Children with Challenging Behavior

07/28/2005

Children with Challenging Behavior

He fled from the rain and sat down under the waterspout.
Saudi Arabian Proverb

In the July 2005 issue of Exchange, Barbara Kaiser and Judy Sklar Rasminsky’s article “Including Children with Challenging Behavior in Your Child Care Community” described one center’s strategy for incorporating children with challenging behavior into their program. Here is some of what they had to say:

“We agreed that prevention was the best intervention. Because we were thinking about how to make everyone feel part of an inclusive community, we took a hard look at the center’s social context. Although it was invisible, it seemed important. I realized that as the director I set the tone. If I was calm, relaxed, and caring, the staff were more likely to act the same way. Sometimes just having a smile on my face made a difference. We began to understand that telling [children] to “use your words” meant nothing if he didn’t know which words to use, so we started to teach social and emotional skills proactively to all the children…. The children learned about their own feelings, about the feelings of others, about problem solving, and about how to communicate their own needs appropriately.

“One of the most valuable things we learned was the importance of recognizing children’s appropriate behavior and focusing on their strengths — what they could do, not what they couldn’t do. At the same time we resolved to expunge “no”, “don’t”, “stop”, and “why” from our vocabulary. This proved to be a surprisingly difficult task, but we persevered because we knew that “Please walk” is much clearer than “Stop running!” We saw with amazement that staff as well as children became more friendly and open when we all used the same language and methods.

“We also started to examine the physical space and program. To encourage children to include others, we created more than one entrance to some play areas; and when conflicts arose, we talked with the children about ways to solve the problem, such as limiting the number who could play in a particular space. Perhaps some of [children’s challenging] behavior was a way of telling us an activity was too difficult, too easy, too confusing, too long, or too boring. We tried to ensure that the program reflected a variety of cultures, interests, developmental levels, and learning styles; and we offered the children choices — about attending circle, standing up during art, or deciding when to read a story, for example — that empowered them and gave them more opportunities to succeed.”

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