by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Adolescent Brain, Alcohol, Critical Thinking, Drugs, Parent-child Communication, Parenting, Teen Culture, Youth Athletics
Drinking alcohol with the expressed purpose of getting “messed up”? Believe it or not, this is an activity practiced mostly by kids. Watch this brief video… What can a parent do? 1. Get the book, How Your Teen Can Grow a Smarter Brain. Then read...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Adolescent Brain, Critical Thinking, Parenting
Most parents think of their child as “officially” an adolescent when they technically become a teenager on their 13th birthday. And they think their project of raising the child to adulthood is pretty much over after high school, when most of these young...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescent Brain, Education, Teen Success
When I was in high school, I got an A in every subject I ever took. I didn’t find out until later that I hadn’t learned as much as I thought. But man, I knew how to make A’s! My dad was in the military, so I knew all about West Point. For years I wanted to go to...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescence, Adolescent Brain, Drugs, Teen Culture
A new study has concluded that teenagers who smoke pot suffer a significant drop in IQ that persists even if they stop smoking it later in life. The article doesn’t explain why, except for this statement by lead researcher Madeline Meier of Duke University:...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescent Brain, Critical Thinking, Programs, Teen Success
If you’ve followed my blog, you know I often write about how a child’s prefrontal cortex (PFC) can be wired for basic critical thinking skills. The window of opportunity for advanced development of the PFC opens at puberty and closes sometime in the early...
by Dennis Coates | Adolescent Brain, Critical Thinking
I consider myself a serious thinker. But to be honest, I’m not an intellectual. I’m biased towards action. I have a Ph.D., but 95% of what I know today I learned on my own after earning that degree. So seemingly my head is full of knowledge. Some people...
