Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 1018, Raising Teenagers.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 1018.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development here in Los Angeles.
Make that beautiful Los Angeles, California.
Go to our website at eslpod.com.
Become a member of ESL Podcast and download a learning guide for the episode you're listening to.
The learning guide contains a complete transcript of everything I say, plus a whole lot more.
This episode is a dialogue between Carl and Marla about raising teenagers helping teenagers children who are now getting older become better people.
A very difficult job.
Let's get started.
Hi, Marla.
I'm really surprised to see you here.
I don't.
Not yet.
I heard about this meeting and decided to attend.
It's best to be ready for those teenage years, don't you think?
Sure.
I heard that the principal is going to talk about different ways to handle our teenagers as they start asserting their independence.
I want to be prepared.
That makes sense, I guess.
I mean more and more teenagers are rebelling by getting tattoos and piercings and experimenting with drugs.
You've clearly done a lot of thinking about this.
I've read a few books on the topic about kids having to deal with peer pressure.
It's my job as a parent to set boundaries and be stricter if it's called for and ease up when my child needs space.
That's all very insightful, but you have some time before all that comes into play, right?
Who knows when he might start hanging out with the wrong crowd and being led astray.
A parent has to be vigilant.
Right.
Carl begins our dialogue by saying, Hi, Marla.
I'm really surprised to see you here.
Carl wasn't expecting to see Marla.
They obviously know each other.
Carl says, I didn't know you had kids attending this high school.
To attend, A-T-T-E-N-D, a school, means to go there as a student.
Carl didn't know that Marla had children who were attending or were students at this high school.
In the United States, high school is usually grades 9 through 12.
Marla says, I don't, not yet.
I heard about this meeting and decided to attend.
Marla doesn't have children going to the high school yet, meaning her children are probably either too young or go to a different school.
But she's thinking about sending her children to this high school.
She heard about this meeting and she decided to attend.
Notice that verb attend again.
Here it means not to be a student of a certain school, but rather go to, in this case, a meeting.
Marla says it's best to be ready for those teenage years, don't you think?
She's saying that she's trying to prepare herself for when her children grow up and become teenagers.
I should explain that teenager means someone usually between the ages of 13 and 19.
Those are the teens in English, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19.
The teenage years are often considered difficult ones for both the teenagers and their parents.
Marla doesn't have teenagers yet it sounds like but she wants to prepare for what will happen when she does, and so she's going to some meeting at the high school.
Carl says, sure, meaning yes, I agree that you should be ready for the teenage years.
Marla says.
I heard that the principal is going to talk about different ways to handle our teenagers as they start asserting their independence.
The principal P-R-I-N-C-I-P-A-L is the director or the leader of a school, especially a school that is either a high school or elementary school.
If it's a school for older people, that is, someone who has graduated from high school, such as a college or university, we don't normally use the word principal.
We might talk about the president of a university or the dean, D-E-A-N, of a college.
However, here we're talking about a high school, and so the leader is called a principal.
Notice that it's spelled P-A-L at the end.
There's another word that sounds exactly the same P-R-I-N-C-I-P-L-E.
That spelling of principle refers to a belief or an idea behind a certain set of beliefs.
This talk by the principal is going to be about how to handle or take care of teenagers as they start asserting their independence.
To assert A-S-S-E-R-T.
One's independence is to demonstrate through your actions that you don't need to be or want to be controlled by others.
This is especially common among teenagers who are used to being told what to do by their parents.
They want to separate themselves in a way from their parents.
They want to be independent, responsible for their own actions.
Basically, they don't want their parents telling them what to do anymore.
Carl says that makes sense.
I guess meaning it makes sense that Marla wants to prepare herself for her children becoming teenagers.
Marla says, I mean more and more teenagers are rebelling by getting tattoos and piercings and experimenting with drugs.
To rebel, R-E-B-E-L, is to fight against someone or some group that is controlling you.
To rebel means to go against someone to have a different idea and to demonstrate that you are opposed to the other person's ideas or opposed to their control over you.
Teenagers rebel when they don't want their parents to control them anymore, perhaps.
Teenagers can rebel.
They can demonstrate that they want to be independent through a number of different ways.
One way, I guess, would be to get a tattoo.
I don't know that many teenagers who get tattoos.
I guess sometimes it is possible for a teenager to get a small tattoo.
But if you want to get a tattoo in the United States you usually need the permission of your parents.
Some states have laws requiring that a parent give his or her approval for their teenager's tattoo.
Many people who put on tattoos we would call them tattooists have their own policies requiring that teenagers get their parents' permission, even if the law doesn't require it.
But I suppose it does happen.
Marla also talks about piercings.
A piercing P-I-E-R-C-I-N-G is a small hole that is put in your body, especially in the lower part of your ear or possibly your nose, where you put a little piece of jewelry, or at least that's what I'm told.
Girls often get their ears pierced, although it has become more common in the last 30 years or so for men to also wear earrings.
I'm not one of them.
Finally, Marla is concerned about her teenagers, or soon-to-be teenagers, experimenting with drugs.
Experimenting with drugs means...
To begin to use illegal drugs such as marijuana and other kinds of drugs.
At the time we record this episode, there's at least one state in the United States where marijuana is legal, but not for teenagers.
Certainly not yet, I guess.
Carl says, you've clearly done a lot of thinking about this.
Marla says, I've read a few books on the topic about kids having to deal with peer pressure.
Peer pressure is the influence that your friends, especially your classmates in high school, have on you, the influence that the people around you have on you who are the same age as you.
Usually, we use this expression when talking about elementary and secondary schools, that is to say, grade schools and high schools.
Marla says it's my job as a parent to set boundaries and be stricter if it's called for and ease up when my child needs space.
There are several words there that need explaining.
The first is the expression to set, S-E-T, boundaries.
B-O-U-N-D-A-R-I-E-S A boundary is a limit to something.
Usually it's where two different countries or two different geographical areas come together.
It's the line that separates them.
To set boundaries, however, means to have limits on what your children can do.
That means, of course, there are things that they can't do.
And so the parent sets the rules, sets the boundaries for the behavior of his or her children.
To be strict S-T-R-I-C-T means to have a lot of rules, or rules that the person may consider very restrictive, that don't allow him to do very much.
Strict also has the idea of not making any exceptions to the rule.
You have to follow the rule exactly as it is stated.
The phrasal verb to call for means to require, to need.
So Marla is talking about being stricter if it's called for, if it's required.
She also mentions easing up.
To ease, E-A-S-E, up, means to become more relaxed, to be less strict.
It's the opposite of strict.
If your child needs space.
Your child wants to have more privacy, more opportunities to be alone, without other people.
So all of these expressions together now.
Carl says, that's all very insightful meaning.
That all indicates that you have a deep understanding of this topic.
But you have some time before all that comes into play, right?
The expression to come into play means to take place, to happen.
Marla says, who knows when he might start hanging out with the wrong crowd and being led astray.
Marla's child is only four years old, which means he has nine years before he becomes a teenager.
But Marla is concerned.
Marla says, who knows when he might start hanging out with the wrong crowd.
The expression to hang out with the wrong crowd C-R-O-W-D means to spend time with people that may have a negative influence on you.
Parents are rightly correctly concerned about who their children have as friends, and because friends have a lot of influence on us.
Children learn all sorts of things from their friends, and so you want to make sure they're learning the right thing.
Nobody says, oh, my child is a slow learner, so it's okay if he hangs out with the wrong crowd.
No, we learn from the company we keep is an old expression.
We learn from the people around us.
We often act the way they act.
And so you want your child to be around other children, your teenager to be around other teenagers who have a good influence on them, not a negative one.
That's why marla is concerned about her child being led, led astray a-s-t-r-a-y.
To be led astray means to be influenced to do bad things.
When a good person starts to do bad things, he or she has been led astray.
A parent has to be vigilant, marla concludes.
To be vigilant V-I-G-I-L-A-N-T means to always be watching out for difficulties or dangers and to be prepared to do something about them.
To be vigilant means to be careful, to be watchful, to make sure, in this case, that your teenager doesn't hang out with the wrong crowd.
Carl concludes our dialogue by saying right.
But although normally right means yes, I agree.
Carl says it in a way that makes it clear that he doesn't really agree.
He in fact thinks perhaps Marla is a little crazy, worrying about her four-year-old son and what he will do when he's a teenager.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
Hi Marla, I'm really surprised to see you here.
I didn't know you had kids attending this high school.
I don't, not yet.
I heard about this meeting and decided to attend.
It's best to be ready for those teenage years, don't you think?
Sure.
I heard that the principal is going to talk about different ways to handle our teenagers as they start asserting their independence.
I want to be prepared.
That makes sense, I guess.
I mean more and more teenagers are rebelling by getting tattoos and piercings and experimenting with drugs.
You've clearly done a lot of thinking about this.
That's all very insightful, but you have some time before all that comes into play, right?
My little Lucas is already four years old.
Who knows when he might start hanging out with the wrong crowd and being led astray.
A parent has to be vigilant.
Right.
I want to thank our insightful script writer, Dr. Lucy Say, for her wonderful script.
She never leads us astray.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcasts.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2014 by the Center for Educational Development.
