Rethinking Challenging Kids-Where There's a Skill There's a Way | J. Stuart Ablon | TEDxBeaconStreet

for the past 25 years or so i have had the privilege of working with lots of different children adolescents their parents their families their teachers their helpers of all different kinds all around the issue of challenging behavior which is a big issue actually it's probably the most frequent issue that we parents talk about in pediatricians offices and family doctors offices it is uh certainly the biggest issue that teachers are concerned about it's the number one reason they get away from teaching the academic curriculum it's their number one cause of stress managing the classroom it's the number one cause of teacher dropout and interestingly it's also the number one cause of referrals for mental health services so it's a big big issue and i feel like i have learned a tremendous amount over the last 25 years from and with these children their families their caretakers their helpers and what's interesting is most of what i've learned during this time completely flies in the face of conventional wisdom completely and that's what i want to talk to you all about and the reality is that most of what i've learned that flies in the face of conventional wisdom can be summed up in a pretty simple phrase and this is it kids do well if they can which has become the guiding philosophy of our work the foundation of our work and when you look at it up here you probably say to yourself what's so earth-shattering about that and on its own it may not seem particularly earth-shattering but it actually is and i want to explain why see what kids do well if they can suggest is that if a kid could do well he would do well if she could do well she would do well and if she's not doing well well something must be standing in her way and if something's standing in her way then we all as the helpers in her life we need to figure out what's standing in her way so we can help and i'm sure that sounds like perfect common sense to everybody because it is and yet it flies in the face of conventional wisdom because the more conventional way of thinking when it comes to challenging behavior is not kids do well if they can it sounds a lot more like kids do well if they want to and you see if you believe kids do well if they want to and a kid's not doing well so for instance they're not behaving well you believe kids do well if they want to they're not behaving well well then you're going to assume the reason he's not behaving well is because he doesn't want to and if he doesn't want to then what's all of our jobs to try to make him want to do well and while that probably seems like a very narrow unpleasant probably pretty ineffective role to play in the lives of these kids the interesting thing about it is when you think about traditional discipline in our homes traditional school discipline discipline in society it is all oriented around trying to make kids want to do well rewards punishments timeouts detention suspensions expulsions you name it they are all aimed at trying to motivate people to do better safe in the assumption that they're not doing well because they don't want to well you know what i don't buy it what i've learned is it doesn't make any sense what i've learned is kids do well if they can i believe kids do well if they can i believe if a kid could do well he would do well and if he's not doing well you know what something has got to be standing in his way and it cannot be as simple as he just doesn't want to i also believe that it's high time we learn from more than 50 years of research in the neurosciences that has shown beyond the shadow of a doubt that conventional wisdom is wrong now there are countless examples in our history of where conventional wisdom sticks around a lot longer after it's been disproven you can go back to something like the world is flat well you know what we learned it was round but nobody wanted to part with the idea that it was flat i think we're going to find the same thing about the notion that kids do well if they want to all of the research in the neurosciences for the past 50 years has shown beyond the shadow of a doubt that challenging kids do not lack the will to behave well they lack the skills to behave well skills to behave well what kind of skills am i talking about i'm talking about skills like problem solving like flexibility like frustration tolerance in other words what all the research in the neurosciences has shown us is that kids who exhibit chronic challenging behavior you know what they have like a learning disability except instead of areas like reading math and writing this learning disability is in areas like problem solving flexibility frustration tolerance i think it's actually a very accurate apt and powerful analogy and here's why i'm in my mid-40s if we went back to when i was in elementary school actually not far from here if there was a child who was reading several grade levels behind his peers back then well-meaning empathic caring educators would not have said to themselves huh i wonder if he has a learning disability i wonder if he's got dyslexia i wonder if he has a hard time phonetically decoding words no actually 40 years ago those folks would have said i wonder if he is either dumb or lazy and i know that there are people sitting here listening right now who can attest to the personal pain of that to being the child in the classroom who ironically was trying harder than anybody else in that classroom to read and was completely misunderstood you know what's interesting about that guess who wasn't trying very hard in that classroom to read the students to whom it came naturally guess who was trying harder than anybody else the very kids that we used to think were lazy what a terrible shame thank goodness we have come a long way since then but not when it comes to kids with challenging behavior here's a little bit of a news flash you know those good kids those kids we say you know they're so compliant they do what we want they're such good kids you know what they get so many kudos for their great behavior and they don't even deserve them you know why they don't deserve them because they're not even trying very hard it just comes naturally to them guess who's trying inordinately hard to behave themselves during the course of the day the very kids we're trying to motivate to behave better a very wise man who has taught me a lot in his lifetime he's in his 98th year now my grandfather he's taught me a lot one of the things he taught me early on is he said when you give a dog a name eventually they will answer to it and i have learned that if you treat kids like they are lazy unmotivated don't care aren't trying hard enough over time don't be surprised when they start to look like talk like and act like they don't care and aren't trying hard enough and you know what i don't believe it i believe kids do well if they can i have yet to meet the kid that prefers doing poorly to doing well i believe kids do well if they can now there may be some of you listening here who have two-year-olds two-year-olds are particularly poorly behaved um now is that because they're evil beings no might feel that way but why are two-year-olds so poorly behaved you know why because they stink at being flexible they have horrible frustration tolerance and extremely limited problem-solving skills but we don't get too concerned because they're two and the good news is when a lot of them get to be four and six and eight and ten and twelve etcetera they get better at all that stuff but some don't and this is the interesting thing development happens at different rates so many of the kids i have worked with have incredible gifts where development has gone way ahead very quickly but in the areas of problem solving flexibility and frustration tolerance they may be delayed relative to their peers and i can tell you something that when adults shift their thinking from kids do well if they want to to kids do well if they can amazing things have happened amazing thing happened things happen when you put yourself in the position of trying to figure out what a kid is struggling with and how you can help as opposed to how you can try to get them to try harder to behave themselves well amazing things happen now here's the interesting thing about this learning disability of sorts that i'm i'm referring to it's different in the sense that you know what you can't set a kid up with a tutor to fix this kind of learning disability an alternative reading program is going to help somebody who has hard time phonetically decoding words but you know what skills like problem solving flexibility frustration tolerance those actually need to be taught in the actual situations when you need to use them in other words you have to actually have situations where those neural networks in the brain are kid to practice those very skills now anyone who spent a lot of time around kids with behavioral challenges the bad news is you got a lot of problems all throughout the course of the day now here's some good news they're predictable problems believe it or not for the parents listening you know these are getting up in the morning and out the door to school on time this is what to wear and what to eat and how much screen time you're allowed and curfew and number one source of meltdowns across north america anyways homework uh there's going to bed there's all kinds of predictable problems and there's a list of predictable problems in classrooms and other settings as well so the good news is that those are predictable and even some even better news is you know what that list of problems is it's not just a list of problems it's a list of opportunities lying in weight what are those opportunities for opportunities to practice problem solving with kids because that's the only way they're going to develop those skills and what's amazing is that we've been able to watch that when you teach adults to solve problems collaboratively with kids there are dramatic results and it's actually not a terribly complicated process but in homes in schools and treatment facilities in correctional facilities even with police forces amazing things happen when adults shift from kids to well if they wanted the kids do well if they can to this is a deficit of skill not will do we got to help them build those skills and how are we going to do that by collaborating with them to solve problems so that they can build those skills it's a pretty simple process in essence it's using a good deal of empathy to identify what a kid's concern is about a problem it's then sharing your concern about that problem not your solution but your concern and then it's inviting the child to collaborate with you to brainstorm solutions that are mutually satisfactory and baked into those simple ingredients is a ton of practice in problem solving flexibility and frustration tolerance and it's a process that can be used with little kids over little problems big kids big problems you name it so i thought i would just give a very quick example of what that might look like so i'll use the example of the the first example i gave a common problem which is everybody in a household getting up getting dressed getting breakfast packing their stuff etc and getting off to school and work on time and if that doesn't go well that's a bad start to the day for all involved so what does this process look like collaborative problem solving well the first thing is it's predictable so the last time you want to solve a predictable problem is right when the problem's happening you want to do that proactively so it looks like this first a good deal of empathy to clarify the kid's concern hey you know what we've noticed we've noticed that the mornings have been pretty tough and when we're asking you to get dressed in the morning sometimes you're um you're not getting dressed don't worry you're not in trouble what's going on what's up i don't know well think about it for a sec i mean do you think maybe you're not so wild about going to school no so you're okay about going to school i like school huh okay an eight-year-old who likes school great so um what else could be getting in the way uh is it something about getting dressed no well because sometimes when we're waiting downstairs with your sister and we're all ready to go we come upstairs and you were supposed to be getting dressed and we just see you sitting next to your clothes so what do you think it could be i don't want to be last oh you don't want to be last so like it's a race or something you think no so it's not a race but why would you not want to be last then because i don't want to be upstairs alone you don't want to be upstairs alone how come i don't know do you get like nervous or something maybe huh so you don't want to be left alone upstairs if everybody else is downstairs you might get a little bit nervous that sounds right and notice all we did was ask some questions we took some guesses we provided some reassurance that we were really genuinely interested and we reflected what we've heard and now we know the kids concerned and now it's time to put our concern on the table and what's that going to look like not our solution it's going to look like putting our concern on the table hey you know what we're just worried about everybody getting out the door on time in the morning so we start the morning off okay and everybody gets to work in school on time here comes the third ingredient don't solve the problem for the kid so you know what i bet there's something we can do so that you're not having to be upstairs alone which makes you sort of nervous but we can all still get out the door on time and start the morning okay and then one of the hardest things for us adults to do bite our tongue you got any ideas and let the kid for take first crack at it and in the example that i'm giving you well the kids first idea was well you could wait upstairs while i get dressed and mom said well i could do that but then you'd have to get dressed quickly enough because i got to get downstairs and start making lunches and stuff like that so i'm worried that if you don't do it quickly i'm going to have to go downstairs and then what does kids say how about if i take my clothes downstairs and get dressed downstairs great idea who wins everybody who loses nobody problem solved challenging behavior reduced morning starting off better helping relationship enhanced and skills practiced and trained notice this was a trial and problem solving and flexibility and frustration tolerance and one of the coolest things about this is not just for the child guess who else is practicing problem solving flexibility frustration tolerance the adult as well now we have found that that kind of a process is a necessity a lifesaver when it comes to kids who really struggle with problem solving flexibility and frustration tolerance but we found incredible benefits in all kinds of other places like workplaces like marriages partnerships you name it because you know what's really fascinating most of the kids out in the world they actually grow up possessing enough flexibility frustration tolerance and problem-solving skills so that when their problems with adults and we adults in essence try to impose our will upon the kids and tell them what the solution's going to be they've got the skills to be able to handle it and you know there's a lot of talk out there these days about trying to prepare the next generation of adults with future ready skills 21st century skills which looks like a list about problem solving flexibility and frustration tolerance and yet we don't actually ask kids to practice those skills very much we hope they develop them so this process this simple process of collaborative problem solving that demonstrates incredible effectiveness across all kinds of different settings can be used with regular old kids all the time and i gotta say that in my experience i think a lot of kids who have the skills are really just waiting to grow up to become adults so that they can impose their will on other people it's sad but it's true and if you think of at any day and any day and time in our world right here you'll see lots of examples of problems being resolved via might makes right on the world stage especially it's extremely rare that you actually see examples of adults coming to mutually satisfactory solutions to problems why is that i hate to say it i'm a little pessimistic i don't think we adults are so wonderful at empathizing with each other i don't think we're great at taking each other's perspectives into account i don't think we're great at arriving at win-win solutions to problems and i'm not surprised because i don't think we get a whole lot of practice and you know what i think it's endlessly exciting to imagine a world where one day the next generation of adults might be more skilled at arriving at mutually satisfactory solutions to problems than simply lining up and figuring out who's bigger and stronger because that person's concerns are going to carry the day and you know what i believe that we can teach the next generation of adults to do just that and i am thankful to the challenging kids that i've worked with over the years who've shown us the necessity of solving problems in collaborative ways and i think we can learn from them i believe we can teach the next generation of adults those skills i believe that challenging kids deserve the same humane compassionate and effective approaches as kids with other recognized learning disabilities and why do i believe that i believe that because i believe kids do well if they can i believe if a kid could do well he would do well i believe if he's not doing well it cannot simply be as simple as he just doesn't wanna because i believe all kids want to do well i believe if the kid's not doing well it's about skill not will and i believe that where there's a skill there's a way i believe that kids do well if they can and i hope you will too thank you very much you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 516,060

Rating: 4.8674774 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, United States, Education, Career, Health

Id: zuoPZkFcLVs

Length: 19min 25sec (1165 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 24 2014

Reddit Comments

[u/pantsoffgaming]

This is A video from training in doing for work. I think this is a fantastic way to approach behaviors from kids that are difficult. Wanting to put this out there and also ewe what you all think about it.