Keeping Your Teens Involved in the Holidays Family Concerns

Keeping Your Teens Involved in the Holidays

This article about: children, christmas, holidays, parenting, teenagers

Keeping your teens involved in the holiday festivities as they get older can be a challenge. Especially when the economy is tough, it is difficult to find creative ways to keep your family united, especially if you have kids in a wide age range. The little kids have it easy ? waiting for Santa Claus is really the only thing they have to do, but older kids need to feel more involved in order to stay engaged and connected.

With the holidays coming and the economy tight, you can be creative on a small budget and keep your teen involved by combining technology with the spirit of the season. Teens love technology, and it does not matter what holiday you celebrate this time of year. The one thing all the different holidays have in common is a sense of gratitude and a desire to stay connected or reconnect with family.

In order to make the holidays special without blowing the budget and give your teens a project that will keep them interested and involved, why not try making a family movie together? When you make a movie using a digital format, you can upload the video onto the web and share it with family and friends across the country, keeping you close even when miles separate you.

The best way to make your family movie a success is to plan ahead. Allow your teen to be involved in both the creative and the technical process of making the film. Decide where you are going to film your movie, what kinds of things you want to include, and how long it should be (15-20 minutes is ideal). If your children have a special talent, this is the perfect time to let them show off. Record your songbird singing Christmas carols or your daughter’s flute solo.

Use a tripod to capture the whole family on film, with everyone singing a song or speaking a greeting, and send the message to friends and family for the holidays. Involve grandparents, if you can, recording them as they answer questions about their lives. The great thing about a project like this is that it gets your whole family involved, creates a feeling of connection between you and your teens, and gives everyone a sense of accomplishment.

Let your teen act as producer and director (they probably know a lot more about the technology required to upload the videos to the internet anyway) and feed their creative instincts. The final product will make a great gift to family members (your teen will probably know how to burn the movie onto a DVD using your computer) and let your teen stay involved in the holiday and create some true holiday spirit.

If you don’t have easy access to a digital video recorder, turn your teen loose with a digital camera and have him or her create a photo collage or photo calendar to share with family and friends to celebrate the holiday and the New Year. It’s a great way to keep your teen involved.

Norbert Georget is an accomplished professional speaker, teen motivator, parenting expert and author of the book, No-Nonsense Parenting For Today?s Teenager ? How To Feel Like A Good Parent Even When Your Teenager Hates You. You may get a FREE REPORT called No-Nonsense Parenting for the Disrespectful Teenager. All the answers you’ll need to deal with your disrespectful teenager.

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