Hi - Sue Blaney here with your Parenting Tip from Parenting Teens Info.com

My tip this week is to
Be creative with after-school coverage >>Listen

Do your teenagers come home after school to an empty house? After school day care options are scarce for teenagers in many communities, and parents have to go it alone. This presents obvious challenges for parents in the workplace, and probably all busy parents.  But I had a conversation with one mom recently that left me concerned. As a working single-parent who has no community alternatives available to her, her daughter is one of millions of latch-key kids. For many families, this works out fine. But this middle-school age girl was leaving her house regularly, and her mom did not know where she was going. There are a few disturbing statistics that you should be aware of:

•  It is between the hours of 3p.m. and 6p.m. on weekdays that the majority of episodes of high-risk behavior occur, including sexual activity, substance abuse, and criminal actions.
•  Lack of adult supervision has been linked to lower GPAs, increased likelihood of accidents and injuries, and lower social competence.
•  Teens who are unsupervised after school are 37% more likely to become teen parents*.

Even if your community doesn’t have a good Boys and Girls Club or other supportive program, you can come up with creative options. I know of parents who band together in their neighborhood and have 6 kids come home together to one house where a parent is there to supervise, help with homework, and provide rides. The kids go to a different house every day, and the parents take turn so they can manage this with their work schedule.

You can be creative and thoughtful in this area, and you need to be smart. Too much unsupervised time may be asking for trouble.

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Teens…….

Til next time…I'm Sue Blaney.

PS. For more information on this topic click here

*Making the Case: A Fact Sheet on Children and Youth in Out-of-School Time; National Institute on Out-of-School Time, 2005. http://www.niost.org/