and lows, the fun and the drama!
 Key Facts From:

The Adolescent: Development, Relationships, and Culture, Chapter 2; Dolgin (2001).

*Forming a personal identity is the single most important task of adolescent development

*G. Stanley Hall, the “father of adolescent psychology,” thought that adolescents were by nature emotionally volatile and unstable.

                                                                                

*Freud believed that adolescents are anxious and moody because they are plagued by newly awakened sexual urges.
 

*Hall theorized that adolescence is a turbulent time of life—one characterized by vacillations between emotional extremes (sound like your classroom?)

*Adolescents (along with adults and children) are greatly affected by observing others, especially respected others.  They have an almost instinctive drive to copy, or model, what they see others do (Be a good role model! they are always watching you!)

Now what you ask? Quick pointer for emotional teens in your classroom:

• Set very clear boundaries and routines, student will feel secure and safe

• Post learning targets daily, set expectation high

• Maintain open communication with parents/guardians, teacher website

• Remember, you are their teacher, not their friend or social worker.. get help when you feel a student needs it. You are not in this journey alone.

 

 

Reference

Dolgin, K.G. (2011).
The adolescent: Development, relationships, and culture (13thed.). Boston, MA: Pearson