It's from a new book by Caltha Crowe called SAMMY AND HIS BEHAVIOR PROBLEMS. Many of the ideas are for teachers to tame difficult students. But the innovative approaches can help parents too!
Chapter One, Getting to Know Sammy, has some invaluable lessons for parents.
First and foremost, treat your children as individuals each with different needs, strengths and weaknesses. If your goals as a family include the basics: share time together, enjoy each others' company and help each other grow as people, then you need to respect your children's positives and work with their negatives.
As this teacher meets her new students for the year, she encounters a high energy, ADD challenging child named Sammy. He grabs more counting rods than are allowed, rolls on the floor during the morning greeting, interrupts and corrects other children...all disruptive behaviors to the group.
Crowe goes on to talk about how she tries to befriend and win the trust of all her students, even the complex ones with behavior outbursts. Helping a child to behave during group time is important at home and at school because most of us live in communities or cities and work in places with other coworkers. Getting along with others is essential to our success and happiness.
It's a lesson small children need to learn. Besides, being apart from the group, at home too, can set a child up for bullying, teasing or being excluded.
The author makes sure to have eye contact, share a laugh, and be genuinely interested in each child so that they learn she really cares for them. That will increase the chances that they behave themselves in her classroom.
As Crowe says, "It's important that I find what's likeable in each student. I need to like students in order to be a good teacher to them. It's not about pretending to like them, which they would surely see through, but genuinely liking them. I try to see things from their point of view so I might understand what they're thinking and feeling. I make it a priority to listen to them. I try to find something we have in common, whether it's loving to read or being slow to wake up in the morning. All these things help me like the students. Often it's the child who's initially a little hard to like... that I become most attached to."
By day two at school, Crowe realized Sammy needed help to sit still during circle time. She asked him if he'd like to sit next to her. He said yes, then climbed in her lap. Having her hold him soothed his uncontrollable energy. Later she got him putty to knead with his hands when he had trouble sitting still during group time. They explained it to the class by saying some kids need glasses, some children break a leg and have crutches, not everyone needs the same thing every day to succeed.
So the real lesson is that "fair isn't the same as equal."
That's a great lesson for your home. If one child needs longer to finish dinner, ask everyone to stay at the table and have conversation until that child is finished so it doesn't feel like punishment to eat. If another child does better doing homework right after school, rather than after dinner, split the homework time according to the children's strengths.
It might be easier to have cookie-cutter kids, but it doesn't work for most children. So loving parents take the extra time to customize their parenting per child.
Each of my three boys has different needs and wants. I'm still learning about my 10-month-old twins' personalities, but I can already tell that Hunter is high-energy, quick to grab a toy or book away from Zeke, and not afraid to cry loudly to show his needs. To soothe him, I quietly say his name, describe what I think is going on, "you're too hungry to wait for me to make the cereal aren't you Hunter?", then try to offer a quick solution that doesn't unfairly favor him. He gets a cracker while I'm making breakfast, but I also offer one to Zeke who is more passive, but also hungry. It works nicely. (My 10-year-old is old enough to tell me what he wants...and he finds the "child psychology" angle of parenting fascinating!)
In this age of iPhones, Facebook, 2 career-couples and multiple sports and hobbies for your children...it's not easy to make time for your children every day...really get to know them and see life from their point of view. It doesn't hurt to be reminded that parents are their child's best advocate...but that's assuming you really know what your child needs and wants.
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