by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Guest Blog Posts, Parenting
This guest post comes from Elisabeth Stitt of Joyful Parenting Coaching. A veteran teacher turned parenting coach and blogger, she knows that kids and families come in all different shapes and sizes and that there is a long and varied list of parenting practices that...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Critical Thinking, Education, Inspiring Quotes, Parenting, Personal Strength, Teen Success
Forty years ago, I was in graduate school at Duke University, in over my head, studying hard and learning as much as I could to catch up with my better-prepared classmates. It paid off – I earned my Ph.D. four years later. It was the most intense period of...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Parent-child Communication, Parenting Books
To be the best listener you can be, I believe you need two, closely related skills: active listening and empathy. I learned active listening in 1976, and I’ve been practicing it and writing about it ever since. The core skill in active listening is to check what...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Parenting, Teen Success
As we prepared to go the gym for our morning workout, my wife discovered that she had misplaced her car keys. We searched for ten minutes and finally found them in the car, still in the ignition. Unfortunately, the battery was dead because she was listening to the...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Inspiring Quotes, Parenting, Strong for Parenting, Teen Success
It’s been said many, many times that parenting a teenager may be the hardest thing you ever do. It can sometimes seem like a thankless, hopeless endeavor. You have your dream – to help your child grow up to be a strong, independent, happy, successful...
