HSHSP Ep 170: Developing Integrity Skills in Teens, Interview with Lisa Nehring

Vicki is joined for this interview by Lisa Nehring (of Skills 101/Life Skills for a Digital Age podcast, right here on Ultimate Homeschool Podcast Network). Lisa is a 27 year veteran of homeschooling. She also owns True North Academy, a gentle Classical and Charlotte Mason approach in an online school for homeschool high schoolers that meets various needs. Lisa’s gift is helping teens develop the soft skills they need for success in life. (That’s why she started her podcast.)

Soft skills are the skills that are related to emotional and social intelligence:

• Kindness
• Integrity
• Honesty
• Politeness
• Communication
• Teamwork
• Adaptability
• Courage
• Good work ethic
• Grit (Angela Duckworth wrote a great book about Grit) Find grit goals, find something challenging and work it for several years

Soft skills are important to develop because they are key qualities that many employers are looking for these days. Many employers have found that soft skills expertise leads to more success than simply having excellent training in the career field. Take a look at this post about what Google found about success and soft skills in its employees.

With soft skills in mind, Lisa and Vicki are discussing integrity in this podcast episode. The word *integrity* comes from the root *integer*, which means *wholeness*. Thus, integrity means being the same person the whole time. Lisa says: The person you are in your grandmother’s house, you should be all the time.

The Bible speaks about integrity in Proverbs 11:3:

The integrity of the upright guides them; but the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity. (Note: duplicity means *deceitfulness*…NOT being the same in all circumstances.)

How do you go about developing integrity skills in your teens?

Model integrity for your family:

• Live out the idea that honesty is always appropriate
• If you make a promise, keep it (as much as is possible)
  • Develop plans that help you follow through
• Know your limits, say *no* when you need to
  • Don’t placate, when something can’t happen, be honest about it
• Swim in your own lane, take care of your own business
• Have the courage to set goals and work toward them
• Live a lifestyle of gratitude
  • Gratitude is an important part of developing integrity. Gratitude helps our teens (and us parents) to be healthy and whole. It is a key ingredient in the skill of integrity. Want an easy way to develop gratitude skills? Check out this post from Vicki Tillman Coaching on how to create Gratitude Lists.
• Live out your faith in practical ways
  • Show compassion and concern for others by investing in them, for instance:
    • friends
    • family
    • fellow Christians around the world
• Humility (be honest and transparent with the things we need help with)
  • In other words, ask for help when you need it.

In developing integrity, realistically dealing with the digital world is vital.

• We need to be the same person online as we are offline. This is an important topic to discuss with teens. If you need some help discussing appropriately *being real* with your homeschool high schoolers, visit our social media expert/friend, Leah Nieman.
• At the same time, we (and our teens) need to beware of social media envy: what others are presenting on social media may not be the whole story. Lisa tells the story of when she showed pictures of her 4 little grape vines and her friends thought she had an orchard. She wasn’t intentionally being deceiving, it’s just that social media can’t really show ALL of life!
• One way to help teens with integrity skills is to develop thinking skills. Integrate thinking, philosophy and World History for a powerful History credit with 7Sisters’ popular History and Philosophy of the Western World.
  • Help your teen with some of the thinking skills that will bolster integrity with this post.

Help your teens in developing integrity by helping them learn wonder and awe.

• Develop wonder and curiosity. Ask questions, do experiments, have experiences outside the daily doldrums.
• Develop a sense of awe. Go outside, leave the digital devices off. Vicki says, we need one moment of awe each day to notice the majestic things God is doing. Here’s a post from Vicki’s coaching page with ideas for developing awe through easy mindfulness practices.

Lisa tells the integrity story about her grandpa who farmed mint for Wrigley’s gum. He was highly respected in the local community because of his integrity. When he shook your hand it meant he was giving his word… it was going to happen.

We must remember that we can do much to invest in our homeschool high schoolers’ success and soft skills. However, we are not in charge of the outcome. God is! We raise our kids with prayer and the best modeling we can do…AND we continually place our kids in His hands.

Join Vicki and Lisa Nehring in our discussion on the soft skill of integrity. Visit Lisa Nehring’s podcast, Soft Skills 101/Life for a Digital Age, right here on Ultimate Homeschool Podcast Network. Check out the True North Program and her True North Facebook page.