Engaging Today’s Teens in Meaningful Conversation

Canadian TV show My New Day just posted three of their shows online where the hosts Bob and Audrey interviewed me about engaging today’s teenagers in meaningful conversation. (You’ll see Part 1, 2, and 3 all linked on this page. Part 1 really gets started at about 8:45 into it, the rest dive in right away.)

These videos are great clips to show to parents about how to use everyday real-world occurrences to get our kids talking about stuff that matters.

Here’s an excerpt from part 3:

Jonathan: It’s funny. If we put 10 parents together from the same church and you asked, “What do you allow and not allow in your house?” Then…

Audrey: You’d get 10 different answers.

Jonathan: Yep. You’d see some who are more strict, some more lenient. And funny enough, when you look at all the parenting experts, all the researchers writing about this stuff, they all will disagree about how strict or how lenient they should be, but they all agree on one thing: we need to talk with our kids about this stuff all the time.

Audrey: Meaningful conversations.

Jonathan: Yep. Literally the most conservative Parents Television Council and Planned Parenthood are both saying, “Talk with your kids about this stuff,” albeit, two different things they’re saying we should say…

Audrey: Yes. (laughing)

Jonathan: But every expert out there agrees. So we can use pop culture to do this, to ask, “Is what she just sang in her song, is it right?”

(My New Day, Get Your Kids Talking, Part 3, beginning at 7 minutes and 43 seconds)

I was interviewed four more times on this same show, posting next month about my new book, More Than Just the Talk.