Effective Communication- Happy MLK Day

Happy Monday! Hope everyone had a great day and had a chance to take some time to remember the contributions of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Last week I went to an awesome training called Mindset. This training is specifically for deescalation. However, I learned so much that truly will help the day to day behaviors in the classroom.

I know every one's class is full of precious, sweet angels. However, sometimes these angels come to school with quite a few learned behaviors that well mixed with other learned behaviors can create quite a challenging learning environment.

How can we help??

Well most importantly, take 2 minutes or so each day just talking one on one with the kids! The number 1 aid in creating a positive learning environment is creating RELATIONSHIPS. Kids will do what you want them do to and exhibit accepted behaviors if they LOVE you and want to please you!

Be PROACTIVE!  If you know certain kids have certain fun behaviors. Discuss them before the behaviors are in ACTION. Discuss the feelings attributed to bringing on the behaviors as well as what caused or could have been done to prevent the behaviors.

Sometimes behaviors will escalate even though you are proactive and have created relationships with kids. What should you do? Try communicating using the following steps to help the student associate a particular feeling with a particular behavior. While this may seem logical, it was quite difficult to do. We practiced scenarios in our training.

Always remain calm and be non-judgmental
1. State only what you see. This helps a young kiddo associate what is happening to a particular feeling. For example if a kid is sad and crying, say... I see you are crying.

2. Question the kiddo about how he/she is feeling. Example, I see you are crying. How do you feel? If a kid doesn't answer give him/her a couple of choices to help. Do you feel happy, or sad or mad??

3. Question the kiddo about the cause of the behavior. Do not as WHY. You can ask about who, what , where, when and how, but do not ask WHY. WHY sometimes sounds judgmental.

4. Question the kiddo about what you could do to help them feel better or solve the problem. You need a plan of action. You can help guide this plan, but ultimately try to put the planning in the hands of the kiddo. You can always give the kiddo possible solutions, but making the student create the plan empowers them be able to follow through with their plan.

We would love to hear how you effectively communicate with your kiddos to create the most positive learning environment possible!