S/O on grounding high school students

[SparklyUnicorn]

Do you do this?  I was never grounded in high school.  I can't imagine too many scenarios where this would be a logical and useful punishment.

 

Just curious if this is common.  I don't have a high schooler yet, but almost (oldest is 14).  

[DawnM]

Nope.  As I said on the other thread, we do what we call restriction.  No electronics, extra chores, etc.....possibly miss a social event if it was a casual deal.

[catz]

No.  And I especially cannot imagine grounding kids from beneficial activities unless there was something very extreme going on.

[Pawz4me]

No.  Neither of ours ever gave us any reason to ground them.  And I don't believe it's a punishment we would have ever chosen anyway.

[Katy]

IMO it makes sense if you have an outdoorsy, social kid who goes out to play all the time, and when their life revolves around outside friends.  Like kids in the 80's.  But when half of their peer interaction is online, and preferred activities are with electronics?  That doesn't seem like much of a consequence to me.

[Bluegoat]

I guess it depends on part what people mean by grounding.  My hisband and I for example seem to mean rather different things.

 

I can see restricting activities or outing under some citcumstances, but the kinds of things would be rather different than for younger kids.

 

Some of the kids who probably could stand to be grounded at that age would make it impossible to enforce.

[SparklyUnicorn]

IMO it makes sense if you have an outdoorsy, social kid who goes out to play all the time, and when their life revolves around outside friends.  Like kids in the 80's.  But when half of their peer interaction is online, and preferred activities are with electronics?  That doesn't seem like much of a consequence to me.

 

Haha..yes that's a good point.  My older kid would not consider it much of a punishment that he couldn't go out.  But taking away Internet access, now that would be painful.

 

It gets tricky with the Internet though because it often gets used for school. 

 

Not that I'm trying to dream up possible punishments here. LOL 

[vonfirmath]

IMO it makes sense if you have an outdoorsy, social kid who goes out to play all the time, and when their life revolves around outside friends.  Like kids in the 80's.  But when half of their peer interaction is online, and preferred activities are with electronics?  That doesn't seem like much of a consequence to me.

 

The grounding I have seen done (yes, even to teenagers. They still need consequences for their actions sometimes) includes grounding from online/electronics.

 

In fact, the grounding I have done for my elementary kid has been grounding FROM electronics. He's still perfectly okay to play on his bike, etc. But he can't get on the computer at home for entertainment.

[Bluegoat]

yes, my kids aren't teens, but even with the younger ones I'd ground them from electronics before going out!

[SparklyUnicorn]

yes, my kids aren't teens, but even with the younger ones I'd ground them from electronics before going out!

 

I've done that too.  Grounding from bike riding wouldn't be a punishment.  They may resort to it if grounded from the computer, but that would be a win win in my book.  More exercise.

[OneStepAtATime]

I guess restricting electronics was not what I considered "grounding" so I am glad the term has been clarified a bit.  Yes, I do restrict electronics when necessary.

 

I was never grounded.  We discussed or sometimes I was sent to my room for a bit to calm down but I was never grounded.  Usually, my mother was able to find out what my underlying issue was and address it, or at least rationally explain why there were consequences for my actions and help me brainstorm better ways to handle things.  Mom rarely ever got truly angry, though, so she was usually able to calmly and rationally assess the situation and come up with a way to help me through it.

 

TBH, the friends I had that were grounded usually didn't change their behavior in the long run.  And the least effective method was grounding for weeks or months.  It just didn't help at all.  Time frame was way too long, and usually the punishment was shouted at the child in the heat of anger.  It wasn't a natural consequence and the underlying reason for whatever was being punished was not addressed.  All the extended grounding did was cause strained relations and anger and resentment.  

[Farrar]

At least around here, the term is just outmoded. I don't hear people using it for any age.

 

My own kids aren't that age yet, but I like specific consequences for specific things. I can't imagine outright "grounding" a teen from all interaction and electronics in this day and age. I wouldn't do that to my middle schoolers and it seems like it would be even harder and weirder to enforce for a high schooler. For one thing, with a homeschooler, it would mean doing nothing except school with mom. That just seems counterproductive to getting better behavior. But also, since kids need computers for school, need outside time to be healthy and happy... it just seems untargeted. I get why it worked "back in the day" as a punishment. It just doesn't speak to how we parent today or how kids live today.

 

Now, making an earlier curfew, taking away screens during certain hours, missing a specific event or not being allowed to go a specific place or see specific other kids for a period - that all seems to make more sense as potential consequences to me. I just wouldn't call any of it "grounding" exactly.

[Tita Gidge]

"Grounding" isn't a word that's used in my native culture, it's a word that my own teenagers and their friends use.  Perhaps I'm using it differently than is intended.

 

My current teens are 18, 16, 15, and 14. #2's best friend is always asking #2 why he's grounded. I've never told #2 he was grounded, only that unless x-requirement is met (school, chores) he can't participate in y-activity. 

 

So if he hasn't mowed the lawn, a chore he's held for six years in regular rotation with his brothers, no he can't go to watch his friend's baseball game.  If he has mowed the lawn, he's free to go wherever he likes. This may mean mowing the lawn early in the week for any unforeseen social event that pops up, or procrastinating the chore and missing out when something comes up.

 

Or if he hasn't done his schoolwork for the day, then no he can't meet his friends at the park for basketball until it's turned in. And if it was rushed through just to "get it done" then no, he won't be going to soccer practice that night because he has to re-do his schoolwork. He made the choices to rush through it, and then to prioritize park time over practice time.  His friend and coach think I've grounded him, but no - he's just made poor choices.

 

Whatever one calls it, I just care that everyone's work is done before play time happens.  Myself, included.

Edited April 22, 2016 by Tita Gidge

[Ottakee]

I have a teen foster that was just in huge trouble at school today. Like possibly criminal level huge.

 

Right now he is "grounded" . his cell phone and chrome book are locked away. He can use another child's under direct supervision ONLY for school work. He is also not allowed to hang out with any friends.

 

He can do family activities (likely will be made to do them :-)), church youth group, meet with his mentor, etc. He will also be doing a lot of extra work around here......a child that is not in school will work those typical school hours. We have 5 acres of leaves to take, 3 horses worth of poop to scoop, a house that needs work, etc.

[Tanaqui]

The girls aren't high school aged yet, however, we do try not to use too much punishment. It doesn't work that well for us, no matter how tempting it is. By now I've learned from experience to never say never regarding this sort of decision, but like I said on the other thread, it'd have to be something pretty extreme for us to pull rank like that on a teenager.

[HRAAB]

No. Neither my dh nor I were ever grounded, and we have never grounded our teens. Now I will say when my dd was way behind in math, we talked and discussed what was getting in the way. She said facebook was a big distraction. I asked her how she thought she should deal with it, and she decided to deactivate facebook until she was caught up. So I guess that was a self imposed grounding.

 

Eta: typing errors

Edited April 22, 2016 by Ishki

[regentrude]

No.

My parents never used this as a punishment, and I have never used it with my kids.

I a hard time imagining how one could effectively ground a teenager.

[Reefgazer]

I pull privileges.  I don't know if that's the same as grounding.

[Wheres Toto]

I never grounded my oldest when she was a teen. 

 

I may have refused to drive her to non-essential activities (school and dance were essential) under certain circumstances, and if she behaved in a dangerous manner we would have taken away the car keys when she was older. 

[foxbridgeacademy]

I've never had to, don't think I would.  I've never had to "restrict" them either.  The worst my kids have ever done is have a messy room or not get their school work done on time.... DD likes to argue but then so do I.

 

 

Mine are still young, plenty of opportunity to get "restricted" in the future. 

Edited April 23, 2016 by foxbridgeacademy

[The Girls' Mom]

We don't now.  After a certain point, if they are doing something bad enough to warrant punishment, then it is going to be tied directly to the offense.  (Something I really haven't had to deal with as teens, thank goodness).  

 

I have only had to ground my oldest and it was back as a pre-teen.  It was pretty much just extra chores and no fun stuff/phone calls for a while.  She went through a stubborn phase...lol.  

[SKL]

Funny, this came up today in the car.  My kids said, "mom, you never grounded us, did you?"  I have sort of semi-grounded one of my kids.  I've taken away some privileges temporarily - mainly electronics / screen time - while giving her extra chores.

 

For us, shutting the kids down physically would be very counter-productive.  And as they get older, it becomes even more important for them to have a variety of meaningful goals and outlets.  An idle mind and all that.

 

I don't remember being grounded as a teen.  I was grounded at least once as a younger kid, but I snuck out the window, so ....

[Tsuga]

Nope.  As I said on the other thread, we do what we call restriction.  No electronics, extra chores, etc.....possibly miss a social event if it was a casual deal.

 

My mom used to call grounding restriction. It offended her that we called it being grounded. We were like... point is, I'm in teenager jail right now.

 

So I don't know how that translates in their minds.

 

Please don't misunderstand: I have no problem with various parenting styles for various kids and I have no doubt that you know what is right for your family. I think there is a time and place for restriction / limited privileges / grounding in many families.

 

Just saying, I was on "restriction" and I remember thinking, "I'm grounded." Like time-out is baby jail. You can call it the naughty step, time-out, "thinking time", time in. It's all baby jail to me, LOL.

[PeacefulChaos]

I haven't read other replies.

 

I think it depends on the kid.  And on what the offense is.

 

I only got grounded once, for being an hour late for curfew my senior year.  That was the first thing I'd ever done to warrant any sort of loss of privilege on that scale.  I don't know that there was a time frame on it, but I do remember that a few days later, I asked to go do something and my grandparents were like, 'sure'.   :)

 

I think that in a case like that, the 'punishment' (for lack of a better word) fit the 'crime'.  I was a kid who didn't generally have a curfew - ever.  The few times I did, I never broke it because it was always reasonable (my grandparents set situational limits - I'd go out with friends to a movie, etc, and call afterwards to say we were going to a restaurant, for example.  Depending on the time, my grandma would always just be like, 'okay, have fun, be home by ____' - usually about 1-2 hours later).  That time I didn't, and honestly, I would have been livid and 50x angrier than they were when I did get home if I were in their shoes.  An hour late with no call, nothing?  (Nevermind the fact that if I had called and wanted to stay out longer, they probably would have extended it anyway).  I would be furious.  Them?  *insert 'mom look' from Grandma here* 'You should have at least called me.  Please don't do this again.  You are grounded from going out with your friends for the time being.'  And then she gave me a hug and a kiss goodnight and went to bed.   :lol:

 

So anyway, that's the part about what the offense is, and it fitting with the loss of privilege.

 

 

And depending on the kid - that's self explanatory.  A kid who doesn't enjoy going out with friends and spend a lot of time doing that, it won't make a difference (which means, honestly, that 'grounding' doesn't usually make sense to me in kids under 15/16 - when they start driving or having friends who drive that they hang out with on their own a lot.  Maybe high school in general.  idk, it's such a situational thing).  Because to them, they aren't losing anything.  At the same time, Idk how a kid like that would do anything which grounding was a sensible loss of privilege for anyway.

 

It's just one of many ways.  My kids are too young to be grounded, but I have taken away all screens before.  Because screen time is something that matters to them.  If I had kids who hated video games and TV, doing that would be pointless.   :lol:

 

 

Anyway, long but yeah - totally situational, depending on the kid, circumstances, and a bunch of other factors.

 

 

 

ETA:  I am seeing after reading other replies that my understanding of the word 'grounding' is much different than some others.  I have never heard it used as anything but grounded = not being able to go out with friends.  I've never heard of it affecting anything else like extracurricular activities, sports, church, etc.  That's weird and doesn't make sense to me.  I also don't use it interchangeably in the screens issue (we just say 'no screens', not 'grounded from screens'), but I could see where it'd be sort of the same, I guess?  

And I believe in any consequences fitting the offense.  So using it for something random like an argument with a parent or anything other than what I listed above doesn't make sense to me, either.  There are better ideas for those things.  

Oh, and being 'grounded' is a loss of privilege :lol: ... what else would it be considered?  :lol: 

 

Edited April 23, 2016 by PeacefulChaos

[Tap]

I have grounded dd17 for a week once.  In our state, when you get your drivers license, you have to wait for 6 months before you can drive with friends in your car.  

 

She was warned ahead of time that if she got caught with a friend in her car, she would be grounded for a week as the 1st consequence, This means that she would come home immediately after school and not be able to hang out with friends.. (she gets together with friends to do homework several days per week).  She would also lose driving privileges which means she would have to get rides from me to school for a week, and get rides from me back and forth to cheer practice and get rides to cheer at games.  Second offence, would be loosing privileges until her 6 months were up.  

 

She got caught driving a friend across the street to Subway at lunch. (She is in public High school) So....consequences happen.  It only took once and as far as I know, it didn't happen again. 

 

I did not make her miss cheer, I drove her. And if she would have had her dog sitting duties, I would have driven her to that too. She is a very social teen, so grounding her was quite effective in this situation.

Edited April 23, 2016 by Tap

[Laura Corin]

No, I haven't done it.  I've taken away electronics when a kid was not paying enough attention to normal family life requirements.

[Jenny in Florida]

We did. It was part of the package we put in place when I agreed to keep my son home instead of marching him down the street to enroll him in the closest public school.

 

When we enrolled him in a full slate of online classes, the agreement was that he would keep up with the assigned workload and keep his GPA at a certain level. The consequence for either not finishing the assignments for a given day by the agreed-upon cut-off time or having his GPA drop below the stated requirement was losing outside activities and recreational electronics for that day.

 

If he ended the work week (as of Friday by 5:00 p.m.) behind pace or under the required GPA, he was grounded for the weekend.

 

There were certain exceptions: If he was currently involved in a stage production, we did not pull him from rehearsals or performances, because his absence would have caused problems for the rest of the cast. And we did not keep him home from either of the last two meetings of any activity prior to a scheduled event. So, if it was just a regular Monday with a regular choir rehearsal or a Tuesday-Thurdsday with a regular dance class, we would keep him home, but if there were a concert or recital coming up in the next week or two, those rehearsals/classes were off limits to miss as consequences.

 

In his case, because those outside activities were his most valuable "currency," it was the only approach we found that worked. He was not motivated by grades or any other consequence we could identify.

 

As I recall, it required exactly one missed choir rehearsal and one day of missed dance classes and a close call one weekend before he understood we meant it, after which he got in gear and got his grades up and generally took responsibility for keeping himself on track.

 

 

[Peaceful Isle]

I don't ground my teens/ preteens. It just makes life miserable for everyone. They are home a lot and I really feel their extra curricular things they do are part of who they are, and it shouldn't be taken away.

 

I do ground from TV, phones, or electronics. I haven't had to in such a long time, though. I'm really blessed.

 

My 5 year old, on the other hand, is always cruzin on the line, lol.

[Haiku]

Do you do this?  

 

My oldest spent a good deal of her high school years grounded. Usually it was because she lied to us and/or deliberately disobeyed us. Once it was for something that would have resulted in significant legal trouble for her and for us had she been caught by the police rather than caught by us.

 

I definitely think grounding has its place. If a child cannot be trusted to be safe outside the home, the child can't go out unsupervised. If the child can't be trusted to safely use electronics, the child can't use them. If the child endangers the entire family through stupid, selfish, and dangerous actions, the child's freedom is limited to protect both the child and the family.

 

It seems completely logical to me.

[Haiku]

Why not just deal with the original conflict ? 

 

When the original conflict is that your child is doing unsafe/illegal things outside the house, it is dealing with that conflict to restrict their ability to do so.

[Jenny in Florida]

When the original conflict is that your child is doing unsafe/illegal things outside the house, it is dealing with that conflict to restrict their ability to do so.

 

Or, on a possibly smaller scale, when the original conflict is the young person not living up to his or her daily responsibilities for no "reason" other than preferring to do other things, putting in place a structure that helps the young person develop the habits necessary to prioritize those responsiblities seems to me to be the appropriate way to deal with the conflict.

 

In my son's case, knowing that failing to meet certain benchmarks meant being grounded from the things that did matter to him provided the structure he needed to be successful.

[luuknam]

My parents talked about grounding me when I got home at 4:30am once in 10th grade. I was 14, we'd had our high school musical performance (I was in the orchestra), then a party at school, then most of us went out to a bar (drinking age is 16, most of my classmates were 16 since it was late spring - I didn't even bother drinking, even though I easily could have (some of my friends would hand me money to go get them more drinks because they didn't want to wait at the bar themselves - in NL they mostly card if they think there's no way you're old enough, as opposed to if you look under a million years old), and bars close at 4am (though most left before then), and then of course time to bicycle home. My mom was, er, not happy when I got home (mixture of scared and mad). I felt so bad I went to school for 1st period even though school had given the people who were in the musical the first two periods off the next day...

 

I don't remember if they actually grounded me. I sort of think they didn't, since it would've been pretty much pointless and they knew it (I rarely went anywhere anyway), plus they were sort of happy that I socialized and had a good time - they just really, really, really wished I'd borrowed someone's phone and called them to let them know I was okay - and I think I learned that lesson.

[luuknam]

No.

My parents never used this as a punishment, and I have never used it with my kids.

I a hard time imagining how one could effectively ground a teenager.

 

My in-laws grounded my wife once after she went on an all-night bike ride (after her dad hit her) by taking one of the wheels off her bicycle.

 

I've heard of people tomato staking their kids (literally being within a few feet from the kid all the time). I personally don't think I'd have the energy to do that with a kid of any age, but some people do.

 

Another option is to say "you're grounded", and if the kid breaks the grounding rules, punish the kid for breaking the grounding rules. So, for example, if the kid goes anywhere while grounded, the kid loses electronics use as well. Or w/e.