Keeping teens tip-top in the New Year.

• Position: Family Life

With Baby New Year 2010 soon replacing Old Man 2009, teens may find themselves facing more pressures than ever before. The advent of new the pitfalls of social networking sites, an economy that has many parents taking ex-jobs (if they can find them) just to make ends leave teens more on their own. Yet, there to beat the tough times with just a little effort, maintains Ketaki Shriram, a 17-year-old author wrote her first novel, Sorceress of the Himalayas at age 13.

Shriram has some advice for teens priming for New Year:

Read more. Read, read, read--newspapers, and magazines. Read more than you did year. Pick a genre that you like and buy five not ignore classics and plays or things your school's reading list. If you enjoyed "The you would love George Orwell's 1984, one of the inspirations for that movie.

Get involved. According to the pollsters, the vote tipped the scales in favor of Barack in the 2008 presidential election. "Young people, when united, were strong enough to the course of one of the most powerful nations on the planet," Shriram notes. "Imagine how much good we could do if we all volunteered our time to a worthy cause at least once a week."

Do something outdoors. Whether you live in the city or suburbs, teens today are spending way too much time shackled to their computers, lounging with their iPods, or texting on their phones. When weather permits, get outside for at least a few minutes every day. "Walk down to the corner store," she...