Questions you can ask young children, tweens, and teens to provoke more than one-word answers, from Joseph A. Califano, Jr., author of How To Raise a Drug-Free Kid
Parents of teenagers, especially older teens, often think that their kids don’t want to sit around the dinner table and talk to them. But at CASA [The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University] we’ve talked to hundreds of teens. We’ve surveyed thousands more. Kids do in fact crave the family dinner and the connecting that comes with it. We asked teens whether they prefer to have dinner with their families or eat alone, and more than eight out of ten teens of all ages preferred to have dinner with their families. And what they want at dinner is to talk to you.
Back in the 1950s, there was a book about childhood and parenting titled: “Where did you go?” “Out.” “What did you do?” “Nothing.”
That’s an exchange typical in families where there is little or no communication between parents and teenagers. Parents who sit at the dinner table with their kids day in and day out can learn to turn such exchanges into more robust conversations. The key is to make talking about anything and everything part of your normal family routine, and establishing that free exchange as early in life as possible.
Conversation Starters
One great way to get your kids talking at dinner is to use conversation starters.
When children are young, appropriate conversation starters might be questions about their world:
- What’s the best and worst thing that happened today?
- What’s your favorite place in the house to hang out?
- If you were in charge of the music for our family vacation, which songs would you pick?
- Which TV family is the most fun to watch?
- What do you like about your friends?
- What’s your favorite amusement park? What’s your favorite ride?
- What’s your favorite smell?
- If you could have a wild animal from anywhere in the world as a pet, what animal would you choose?
- What’s the greatest invention of all time?
- Using one word, how would you describe your family?
- What do you want to be when you grow up?
- What do you most like to do with the family?
Dinner conversations are the perfect opportunity to instill values in your children when they enter the later tween and teen years. Appropriate topics for conversations at this stage would include current events, family matters, topics of special interest to your family (film, sports, philosophy, politics, religion), goals, difficult situations, and such questions as:
- What’s the best and worst thing that happened today?
- What values are most important to you?
- Who’s the greatest athlete of all time?
- What can we each do to make the world a better place? What can we do as a family?
- What can we, as a family, do to improve our communication?
- Who’s your favorite teacher (coach, role model) and why?
- What’s your favorite subject in school?
- What would you do if your best friend started using marijuana (OxyContin, cocaine)?
- What three things do you want to accomplish this year?
- What do you want to be when you grow up?
- What’s your favorite movie? Band/musician? Sports team?
- What do you think of last week’s sermon?
At CASA, we consider the family dinner so important that we have created a national day of celebration, “CASA Family Day — A Day to Eat Dinner with Your Children™.” Family Day is celebrated every year on the fourth Monday in September, as a reminder to parents of the importance of family dinners. The president, the governors of all the states, and hundreds of cities and counties recognize the importance of family dinners by proclaiming Family Day every year. Lots of community organizations, churches, schools, and social centers celebrate Family Day. For more information about Family Day, and for ideas about how to make dinner together fun, visit our website at www.CASAFamilyDay.org.
If you make every day Family Day, you will take a giant step toward raising your children to be emotionally and physically healthy, academically successful, and drug and alcohol free.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Joseph A. Califano, Jr., the author of How to Raise a Drug-Free Kid: The Straight Dope for Parents (Copyright © 2009 by Joseph A. Califano, Jr.), is the father of five and grandfather of eight and is founder and chair of The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University. Califano held various U.S. government positions and served from 1977 to 1979 as U.S. secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, where he launched the nation’s antismoking campaign.
LEARN MORE
- Read the Preface to How to Raise a Drug-Free Kid: The Straight Dope for Parents
- Watch the video: The author on How to Raise a Drug-Free Kid
