Behave Coach -

5/18/10, Eric Putnam will be facilitating an all-day school teacher coaching session at Wilson Elementary School, 2929 E. Filmore, Phoenix

Gail E. Joseph, Ph.D., & Phillip S. Strain, Ph.D.
Center on Evidence Based Practices for Early Learning University of Colorado at Denver

Posted by Eric Putnam at www.behavioralcoach.com

The fundamental importance of building positive relationships with children can be best illustrated by the following scenarios.

Helen and her 30-month-old daughter, Lucy, have a long-standing morning tradition of going to a neighborhood park and playing with other parents and children. They spend anywhere from 1 to 2 hours each day at the park. This day, however, Helen receives an emergency call and needs to return to their home immediately. She and Lucy have been at the park for about 10 minutes, and Lucy is playing “cooks” with her best friend Tito. Helen says to Lucy, “Honey, I’m sorry, but you and Mommy have to go home right now. Everything is O.K., but we have to go.” Lucy begins to whimper and says, “But, I was playing with Tito.” Helen reaches down and hugs Lucy, saying, “I know. Let’s call Tito’s mommy when we get home and invite him over to play later.” Lucy says, “O.K.,” and she and her mom hurry home.

Eric has been a Head Start teacher for 10 years. In that time, he has built a reputation as the teacher for the tough kids. This year, Bill is assigned to Eric’s class because of Bill’s long history of hyperactivity, negativity, and aggression toward adults and peers. Two months into the year, the Center’s administrator sheepishly asks Eric how things are going with Bill. Eric replies, “Great, boy were folks wrong about Bill.” Somewhat flabbergasted, the administrator decides to see for himself. What he observes in less that 10 minutes is as follows. Eric says to everyone, “Look at Bill, he is sitting so quietly in circle; too cool Bill!” When Bill answers a question about the story, Eric says, “Bill, that’s right, you are really concentrating today.” When transition is about to occur, Eric says, “Bill, can you show everyone good walking feet to snack?” At snack, a peer asks Bill for juice, and he passes the container. Eric, being vigilant, says, “Bill, thanks for sharing so nicely.”

After completing a functional behavior assessment, Erin, an ECSE teacher, determines that Jessie’s longstanding tantrum behaviors in the class are designed to acquire adult attention. Erin institutes a plan to ignore Jessie’s tantrums and to spend as much time and attention when Jessie is not having a tantrum. After four days of increased tantrums, Jessie’s behavior has improved dramatically.

In each of the foregoing scenarios, adults were successful in achieving improved behavior change in contexts that many individuals might predict would lead to continuing, even escalating challenging behavior. However, in each case, children were obviously attuned to adults, focused on their communication, and prone to value and seek-out adult approval. In each case, the adults had invested time and effort prior to the events in question, communicating their noncontingent affection and unquestioned valuing of these children. We submit that this prior history of positive relationship building is a prerequisite to effective intervention practices for challenging behavior and thus goal one for adults and caregivers wishing to prevent challenging behavior and enhance children’s sense of well-being and social competence. How does one go about the task of relationship building?

Building Positive Relationships

Building positive relationships with young children is an essential task and a foundational component of good teaching. All children grow and thrive in the context of close and dependable relationships that provide love and nurturance, security, and responsive interactions. A positive adult-child relationship built on trust, understanding, and caring will foster children’s cooperation and motivation and increase their positive outcomes at school (Webster-Stratton, 1999). In a review of empirically derived risk and protective factors associated with academic and behavioral problems at the beginning of school, Huffman et al. (2000) identified that having a positive preschool experience and a warm and open relationship with their teacher or child care provider are important protective factors for young children. These protective factors operate to produce direct, ameliorative effects for children in at-risk situations (Luthar, 1993). Next, we describe some of the key ingredients for relationship building.

First Things First

Utilizing a relationship-building model, proper sequencing of adult behavior is critical. Simply put, adults need to invest time and attention with children as a precedent to the optimum use of sound behavior change strategies. There are two reasons that this sequence is so important. First, it should be noted that the protective factors promoted during relationship building can and do function to reduce many challenging behaviors. As such, taking the time to do relationship building may save time that would be spent implementing more elaborate and time-consuming assessment and intervention strategies. Second, as adults build positive relationships with children, their potential influence on children’s behavior grows exponentially. That is, children cue in on the presence of meaningful and caring adults, they attend differentially and selectively to what adults say and do, and they seek out ways to ensure even more positive attention from adults (Lally, Mangione, & Honig, 1988). It is this positive relationship foundation that allowed Helen with minimal effort to leave the park early with Lucy, for Eric to experience Bill in a much more positive way than prior teachers, and for Erin to alter Jessie’s tantrums in such short order.

Getting to Know You

In order for adults to build meaningful positive relationships with children, it is essential to gain a thorough understanding of children’s preferences, interests, background, and culture. For very young children and children with special needs, this information is most often accessed by observing what children do and by speaking directly to parents and other caregivers. With this information, adults can ensure that their play with children is fun, that the content of their conversations is relevant, and that they communicate respect for children’s origins. Whenever possible, this kind of information exchange should be as reciprocal as possible. That is, adults should be sharing their own interests, likes, backgrounds, and origins with children as well.

It Takes a Lot of Love

For many children, developing positive relationships with adults is a difficult task. Prior negative history and interfering behavior often conspire to make the task of relationship development long and arduous. On occasion then, adults should consider that they will need to devote extensive effort to relationship building. The easiest, most straightforward way to achieve a high level of intervention intensity in the relationship-building domain is to think about embedding opportunities throughout the day (see list below for specific suggestions). While there is no magic number that we know of, we have seen teachers who can easily provide several dozen positive, affirming statements to children each day. For children who have mostly heard criticism, it takes, we feel, a lot of messages to the contrary.

Making Deposits

A metaphor for building positive relationships that we find particularly helpful is that of a piggy bank. Whenever teachers and caregivers engage in strategies to build positive relationships, it is as if they are “making a deposit” in a child’s relationship piggy bank. Conversely, when adults make demands, nag, or criticize children, it is as if they are making a relationship withdrawal. For some children, because there has been no prior effort to make deposits in their relationship piggy bank, nagging, criticism, and demands may be more akin to writing bad checks! It may be helpful to reflect on the interactions you have with an individual child and think to yourself, “Am I making a deposit or a withdrawal?” Or, “Have I made any deposits in Bill’s piggy bank today?”

Undoubtedly teachers and child care providers strive to build positive relationships with all of the children in their care. Typically, we have the best relationships with children who respond to us, seemingly like us, and go along with our plans. But as you know, it is more difficult to build positive relationships with some children than with others. We have all had experience with children who push our “hot buttons.” Maybe they demand more attention than others, are disruptive, unmotivated, oppositional, aggressive, or do not give us the positive feedback we get from others. When our hot buttons get pushed, we may feel frustrated and discouraged, or bad about ourselves as teachers, causing us to get angry, raise our voices, criticize, or actively avoid these children. Yet, the very children we find the most difficult to build relationships with are the ones who need positive relationships with adults the most! It is a natural reaction to feel emotional when a hot button is pushed. However, rather than feeling frustrated, angry, or guilty about it, it is more productive to think of the emotional response as a warning sign that you will have to work extra hard to proactively build a positive relationship with this child. If the adult is simply reacting to a hot button being pushed—he or she may consistently become frustrated and avoid the child. We recognize that building positive relationships is far from simple with some children. It takes a frequently renewed commitment and consistent effort. Because this is easier said than done, we have provided some practical strategies for building positive relationships with children throughout the preschool day.

Practical Strategies for Building Positive Relationships

• Distribute interest surveys that parents fill out about their child
• Greet every child at the door by name
• Follow a child’s lead during play
• Have a conversation over snack
• Conduct home visits
• Listen to a child’s ideas and stories and be an appreciative audience
• Send positive notes home
• Provide praise and encouragement
• Share information about yourself and find something in common with the child
• Ask children to bring in family photos and give them an opportunity to share it with you and their peers
• Post children’s work
• Have a “Star” of the week who brings in special things from home and gets to share them during circle time
• Acknowledge a child’s effort
• Give compliments liberally
• Call a child’s parents to say what a great day she or he having in front of the child
• Find out what a child’s favorite book is and read it to the whole class
• Have sharing days
• Make “all about me” books and share them at circle time
• Write all of the special things about a child on a T-shirt and let him or her wear it
• Play a game with a child
• Play outside with a child
• Ride the bus with a child
• Go to an extracurricular activity with the child
• Learn a child’s home language
• Give hugs, high fives, and thumbs up for accomplishing tasks
• Hold a child’s hand
• Call a child after a bad day and say “I’m sorry we had a bad day today – I know tomorrow is going to be better!”
• Tell a child how much he or she was missed when the child misses a day of school

Beyond the specific strategies enumerated above, we suggest that adults can speed the process of relationship building by:

• Carefully analyzing each compliance task (e.g., “time to go to paints”) and, where possible, shifting that compliance task to a choice for children (e.g., “Do you want to paint or do puzzles?”);
• Carefully considering if some forms of “challenging” behavior can be ignored (e.g., loud voice)—this is not planned ignoring for behavior designed to elicit attention but ignoring in the sense of making wise and limited choices about when to pick battles over behavior; and
• Self-monitoring one’s own deposits and withdrawal behaviors and setting behavioral goals accordingly. Some teachers have easily done this by using wrist golf counters to selfrecord or by moving a plastic chip from one pocket to the next. A strategically posted visual reminder can help teachers remember to make numerous relationship deposits.

Conclusion

Most of this article has focused on what children get out of positive relationships with adults. However, we contend that adults get something valuable out of the time and attention they expend to build these meaningful relationships too. First, as was mentioned earlier, the children we build relationships with will be easier to teach, more compliant, and less likely to engage in challenging behavior. Second, teachers will feel more positive about their skills, their effort – and we think may like their jobs even more. Third, adults will begin to see the “ripple effect” of relationship building. As children learn in the context of caring relationships with adults, they will become more skilled at building positive relationships with other children. Finally, providing a child with the opportunity to have a warm and responsive relationship with you means that you have the pleasure of getting to know the child as well.

References

Huffman, L., Mehlinger, S.L., & Kerivan, A.S. (2000). Risk factors for academic and behavioral problems at the beginning of school. Bethesda, MD: National Institute of Mental Health.

Lally, J.R., Mangione, P.L., & Honig, A.S. (1988). The Syracuse University Family Development Research Program: Long-range impact of an early intervention with low-income children and their families. In D.R. Powell & I.E. Sigel (Eds.), Parent education as early childhood intervention: Emerging directions in theory, research and practice (pp. 79-104). Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing Corp.

Luthar, S.S. (1993). Annotations: Methodological and conceptual issues in research on childhood resilience. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 34 (4), 441-453.

Webster-Stratton, C. (1999). How to promote children’s social and emotional competence. London: Paul Chapman Publishing Ltd.

Article Source: http://www.vanderbilt.edu/csefel/modules/module1/handout5.html.

For more information helping build relationships with children go to www.behavecoach.com.

Posted by Eric Putnam at www.behavioralcoach.com

March 4, 2010 — PHOENIX – Arizona Governor Jan Brewer today announced that with or without the federal government, Arizona will continue to move forward with its aggressive and innovative plans for education reform. The Obama Administration rejected Arizona’s first round application to receive Race to the Top funds (RTTT).

The education reform proposals developed in the process of this application have helped Arizona enter into a new stage of transforming education to meet the challenges of the 21st Century.

“The ultimate goal of this effort is to implement education reforms that provide Arizona students with a world-class education that enables them to compete on not only a national, but a global basis,” said Governor Brewer. “We will continue to advance education reform regardless of the federal grant process. I would like to thank Superintendent Tom Horne and his staff at the Department of Education, the State Board of Education and the Arizona legislature for their continued support and push for aggressive education reforms in Arizona.”

Through the work of Governor Brewer’s P-20 Coordinating Council and its task forces, comprised of a myriad of key stakeholders, including education, business and community leaders statewide, Arizona began to develop a comprehensive, collaborative plan for Arizona’s educational system. The state’s process of developing the RTTT application was designed to serve as a roadmap for continued education reform, regardless of whether funding is received.

With the development and submission of the first phase application, the state has the experience to continue to build a strong framework for reform. The Governor is excited about key education initiatives that are progressing at the legislature and the State Board of Education, many of which were mentioned in both her State of the State address on January 11th as well as the RTTT application. Education officials will work aggressively to further develop, refine and strengthen Arizona’s future applications.

Race to the Top is a $4.35 billion competitive education reform program funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009. For this program, the U.S. Department of Education is asking states to build comprehensive and coherent plans around the four areas of reform outlined in ARRA, including: aid to struggling schools, improving data quality, supporting effective teachers and bettering standards and assessments.

The following 15 states and the District of Columbia were selected by the Obama Administration today as finalists for the first round of funding: Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Finalist states will give oral presentations in Washington, D.C. during the week of March 15 and winning states will be chosen in April.

Article Source: http://www.allamericanpatriots.com/48758518-arizona-fails-race-to-the-top

For more information on help for children that meet special education guidelines and resources for support and help, visit www.behavecoach.com.

Posted by the Protecting Arizona’s Family Coalition (PAFCO)

www.pafcoalition.org

PAFCO is a historic, diverse, non-partisan alliance of social services, health, community service agencies, advocacy groups, citizen advocacy, and faith-based associations.

-       Health Care reform has derailed the bad budget passed by the Republican legislature and signed by Governor Brewer.

-       Up to $7 or $8 billion dollars in federal matching funds to fund health care for Arizonans in need could be lost.  So – bang – just like that – the Legislative mandated cuts to cut 40,000 children eligible for KidsCare and 310,000 poor people from on AHCCCS must be restored.

-       Major provisions of the health care reform legislation include “maintenance of effort” basically requiring states to keep current KidsCare and Medicaid (AHCCCS) programs.  http://www.azahcccs.gov/reporting/federal/legislation.aspx#AHCCCS_Update_Regarding_Health_Care_ReforM.

-       The Kaiser Family Foundation has published a timeline for implementation of the various elements of Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which President Obama signed on March 23.  http://www.kff.org/healthreform/8060.cfm

-       This necessary change will save health care for these families, but also will save about 10% of the Arizona economy and 42,000 jobs.

-       While the Governor is considering a lawsuit, the Legislature needs to act soon and restore KidsCare before the June 15 deadline for the cuts.

-       The legislature has time to consider restoring AHCCCS cuts and that may not occur till next fall or until after the May 18 sales tax referral election.

-       Urge the Governor and Legislature to restore KidsCare and AHCCCS to save health care reform in Arizona.

HOWEVER — OTHER CRUEL BUDGET CUTS CONTINUE  – even as the bad health care cuts are restored before their implementation — other cuts go forward when real options are available.

Behavioral Health cuts going forward:

-       4,200 children to lose behavioral health services leaving children and families with no where to turn.

-       6,600 people losing substance abuse services — leaving families abandon to addictions and children in those families at greater risk, stuck in the child welfare system, or people jailed or deaths or more emergency rooms visits and 911 calls.  This is both cost shifting to local governments and other people and business paying health insurance premiums.

-        11,000 people getting general mental health services — except for some very limited medication and medication management services.  http://www.ospb.state.az.us/documents/2010/FY2011_BudgetSummaryFINAL.pdf

Human Services cuts going forward:

-       10,000 families (most female-headed) with 17,000 children will lose cash assistance — for families already by definition very poor driving these families into deeper poverty effective April 1, 2010 if passed by the Legislature.  This is an attack on some of the poorest of the poor with no where else to turn.  Results will be increased homeless, desperation, illness, and family dislocation.

-       20,000 children will be denied child care by the end of the year stopping families from working and putting children at risk.

-       No 100% investigations of child protection or adult protection referrals and continued elimination of family support services.   The system of in home family services has already been cut severely in the 2009/2010 cuts.

-       Cuts in emergency services (eviction prevention, homeless prevention, etc) services for families in crisis effecting meaning 1,100 fewer families will receive emergency services.

-       Cuts in domestic violence services reducing service to 1,600 victims of domestic violence will be turned away from shelters.

-       Cuts in aging independent living services impacting hundreds of elderly and people with disabilities.

-       Eliminate support for grandparents caring for their grandchildren.

-       Eliminate state only supported services for children and adults with developmental disabilities throwing 300 children and 400 adults off services.

-       Implementation of many new fees and means testing for programs like adoption services for children with disabilities, services for children and adults with disabilities — potentially leaving many children and adults at serious risk and costing more downstream as high cost services are used.

-       These cuts are all on top of 2009 cuts which were massive and destructive already in these same categories.  We must work to undo these cuts.

-       Click here for a list of major budget cuts proposed to children and families from Children’s Action Alliance.  http://www.azchildren.org/MyFiles/10%20Legislature/Gov_Budget_FY11.pdf

 For more information and help for children with anger problems go to www.behavecoach.com