Hello All,
This is a wonderful conversation and I'm happy to read that Teachstone will take the topic on in terms of developing a podcast or sharing out additional information.
I agree with Monique that when children use behaviors that challenge us or disrupt others in the classroom, it often feels like the problems multiply (3 children feel like 10 children).
One essential strategy that we have in our teaching bag of tricks regarding trying to change a child's behavior is that we first have to change our own ways of teaching, talking, building relationships, reinforcing appropriate behaviors, teaching appropriate behaviors, and approaching challenging behaviors in a proactive instead of reactive teaching stance.
In other words, we have to change us first before we can expect a child to change. And, we all know that changing adult behavior is as hard and difficult as changing a child's behavior.
So, don't get discouraged. Instead, take a close look at what you are doing, what messages your classroom environment is sending, and what your children are communicating. All behaviors - including ours - are attempts at communication. When a child does not have the skills to use more appropriate behaviors he or she will resort to using the skills they do have (yelling, screaming, throwing, hitting, biting, etc)
Build a positive relationship with the children that challenge you the most.
Use information, ideas, strategies, resources found at
www.challengingbehavior.org or www pyramidmodel.org to guide your professional development and reflection on your classroom environment, visual supports for children, and evidence-based teaching strategies for teaching children social emotional development skills.
As you have already noticed, trying out isolated strategies doesn't work when we are trying to teach appropriate social emotional skills to young children.
Caring enough to start a conversation amongst others is a great first step.
Start small - work to teach appropriate behaviors in one segment of the day. Circle time and Work/Center time - are often two of the more challenging times of the day.
Good luck - and don't give up. Celebrate small successes for you and your children.
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Patricia Kluzik Stauch
EC Instructional Coach
Elgin IL
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-10-2019 13:19
From: Je Ton Carey
Subject: Teacher Sensitivity
Hello
Hang in there and I think it's wonderful that you are reaching out to see how to best support these children in your program. I'm a huge proponent of teachers having as many tools as possible on their teacher tool belt to support children. In understanding this I would suggest that you and your staff get familiar with The Teaching Pyramid. It meshes beautifully with CLASS and provides a framework of how to address tier 1 and tier 2 challenges/behaviors with children. They do offer trainings but they have free resources online that are helpful.
The first thing to do is to observe what is triggering this or these behaviors. It requires documentation during a variety of different settings and times to get a sense of what changes you can do in the environment to prevent these behaviors. There are a lot more steps involved but this just gives you an idea of what you need to do. There is no easy fix and each child is unque in what triggers behaviors and what they are seeking or avoiding with these behaviors.
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Je Ton Carey
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-10-2019 11:58
From: Monique Vasquez
Subject: Teacher Sensitivity
Thank you for your help, some of the things you have suggested we have tried. That's why I'm wondering if there is anything else. We acknowledge the good behavior and give positive feed back. One child wants the attention for the negative behavior But when we try to ignore the bad behavior he gets louder until we turn to look and talk to him. When we ask what is bothering him he will explain what he's upset about and then when we give him what he wants he is not happy and continues the negative behavior.
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Monique Vasquez
Fillmore
Original Message:
Sent: 01-10-2019 11:23
From: Tamara De Los Santos
Subject: Teacher Sensitivity
I've been waiting to see if anyone else had thoughts/ideas. I'll go ahead and share mine.
This is the kind of question/topic that can be super challenging to give advice or suggestions for. Here is my example of why.
Toddler is jumping on the couch. Parent has child go jump on the exercise trampoline. The problem with this is, the child was needing connection with the parent, so the child goes back to the couch to jump as it was what worked to get the connection.
Toddler is jumping on the couch. Parent goes and sits to read a book thinking the child needs connection time. Child is super wiggly and won't sit still for the book. Parent is frustrated and now thinks the child doesn't like books. Child really needed to burn some energy.
The challenge most often is discovering the true need behind the behavior. What is the behavior telling you? Often the same behavior in two different children will mean two very different things.
In Head Start we often deal with children and families who are dealing with traumatic events in their lives. Young children don't know how to say "This thing that is happening in my life is super scary, I really need people to keep the rules the same so I know what to expect and I need people to demonstrate care and respect when I can't handle a situation". Instead you get a child who has a meltdown/is aggressive when then smallest of things are changed, or the child moves to defend herself before another child can harm her.
Most children with challenging behavior benefit from being told "I am so glad you are here at school today. You are safe here. Now go play". Statements like "I won't let anyone hurt you" also helps as they generally don't hear that.
Another successful thing that works well for us is examining our own relationship/connection with these children. Generally speaking the children teachers struggle with the most are also the children they don't have good relationships with. Then when teachers make extra effort to connect/build relationships with these children the behaviors often slowly disappear.
I hope this helps.
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Tamara De Los Santos
Original Message:
Sent: 01-09-2019 14:46
From: Maria Pilar Garcia
Subject: Teacher Sensitivity
Hello Monique, we have the same problem in my classroom, we have tried many different techniques that don't seem to work. It would be great if the experts would share some advise.
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Maria Pilar Garcia
San Jacinto CA
Original Message:
Sent: 01-07-2019 13:18
From: Monique Vasquez
Subject: Teacher Sensitivity
I would like to know what are ways you can use teacher sensitivity with really challenging children. In our classroom we have 3 to 5 year old and a total of 24 students. We have 3 very challenging children, that it almost feels like its 10 children in just one student. There are some strategies that we have tried I know for example taking them outside for a walk or letting them have a job. But when the tasks we give them is over they go back to the actions that they had been doing. There's a lot of hitting and throwing stuff in our classroom, I was just wondering what else could we possibly do??
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Monique Vasquez
Fillmore