the frontal lobe, is not always functioning fully in teenagers and therefore their brains respond differently to the outside world. As their responses are driven with more of a gut reaction, than an executive or thinking kind of response, they tend to offer a more impulsive behavioural response, instead of a necessarily thoughtful and measured kind of response. These are typically the ‘grunt’ response, the ‘slamming door’ response and sometimes the ‘you’re ruining my life’ response. So, not only are our teenagers unable to make good decisions, when they do, they are often using the wrong parts of the brain. The third aspect that I want to share, involves the cerebellum. The cerebellum is the part of the brain that changes most during the teenage years, and it also doesn’t mature until our early twenties. The cerebellum is often linked to the coordination of our cognitive and thinking process. The ability to smooth out all the different intellectual processes to navigate the complicated social life of a teenager and get through in-tact, is also the function of the cerebellum. How does any of this information help our students? Perhaps, we need to share this information more with them so that they have some understanding of their own development. As teachers we often talk of motivation, specifically intrinsic motivation, and its impact on learning. As motivation is increasingly linked with identity, the more we understand ourselves, the more motivation we have, to improve ourselves. Perhaps if our students had a little bit more information about what was going on in their heads, it could help their motivation and their learning? It certainly couldn’t hurt to try. How does this information help you? I think the most important thing to remember is what I wrote at the start of this article, ‘several parents asked, ‘how has my once sweet child, morphed into a lazy, moody, sometimes unlikable adolescent?’ The key word here is ‘several’. Poor
decision making, emotional outbursts and social and cognitive clumsiness are often characteristics that describe our teenagers. A couple of years ago, I read the book “Stumbling on Happiness” by psychologist Daniel Gilbert. In it he describes what scientists have discovered about the uniquely human ability to imagine our future and predict what will make us happy. About two thirds of the way through, I came across the following graph which should be labelled ‘the most terrifying graph for all new parents!’. It’s made up of four completely independent studies which all show a precipitous drop of marital satisfaction, which is closely aligned with broader happiness, that peaks during the teenage years and does not rise again until your first child goes off to college. All parents would agree that their lives have gotten dramatically better because of their
children, but when you reach those teenage years, it is safe to say that your average happiness may occasionally waiver. However, be reassured that you are not alone. It is not just your teenager. Also be reassured that as a community, we are here to support you as your child progresses through these teenage years. There will be many highs and lows during adolescence and eventually they will become independent, responsible, and communicative young adults. Until that happens, always remember that we are in this together, and we will come out of it together!
