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Helping the "Difficult Child" at School

Published 11.07.2008 | Permanent Link | Comments (7)

Your intrepid advice columnist has up and had herself a baby, and will be taking a couple weeks off from her bossing-around duties. In the meantime, she's arranged a cavalcade of her favorite writers from around the Web to come and take a crack at some of your questions, share their personal style secrets and wisdom, and hopefully keep you entertained while Amy attempts to make that Medela breast pump her bitch.

Today's guest author is the gorgeous Kelly of Mocha Momma who actually brought along her own question to answer (show-off!). It's clear why she is qualified to answer this difficult question... she not only has the experience as the assistant principal at a public high school but is also a compassionate mom!

Hi, I came across your blog and have been reading all night! I have been laughing and crying, I can relate to many of the same situations. I hope this isn't too weird getting an email from a complete stranger. I am just a little desperate.
I have a 7 year old son that is.....well, difficult. We don't have a
medical diagnosis(yet), but the spec ed has labeled him Emotionally
Handicapped. He is a very, very, stubborn little boy. He has a history of misbehavior and defiance (aggression too) going back to daycare, long before preschool. Most currently, the biggest problem he gives the teacher is refusing to do work at school, and disrupting the classroom. I just wondered if you had any advice, since you can see both sides, teacher and parent.

Elly

Thanks for that question, Elly. Surely, you have already tried a number of things and you’re thinking of getting some medical help to help diagnose the issue and find some things that work. For the record, rocking in the corner chewing on your hair isn’t one of them. I speak from authority on that one. It’s why the left section of my hair is moist most of the time.

Since you’re getting help from school I will simply remind you that you’re dealing with a lot of opinions there. It’s difficult to navigate those waters when many people have many things to say. Take all the things that apply to you and take suggestions from those teachers who are with him the majority of the day. If you can remember to ask for strengths as well as weaknesses you’ll be a healthier parent. When all we hear is the negative things about our children we can get overwhelmed with the overload of information and you must be sure to filter all that you’re processing.

Since you plan on seeking medical help as well, I can only encourage you to be as honest as possible with the doctor. Tell him or her how you respond and react when your son is acting out. If you can find the triggers for his negative behavior then you will learn to avoid those minefields. A doctor once told me that I needed to find the positive behavior and keep that bottled up – literally. We used an empty jar and filled it with a marble every time we got the desired behavior from our son. When it was filled, we asked him what special thing he wanted to do. An ice cream date with just mom, a video game with just dad, a chance to be the child who picked out the family movie for the night. It’s important to note that you can’t take good behavior away so we never removed a marble when he behaved poorly.

Children who are emotionally handicapped have many services available to them through the local school district. Search to find out what your options are so you know where you stand. There are county area programs as well, so ask around, attend meetings, and network with other parents who have been through this and can help you avoid rookie mistakes. Usually, a team of teachers are present in an IEP (Individualized Education Program) to help determine how to best get your son to learn.

If you can focus on what he knows throughout his education, you’ll be the wiser for it. Oftentimes, educators (I’m looking at myself on this one!) get mired in the behavior and not the causes or whether or not the child has learned. Search out his learning style and ask that teachers assess him in the way he can best express that he’s mastered a skill or whatever material was presented. Sometimes, this means using a different assessment tool, so be sure to ask if that is an option. If not, ask why! We use “safe seats”, rewarding positive behavior, and Behavior Intervention Plans (BIPs) to help support children with emotional disturbances. It is a struggle to stick to, but the rewards are worth it.

Finally, remember to get some support for yourself. Hair chewing only works for so long and then you have a lot of explaining to do to your hairdresser.

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Comments (7):

isa said:

Elly is really playing my song on this one. We actually have a diagnosis (ADHD), and are working on another one (ODD). Our son has aggression, disruption, defiance, and anxiety down to a science. Don't get me wrong, he's also brilliant, funny, helpful, and loving.

I have so much personal experience advice I can't fit it in a comment. SST, IEP, BIP, psych eval, social work eval, OT eval, blah blah blah. Currently we use a daily star chart at school. X number of stars per day gets Y treat (the fun center, an ice cream, hot lunch tomorrow, etc). 4 - or 3 (aim low) days with X stars gets some really big weekend treat (fishing with daddy, mini golf, a video game, etc).

At home we use Red Light Green Light, which makes behaving a game and he likes it.

Here is the best piece of advice of all, given to me by my son's social worker when I was beating myself up for my failures: Yesterday doesn't matter, and neither does tomorrow. You can only be the best mom you can be, right at this very second. Know that you are, in every moment, doing your absolute best. If it's not as good as it was a minute ago, or will be a minute from now, it's still your very best, and you are doing it.

Posted on November 7, 2008 10:40

Kim said:

We haven't gone the medical route with my daughter, but having the right approach has helped beyond words. I just want to kiss the school counselor for helping us (my husband and I) adjust our attitudes as well. My daughter has improved a lot with the help of her counselor, teacher and us, but adjusting our expectations and looking harder for the positive instead of focusing so much on the negative has helped us beyond measure.

At the risk of sounding like zealot, I cannot recommend enough the book, Transforming the Difficult Child: the Nurtured Heart Approach. I believe it truly saved my life, my marriage and my daughter.

Best of luck.

Posted on November 7, 2008 12:10

Meghan said:

One idea: take a look at the kiddo's diet. My family has some really crazy medical issues, and many/most of them have been alleviated by following the Feingold diet. (http://www.feingold.org/) It eliminates the artificial colors, flavors, preservatives and other additives that are found in almost everything we eat. I've turned into one of those dirty hippies yelling "just because the government tells you it's safe doesn't mean it is!" because seriously, things like BHT, TBHQ, Red 40, and splenda are now poisons in my mind.

It's an elimination diet, you start off avoiding all of the artificials as well as salicylates (which occur naturally in foods like apples and tomato) and slowly re-introduce them one at a time. Keeping a food diary helps a lot to determine patterns in behavior and physical ailments that might be linked back to foods.

A lot of the parents who start the Feingold diet in their house to help their kids find themselves to be "accidental targets" and find that medical issues they've long had and dealt with are alleviated by the change in diet. The build up of sals leads to joint pain for my cousin, and I've now realized that it's a major issue for me too. The analogy that's used is a rain barrel: It's empty, and things are ok. The rain picks up and the barrel fills, and things are still ok. But then the barrel gets to a point that it's absolutely full and the water starts spilling over. That's when the negative behaviors come out. For most Americans they're ingesting this junk constantly, so they never get a chance to detox from it and they continually react.

My aunt and her family have followed the program for about 10 years and yes, for a long time we thought they were strange to turn down delicious things like Diet Pepsi and Doritos, but it was a little over a year ago (Labor Day, '07 to be specific) and we were talking about her kids, and she mentioned that Matthew hadn't been hospitalized for asthma since they'd changed their diet. It was shocking, this is a kid who was frequently in and out of hospitals for everything from asthma to juvenile arthritis. It was his ADHD and defiant behaviors that led her to Feingold (often the "last resort" for people trying to figure out what's wrong with their kid) and they'd found major improvements in everyone's health. I remembered the cousin I used to be afraid of and saw this awesome teenager who is kind and dotes on his baby sister, and realized that he's a completely different person now. I've now been following it for a year and have found that I just feel better. Period.

Just another option to consider.

Posted on November 7, 2008 13:29

Rae said:

Try reading The Out of Sync Child by Carol Stock Kranowitz and see if it helps. It could be your child has a problem with Sensory Disfunction.

Posted on November 8, 2008 20:04

kat said:

I sympathize with you. My son (9) is not a difficult child, but has some anxiety issues and sensory issues. Please run, do not walk, to a PhD. Psychotherapist that specializes in kids... wait...don't be afraid... it is the right thing to do. Your medical doctor doesn't have the experience or skills to diagnose your child. The psychotherapist does. I have never felt better about being able to help my child and being more in tune with him then after a few visits to the psychotherapist. A book from Borders just isn't going to do it...a school counselor has such bigger issues than your kid and the teachers just aren't trained either.

Please do it for your child.

Posted on November 10, 2008 08:58

amy said:

Diet makes a big difference in my son's behavior as well (ADHD.) Red food coloring is the devil, as far as I am concerned. I cannot explain it, but if you give that child red candy, red gum, red soda, etc. he turns into a little demon child for the next several hours. A 'normal' amount of sugar for other children often sends my child nearly into orbit from energy. If we took the diet further we'd probably see even more improvements, I'm sure. We've been starting small though. We stay away from candy, fruit snacks, etc and try to stick to real fresh fruit, crackers and cheese for snacks and water or milk for drinks.

Posted on November 11, 2008 17:41

beth said:

I'm a spec ed teacher for kids with emotional disabilities. I am convinced that there is so much more that can be done to prevent kids from being placed in my classroom - don't get me wrong my class is a great place to be! BUT if it can be prevented, all the better. I am a big proponent of altering diet, exercise, and rewards system in order to best meet the child's needs and help them to be the best they can be. Whatever it takes! I also find that not just rewarding the behavior, by marbles in a jar or however you choose to do it, but explainging WHY that good behavior is important really helps. It trains them to think about the community that is around them and how they can positively impact it. So not just "good job" clink clink goes the marble, but instead: "thank you for putting away your toys, clink clink, isn't it nice that we'll have a nice clean space to play in when come back later?"
It takes longer, but most things that are worth it do!

Posted on November 13, 2008 10:15

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Amalah is a pseudonym of Amy Corbett Storch. A Washington D.C.-based freelance writer. The Smackdown is published on Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays. You can follow Amy's daily mothering adventures at www.amalah.com. Also, it's pronounced AIM-ah-lah.

Amy also documented her second pregnancy in a Weekly Pregnancy Calendar, Zero to Forty.

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