(2-minute read)
Hi All,
Here’s a question that was recently sent in.
Question:
How do you deal with a student (10 years or older) who doesn’t respect authority, including principals, teachers, and parents? She’ll say things during class such as, “that was a boring lesson” or “it’s all your fault,” and more. I would love to learn more on this topic and hear tried and true strategies. Thanks.
Answer:
As parents, we all want our children to be respectful towards authority figures, especially towards their teachers. However, there are times when our children may act out and be disrespectful towards their teachers. How do we break the disrespectful cycle?
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- Address the behavior as if it’s a “skill-based” problem.
What does that mean? Instead of assuming that the child intentionally wants to be manipulative and “bad” (a performance-based problem), I prefer to start with the assumption that the child is lacking some skills.
For example, the child might not know the difference between respectful and disrespectful behavior. Or the child got upset and did not know how to deal with her emotions in a respectful manner. In other words, she was lacking emotion regulation skills in that moment.
What do we do when someone lacks skills? We teach it! Therefore, we need to teach the Red and Green behaviors of Being Respectful vs. Disrespectful.
Using the six steps to teach any skill, we do the following:
1. Label
2. Draw a picture
3. Model
4. Practice
5. Reinforce
6. Correct
Below is how I might draw a picture of respectful vs. disrespectful. In this picture, the purple child felt the yellow feeling of boredom. She has the option of choosing red – being disrespectful, or green – being respectful.
Have you ever wanted to learn some of the strategies that are mentioned in the blog but didn’t know where to get the training?
Coming soon on our website!
Mini-Workshops to teach a variety of skills to educators, parents, and professionals, such as the following and more:
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- Six Steps To Teach Any Skill
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- Mini-Emotion Books
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- Emotion Webs
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- Special Mommy/Daddy Time
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- Sibling Rivalry
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- Anti-Bullying
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- Red Green Social Behavior Stories
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- Mini-Behavior Books
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- Etc.
Look out for them in the next few weeks!!
We’ll discuss more strategies in the coming weeks.
Have an inspiring week!
Yours,
Dr. Devora