The Disengaged Teen: Helping Kids Learn Better, Feel Better, and Live Better by Jenny Anderson and Rebecca Winthrop provides a framework to consider why students approach school as they do. Mainly targeted toward parents, this newly published book (January 2025) can be helpful for educators and providers to help teens navigate their education and next steps. The writers walk through four types of engagement and what they could mean about how a student, or anyone, is approaching a particular aspect of their lives.

The passenger is quietly quitting, the achiever faces the perils of perfection, the resister is driving in reverse, and the explorer is productive and happy. How can we help students stuck in a nonproductive and unhappy mode while assisting them to develop skills and expectations for what makes sense for them and others around them? The writers have been there and have insights to share.

The Disengaged Teen

Tags

Zone of proximal development

Engagement

Disengagment

Adolescence

Parenting

High School

“Stop Panicking Over Teens and Social Media,” an essay from the Wall Street Journal by Lucy Foulkes provides a different point of view that Jo-Ann and Candida discuss. Foulkes points out that some of the generalizations about social media use and teen mental health may not be backed up by the data. While we have some differences, we agree that parents need tools and guidance to help their teens learn to safely navigate the digital world that is different than what they grew up with.

Stop Panicking Over Teens and Social Media

Candida and Jo-Ann talk about a recent guest essay in the New York Times,

Giving Kids Some Autonomy Has Surprising Results (Jan 2, 2025) by Jenny Anderson and Rebecca Winthrop, authors of “The Disengaged Teen: Helping Kids Learn Better, Feel Better, and Live Better.” Students are more likely to be engaged in their education with some autonomy, particularly in choosing how to approach their learning. With flexible thinking from students, teachers, and parents there can be some leeway with demonstrating mastery and prioritizing school work, extra-curricular activities, and sleep. We also noted how students feel pressure to build the “best” resume for college applications so that they can go to the “best” college and then repeat the process to gain entry to the “best” graduate education or “best” employment opportunities while not attending to personal priorities. While acknowledging that there are things at every level students need to learn that they may not be interested in, this pathway can leave students bored, tired, and not truly engaged in what they want to know to meet external standards.