Parenting

Coffee Chat: Challenging Behavior at School

| Patti Webb

I thought it relevant and a natural extension to the big, baffling behavior conversation to talk about our kid’s behavior at school. While our kids are at school, they are 100% out of our control and that can be nerve-wracking.

I would be mortified if our kids acted at school the way they act at home. Not to say that their behavior is particularly bad or challenging; they are fairly typical but today’s breakfast outburst was super annoying. I think we all have a fear that our kid is going to cry/scream/throw themselves on the floor on the daily when we’re not there.

We’ve also been told that bad behavior at home is age-appropriate. It means that your kid is comfortable enough to lose their sh*t with you. But a kid who misbehaves at school means that the kid is in fight/fright/flight mode with parents and this is indicative of problems at home. The reverse psychology of it has us feeling like any hiccup is a direct sign of bad parenting.

So what do we do and what role does the school environment and teacher play?

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Child(ish) Reads: Raising Kids with Big, Baffling Behaviors, Pt. 2

| Patti Webb

Back with Part 2 of our Raising Kids with Big, Baffling Behaviors review.

We got into what goes on in our kid’s brain when they are dysregulated and showing bad behavior. But it takes two to tango, and how we react to our kids during the tumult matters.

So here are the parent takeways that help us keep our heads:

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Child(ish) Reads: Raising Kids with Big, Baffling Behaviors

| Patti Webb

First Child(ish) Reads review of the year!

Today’s post is on Raising Kids with Big, Baffling Behaviors: Brain-Body-Sensory Strategies That Really Work by Dr. Robyn Gobbel. And of course, it has the magic word: sensory.

Dr. Gobbel is a psychologist with a Masters in Social Work, so this book is all about the neuroscience behind challenging child behavior. It had some pretty lofty goals in the Introduction: to completely change the way you parent. Challenge accepted.

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Course Notes: Challenging Behaviors, pt. 2

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

For the record, not all behaviors are bad. Our kids are figuring out how to navigate their world while simultaneously learning who they are and advocating for themselves. What constitutes challenging behavior is when their actions hinder their ability to learn, complete daily tasks, or engage appropriately with others. While some behaviors occur once in a blue moon, like that total meltdown at grandma’s house, it becomes a problem when it’s consistent (aggression/defiance at grandma’s house, at the store, at school, at a party, you get the idea).

In this post, we’re getting down to the bottom of these behaviors: why they’re happening, why they continue, and how we can help our children manage and reduce them. So grab your magnifying glass Watson, because we got some investigating to do.

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Course Notes: Challenging Behavior, Pt. 1

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

The shrieks! The screams! The calamity of it all!

No, this isn’t a trailer to the newest horror flick. It’s just another day in my house with the kids. *sigh*

Children are not easy obviously, but especially so when their behaviors are on another level. But behind every bit of challenging behavior lies a need that your child can’t quite articulate.

Last fall, I took a CEU course called “Identifying the Root of Challenging Behaviors.” So this week, we are giving you the parent takeaways. This first part on the developing child brain is a lot of what we’ve previously written about, but it sets the stage for how all of these parenting/OT approaches and strategies come together effectively.

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