Creating a Morning Rhythm for Teens

March 26, 2024

Most adults have a sort of internal rhythm or to-do list of the things that they do each morning after they wake up. While this rhythm will depend on whether you work or stay at home and your involvement with getting any children ready for their day, there are predictable tasks that need to get done. Most mornings, you may find that you go through your morning rhythm somewhat automatically. You may need to alter your rhythm slightly depending on the day, but this is typically inserted somewhere into the routine (e.g., gathering library books to return, jotting down a grocery list, putting a letter in the mailbox).

Teens also have a morning rhythm, but they are often not as aware of the exact steps and may be very or somewhat reliant on their parents to do portions of their rhythm or to remind them to do certain steps. When working with parents, they are often somewhat overwhelmed and frustrated with their teen in the mornings as they may be juggling their own rhythm, along with the rhythms of any other children and even pets. One way to alleviate some frustration and overwhelm parents experience in the morning, while also building independence and autonomy in teens, is to help teens understand the steps of their morning rhythm and what they are responsible for doing. By developing an understanding of the exact steps of a teen’s morning rhythm and what help, prompts, and reminders they need, it can make everyone’s mornings go a little smoother!

Step 1 – Observe for a few days. With your teen, take time to jot down your teen’s morning routine steps from the time that they wake up until the time that they walk out the door to go to school. This may include steps such as waking up, getting dressed, brushing teeth, eating breakfast, packing their backpack, and getting shoes and coat on. It will also be important to observe how much help is needed – which includes reminders or prompts to get started, keep going, and finish tasks. Parents should also note what steps they need to do for their teen and what steps their teen is able to do completely independently.

Step 2 – Write out the steps of the morning rhythm. It is often helpful to be very detailed when first writing out the steps of the morning rhythm from start to finish. Steps can then be combined to make the rhythm more manageable. For example, all of the personal hygiene tasks that are done in the bathroom such as brushing teeth, combing hair, and washing face can be combined together. The parent and the teen should be involved in writing down the steps together to increase collaboration and buy-in around working on the skills that make up the morning rhythm.

Step 3 – Discuss what help, prompts, and reminders are needed for each step and if there is anything that can be used to increase or build independence. This will help both parents and the teen to understand the steps that are mastered and the steps that need to be worked on. For example, does the teen need to be woken up several times by the parent before they get out of bed? Or does the parent need to remind the teen to pack up her planner, lunch, water bottle, and computer in her backpack each morning? As the parent and teen discuss what prompts or reminders may be needed, they could also problem solve and brainstorm solutions to increase the teen’s ability to complete things independently (e.g., use an alarm clock on the teen’s phone to wake up, create a checklist of items that need to be packed in the backpack each day). It can be helpful to make a plan for implementing solutions to increase independence (e.g., set an automatic alarm on the teen’s phone for Monday-Friday, post the backpack checklist near the front door).

Step 4 – Post the steps of the morning rhythm. Once the steps of the morning rhythm are written out, they can be posted in places that will remind the teen to complete these steps (e.g., the refrigerator, the teen’s bedroom door, the bathroom mirror, near the front door, etc.).Some teens may prefer to use a whiteboard to write out steps and check them off. Teens may also want to incorporate the morning rhythm steps on their phone or tablet (e.g., using a calendar app, notes app, or to-do list app).

Step 5 – Set a goal for what steps the teen will do independently in their morning rhythm. Once the morning rhythm steps have been written out and posted, the parent and teen should set a goal for increasing independence with skills in the morning rhythm. For example, the teen could work towards completing 8 out of 12 of their morning rhythm steps independently with only 1 prompt or reminder from their parent. As another example, the teen could just work on doing specific steps independently (e.g., brushing teeth and brushing hair after they get dressed without any reminders).

Step 6 – Specify a reward that the teen will earn if they are able to independently complete their morning rhythm. Once a goal has been developed, the parent and teen should talk about a reward that can be earned. The reward should be motivating to the teen, but should also be commensurate with their goal. For example, earning an extra 15 minutes of screen time for meeting the daily morning rhythm goal may be appropriate and motivating, but earning an extra 3 hours of screen time may be very motivating to the teen but is not commensurate with the effort that they are putting in. Rewards can be earned daily, or a teen could also work towards a weekly goal (e.g., choosing a movie for movie night, extra dessert, staying up late on the weekend, etc.)

Step 7 – Track progress and re-evaluate morning rhythm goals weekly. It can be helpful to monitor the teen’s daily progress by writing down whether they met their goal each day and any challenges or obstacles that affected their ability to meet the goal. At a daily or weekly check-in session (e.g., Sunday evening), the parent and teen can review the teen’s progress and should discuss what is going well and what is challenging. For example, if a teen is struggling to finish their breakfast before leaving for school, the parent and teen could brainstorm solutions and edit the morning rhythm steps as needed (e.g., wake up earlier, eat breakfast earlier, make a different breakfast, discuss how to manage time more effectively, etc.). It will also be important for the parent and teen to modify the goal and reward as needed, and this can be done prior to the start of the next week (e.g., Sunday evening).

Step 8 – Continue to challenge over time. As the teen continues to make progress with their morning rhythm, their goals should be changed to challenge them. The end goal is to have the teen do all steps of their morning rhythm independently, but it may take many weeks and months to get to this point. As the teen masters all of the skills in their morning rhythm, the reward can be faded and then removed after they have consistently demonstrated independence for several weeks or months. However, the parent can discuss the natural rewards of being independent (e.g., decreased nagging from their parent, positive feeling that comes along with being autonomous) and also that the teen can reward themselves for continuing to demonstrate independence with their morning routine (e.g., can have free time after morning rhythm is completed each day).

Creating a Morning Rhythm for Teens

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