Remember, youth culture is real and can be defined. Understanding youth culture throughout the decades can help parents and other adults talk with today’s teens.
Exercise 1: Rent it Today!
Go to the local video store with your teen and rent two movies—one that you pick which depicts what life was like when you were a teenager and one that your teenager feels accurately depicts his/her experience. Watch them together and talk about the positive and/or negative ways young people are portrayed.
Exercise 2: Try This on for Size.
Play dress up! Go into each other’s closets and choose something that you would actually wear in public. Was this difficult? Why did you choose a certain article of clothing or accessory? What made other clothing choices seem unacceptable or undesirable?
Remember, there are similarities and differences across the generations. Explore them with your teen.
Exercise 3: Say What?
Divide a stack of blank index cards between you and your teen and write down different slang terms for drugs, one on each card. You use the terms from your teenage years and your teen should use the ones that he hears today. Quiz each other and see how familiar you are with each other’s slang terms. Have any of the terms stayed the same? If not, why have they changed? Have drugs (their potency, consumption pattern, popularity) changed?
Exercise 4: Fill in the Decade.
Get four blank pieces of paper and write down the decade that describes your teenage years at the top of two (e.g., 1960s) and do the same for your teenager (e.g., 1990s) on the other two pages. Each of you takes a set of the papers and writes down what you know about the decade and the youth culture of that time. After you both finish, either switch papers or read your thoughts aloud. Discuss the similarities and differences in your impressions.
Remember, youth culture influences youth attitudes and behaviors.
Exercise 5: You Think THAT is Cool?
Do you ever think back to your high school days and cringe when you remember how you dressed or what you used to do for fun? Or maybe you still like to do the same things and laugh at how little things have changed. But, what does your teenager think? Ask your teen what she thinks is cool and likes to do for fun. Then share what you thought was cool and what your interests were when you were a teen. Why were/are these things cool? Is it because everybody else was/is doing it? Are your interests similar? How have your interests changed over the years? Has your teen’s interests changed since he was younger?
Exercise 6: www.FIND YOUR IDOL.com
If you have access to a computer and the Internet, sit down with your teen and do a little surfing together. Each of you look up a person you admire(d) as a teenager and see what interesting things you can find out. Are your idols anything alike or totally different? What is it about these people that you and your teen admire? Did they or do they have any influence on your attitudes or behavior?
Remember, music is powerful and is a dominant force in youth culture.
Exercise 7: Turn the Beat Around.
Take turns playing deejay the next time you and your teenager go for a ride in the car. You play the tapes or choose the radio station(s) on the way to someplace, and your teen gets to choose the music for the ride home. Did you both survive the rides?
Remember, media play an important role in youth culture.
Exercise 8: Pass the Remote Control!
Watch each other’s favorite television show together at least once sometime during the same week. Was the show any different than you thought it would be? Did you like it? Talk to each other about your impressions.
Remember, advertising plays a major role in youth culture.
Exercise 9: Tuning In.
Trade copies of magazines you and your teen like to read and pick one advertisement* that catches your eye. Sit down together and ask each other the following questions:
- What product or lifestyle is the ad selling/promoting?
- Why did the company pick this particular magazine to advertise its product? Who is the intended audience?
- What does the company want you to think or believe about the product? What will using the product do for you?
- Is there anything the company might not want you to know about the product? Are there any negatives or harms associated with using the product?
* After you each do this once, try it again with an alcohol or tobacco advertisement.
