Video Transcript: Offensive Strategies

Welcome back.  Hoping that you are ready to dive into a serious amount of strategies that we would call offensive strategies that will hopefully allow you to come into a situation prepared, equipped, and ready to handle those challenging behaviors that may come your way.  Hopefully, we can get on your detective hat.  And also just reveal lots of great techniques that you can use along the way.  So let's dive into a couple.  

And the first one, as I've sort of mentioned, you want to come into a situation prepared.  You want to have a plan, as well as to think about some adaptations.  If you come into a classroom and already someone standing on the desk throwing things around, you have lost control from the very start. 

I happened to have this the other day.  I got called in to help in a preschool setting.  The teacher had scheduled a substitute, but then that substitute woke up that morning with a sick child and could not come in.  So five minutes before the class time was ready to start, here I am saying, All right; here we go.  What do I need to do? 

Come into the room and already the room is full of these four year olds who have more of an idea of the plan for the day than I do, right?  And so I'm trying to find where some paperwork might be to let me know what happens next, or where the activities are for the day.  And they're already finding the toys off all of the shelves, they're already finding their name on what their job was supposed to be for the day.  And all of these things are happening to let me know that I already have no control over what's happening in this room.  So behavior management was very reactive.  

For a little while, I definitely had to go on the defense for a while before regaining some semblance of control of that room.  And if you have ever been in your ministry setting, perhaps the Sunday school teacher for the day, or the Bible Study leader for the day, and you didn't look at your lesson or prepare anything until five minutes before or maybe even after the start of that time, well, I hate to say it, but just sort of deserve what you got.  Because if you don't come into the situation prepared, then you're going to just be setting yourself up to be lost, having lost control of a lot of what's going to happen in there.  

Because what you want to have is a setting much more calm and serene, where everyone is coming in and there's already a sense that you have a plan for what is going to happen in this space and in this time, and everyone knows what to expect.  I know we've talked a lot about providing expectations, and other strategies for various differences in people's level of ability and anxiety and things like that.  But definitely having your plan already made, knowing what it is that you need to do, having your materials close by at hand and everything that is going to be used for that time right there by you makes a big, big difference.  

Also thinking about adaptations, right?  We've spent some time thinking about how do you need to adapt the environment, the learning materials to match up with those who are going to be engaging with it.  Do you need to have some extra visuals to go along with this lesson?  Have you thought for that?  Do you have an object lesson already set up to go with these things?  Do you have information about the people that you're engaging with?  Do you need to know a little bit about their diagnosis or their differences, their strengths, in order to make this an effective time for them?  So do you need some sound blockers or some headphones?  Is it helpful to have a storybook to look at and something to listen to, something to have in their hands while they do this?  

One trick I learned with very young children was to do story time at the same time as snack because they can't be chatting if they're already chewing.  And therefore they could listen to the story much better when they are at the age where really what we're doing in our worship time with them is teaching them how to do worship time, how to sit through a story, how to engage in the social setting.  And so much of what we had to do was to teach them how we do things, not just to teach them about the Bible story or what have you.  So coming in having a plan, thinking about your adaptations, and being prepared when you walk into that space is where you want to start things.  

Other things about preparing for this ahead of time, being prepared comes into play.  When we think about our physical environment, what kind of room are we walking into?  Is it set up for the activities that we're going to be doing?  Now if you have a large room, do you need to divide it up?  Again, thinking for young children, used to work in a room that happened to be this wonderfully wide open space that maybe had one table over in a corner for a couple of activities and our snack time, which was a fabulous space, except that when you introduce a lot of preschool aged children into a wide open space, do you know what they're going to do?  They're going to run all over the room.  So we learned pretty quickly that it was much more effective if we had some tables split up throughout the room, sort of a carpet area.  We did actually put in some climbing equipment that was just small slides and things like that for kids to play on in one space.  But we were able to block off some spaces so that we could use our space more effectively.  

Do you have some who would appreciate a quiet learning nook so maybe they need a space to work that is quiet?  Do you need a good table space for everyone to be doing the same activity at the same time?  Do you need some spaces for one on one activity?  How can you arrange the physical environment to be more effective for those who are engaged in what you're doing?  And this can be true even in our sanctuaries and in our main worship spaces?  Do we have a quiet zone where the sound doesn't come quite as heavily for those who would appreciate just a little bit less of those sound waves coming at them during worship time and during the sermon message?  Do you have spaces for people to stand up during worship?  Maybe an easel for drawing or taking notes on?  Or does everyone have to do it sitting at a seat right next to others?  Do you have things available for people to use a different sort of environment setting?  

But again, thinking about behavior management, we're often thinking about younger people more in the youth in the children's settings and so is your environment set up to welcome them to the chairs the proper size?  If you have chairs that are too tall and tables that are too short, they're not going to want to sit very well.  Do you have tables or chairs that are too small for kids that are now growing too big for those chairs?  They're not going to sit well in them either.  They're going to be tipping them over and some of those types of things.  So is your environment set up well for that?  Have you thought for this space that you're working in?  

Now, some individuals are really going to struggle to be in this space until they've been able to experience it when it's not full of other bodies.  So visiting the space when it's empty, can be very, very effective in helping to establish how they can maneuver through this space, much like we talked about with mobility differences.  Can you get a walker through here?  Can a wheelchair come into this space?  

So we want to think about some of those types of things.  But also just, there are so many kiddos who just need to get their bearings before all the activity starts to happen, because a lot of those behaviors might be telling you that they can't navigate both the space and the activities and interactions all at the same time.  So giving them a chance to interact with the space while it is empty can be very, very effective.  

Having those open house moments where you get to come and see where you're going to be doing things on Sunday mornings from now on because you're in a new class this year; there's a new teacher and they've changed things around.  So you're going to have your Bible time over here, and there's some play area over there.  And establishing the rules for what's in that space is very helpful as well for knowing when it's okay to get the things down off the shelves. 

Or, what happens when we're sitting in our pews here?  And what's appropriate behavior for those?  Do we stand on those?  Do we run on the tops of them?  Do we sit upside down on them and our legs over the wood, or with our heads dangling down on the padding?  Or do we sit upright in them?  So allowing a person to experience this before it's also full of these other expectations and social interaction can be very, very helpful strategy.

Thinking about seating in particular, I know that Barb showed you some of our favorite things like these parking spots, these great big things much like a carpet square, but big and round so that when you sit on them, the boundary remains visible around you.  I know I've also started to see carpet sample squares or even tiles of carpet that carpeting companies are now getting the idea that people like to carpet their room with two-by-two, two foot by two foot square tiles of carpet.  And those are also handy for this very purpose because it's big enough that when you sit on it, you still see the boundary around you of what is your space that you are sitting on these parking spot ones happen to be handy because they're also color coded.  So you can have yours is the blue spot, yours is the red spot and so on.  

But again, it's establishing a space, it's identifying some boundaries for individuals so that they know where to sit.  But thinking about, is it more effective to have hokey stools at the table and beanbag chairs in our reading corner?  Is a rocking chair appropriate to have?  Is that helpful for the behaviors that we expect to see in this environment.  Or a balance stool?  Do we need some wiggle cushions on our chairs?  And if we have them have we told people what they're there for?  Or are they going to come in and think it's a Frisbee and try throwing it around?  Right?  So having our seating options in place so that there is movement for those who need movement, there is calming for those who need calming, but having them all as options.  

Again, we're talking about universal design ideas that help so many people and they actually help with behavioral challenges as well.  So giving options and thinking about our seating arrangements is a very effective place to start.

Something that you can actually do with your seating options is to add structure.  You can add structure to your space through seating, as we talked about visual structure with your carpet spots.  There is a difference between sitting in a chair that has no back, or a chair that has a back, now we have one boundary.  There is a chair that has a back and two arms that now has three boundaries around a body.  We pull that chair up to a table, now we actually have four boundaries.  We have just placed our body within a box.  And for some of us, that's extremely helpful, because now we know where our body belongs in space.  And that's just the amount of boundaries that we need in order for our behaviors to remain in a seated position for the time that we need to be.  So thinking about adding structure to our space.

We can also add structure to time; isn't that fascinating?  Time is a concept that is very, very difficult for some of us.  And it can create a lot of behavior challenges because of that.  But if we can add structure to it by visually seeing how much time we have left for an activity, well now we have done this magic of making it visual.  

We can also use that visual schedule; that's come up a few times already.  And this is effective with every age group.  Barb mentioned to them in our group with adults with dementia, that we had a visual schedule up there of what was going to happen next.  I don't know about you, but I still appreciate having the schedule in my hand when I sit in my worship service and begin to engage.  I want to know how many songs is it before it's time for this sermon?  When is the offering?  When is the closing prayer?  I like to know what's coming in.  And this is very helpful for me to gauge my energy; when I can take a potty break all of those types of things.  So definitely helpful, helpful to have structure to our time and make that a visual as well.  

We can add structure to our materials.  I know that Barb just showed you something called highlighter tape, which can be very effective for those who are struggling with visual needs.  But it's also just effective to add structure to what it is you're looking at.  Where are we supposed to focus on this set of materials that we're looking at; this page in the Bible, or in our Bible study, or the worksheet that we're doing today?  Can we highlight that?  And can we do that in a temporary way so that we can remove it when it's time to move on focus on something else? 

How about outlining the activity that we're supposed to work on?  So we have a coloring activity, but it's very difficult for someone not to just scribble all over it.  Can we highlight or outline the places to focus on because we're talking about Joseph and his colorful coat and our objective today is to color the coat.  And by not just having our words, express that but having visual right there and outlining that that's what we're going to focus on coloring today can be, again, just helpful in adding that structure so that it's much better received when we have an expectation for the behavior of what they're going to do with that material.  

Giving information is extremely helpful.  And again, we've mentioned this before, because it's just an effective strategy for everyone.  But it's extremely effective when we're talking about behavioral expectations.  Using that welcome story to say this is the situation in which you're coming.  These are the behavioral expectations.  This is how long you might be there.  This is who you'll be with.  And so setting everyone up for success by saying, here’s what you're going to do there, and here's what we expect of you, and here's what you can expect of us while we're in this environment.  

So saying the timeline, giving examples of who's going to be there, definitely having pictures of real objects and real situations involving this person, extremely helpful.  But giving that information ahead of time sets everyone else, everyone up for success.  So a preparation strategy, those social stories.

Something else to think about ahead of time is, is there a job that this individual would be good at?  So often our behavior is a sign of a need to do something with purpose in a place.  So often kids get put in a ministry setting because their parents are eager to be at their ministry setting.  And so quite often, we have kids who are there who might not be excited to be, or they're excited to be there because now they finally get to see their friends but they haven't been able to chat with all week.  And so their goal is to spend time with their friends, not necessarily doing what you had in mind to do for the day.  So sometimes what can really help these kiddos be able to focus is to assign them a job with purpose in that space; whether it's helping to keep the space clean, or organized and sorted or helping with another friend and a task.  

Sometimes it's being the prayer partner.  I know some kiddos that have really struggled to feel that they had a gift to bring to the group, but boy could that kid pray.  And so by putting them in charge of being our prayer partner for the day, every little thing that came up and said, Oh, I'm going to write that down; that's going on our prayer requests.  And so by the end of the day, they knew their list of things that needed to get prayed for.  And what a way to encourage our kids’ spiritual growth in that.

Maybe it's keeping up our calendar, or our prayer list or our praise reports.  Kids love to have purpose.  I know I was with a group of kids one time and we arrived back from a little bit of a field trip, we were doing an outing together, and I was grabbing all sorts of car seats and things and these kiddos were kind of mulling about and finally one of the other adults had to say to me, would you give up that car seat because I have a child who really needs that job right now.  It was her job to carry that car seat.  And I thought, Oh, well, I can do it.  Nope, this child needs to do it.  Sure enough, I said, Oh, I'm sorry, I have too many of these.  And she happily took it from me.  Suddenly, her face lit up, her countenance was different.  She was no longer moping and sort of set apart from the group.  She had purpose in being there and she was willing to participate.  And that's all it took was for her to have that specific job to be able to get that back into the building where it belonged.  

And so having a job builds purpose, build confidence and actually build self-esteem in children.  And quite often, those who are struggling with these challenging behaviors find that they tend to have low self-esteem because they don't feel very successful, because so often they're being called out for all these behaviors that people don't like.  So being successful at a job can be a great encouragement for these kiddos.  

Something else to do for kids, in that sense, is noticing things about the individual.  But I don't mean just saying Oh, it's great to see you.  I mean, being very intentional about what we say and being very specific.  So, I love how you're so kind to hold the door for people, acknowledging good things that we see in them.  You're so great at greeting friends with that smile.  So not just oh, you have a beautiful smile, but acknowledging the good that they do with who they are and what they have been given by God.  

Developing a relationship is absolutely key.  What can you do to get down at their level and do things that this individual enjoys, and I specifically have a picture with a young child.  I do happen to love building Lego as well.  But I also have a couple of pictures up here with an older individual because as we said, sometimes behavior becomes an issue, again, when we have some fading memory and mobility and some of the onset of dementia and things like that.  So again, having relationship building activities is crucial to having some buy-in and the ability to speak into their lives.  As many people have put it, they don't care what you know until they know that you care.  

Reinforcing the positive.  We always want to say how thankful we are and how much we appreciate what has gone well, but let's be careful about how we reinforce the positive.  We are eager to give hugs to a child when they do something that we have appreciated.  But what if that child really does not like touch, and that sensation is very frightening to them for various reasons.  So let's be careful that we know what is truly enforcing reinforcing to that child and what is going to be effective in that.  And be careful that we do that with knowledge of who the person is.

Setting up a system of rewards, again, by knowing the child and what rewards them.  But it can be a lot of fun and very effective to just have some prizes involved.  I know a lot of different classrooms and teachers and people who like to use what they call their bills, or their teacher dollars, or these various things.  And so students and kids can earn them for doing things that they appreciate.  And they get them taken away for doing things like taking too long to get that drink of water or sharpening their pencil while the leader was still talking.  So again, having the system of rewards can be a very effective strategy as long as it is used well.

Teaching versus reacting.  I think about this as a strategy that, again, we've sort of touched on this before.  But the idea being that it's us who have misspoken or have not quite taught that strategy well enough when we have said for something to do.  So if we want the whole group to be sitting quietly, and we have that one who simply isn't doing that, let's go back and say, Oh, you know what?  I think I need to reteach how to do that.  So what does it look like to sit quietly at carpet time?  

Or what is it that I'm feeling right now?  Can we teach some of those feelings and say, I can see that that made you angry?  Let's go back and look at this.  And let's teach how do we do things when we're angry?  Let's use our words to say this as opposed to Don't hit your friends when you're angry.  Right?  So let's go back and teach how we do things. 

So here are a few examples of how to do some of those.  We have that loud child who just seems to shout everything with all the emotion that's in them.  Well, how do we get them to maybe understand how to turn down the volume?  Can we teach the idea of speaking at a level eight is too loud?  Can you turn your voice down with a remote control to match my voice?  And now we're teaching that that sound regulation, that maybe they weren't aware of before.  And so we're teaching effectively with a visual, how do we do this in a good way?  

How about everyone who's just sprawling all over, all over the place because the activity just ended?  When really what we wanted them to do was to line up.  Well, can we stop everyone and say, let's try this again. Let's practice what it looks like to stand in line nicely before we move on to our next activity.  

I know, Barb had mentioned something about those transition chairs and I would dare to guess that there was a good amount of teaching about how you use a transition chair in between activities, and some practice for kiddos who maybe need to master it a few times before they got really effective at sitting in the transition chair before moving on to the next activity.  

So practicing it, and going back when you have those that one who's just running out of line and going back and saying, You know what, I see that everyone else is learning to do this, but we're all going to practice it together.  So let's try this again, going back and re teaching these activities each time.  

How about cleanup time?  So often we like to say, all right, clean up your mess, or what is it?  What are we going to do now; you just spilled all those things on the floor.  And I don't know about you.  But when I say clean up the kitchen, or clean your bedroom to my kids, how they interpret that message is a bit of a different picture than what I thought it meant when I said clean up the kitchen or clean your room.  So what can be very effective as if we take a picture and we show what does it look like when it's clean.  So all of the glue bottles and these supplies are organized down here, the scissors are back in their home, everything's neatly on their shelves.  So now when we say clean up, what we're really saying is, I would like you to make it look like this again.  Right?  So giving an example and saying, How can we get it to look like it should?  Let's pick things up so that it matches the picture.  That's a better vision of cleanup. 

In fact, I was working with one church who thought this was such a great idea that they were going to take pictures of their coffee hosting area and label everything that should go in there because they said everybody comes in and makes coffee at different times for different ministry events.  And nobody puts anything back in the right place.  So I'm taking pictures, this is perfect.  And I think their coffee host, Stan, has been a happier place ever since then.  

Oh again, what does it look like to sit at our carpet time?  Everybody pick a color to sit down?  Well, how about those bodies sprawling all over the place?  What does it look like to sit crisscross applesauce hands behind your back?  Do we have an example of it?  Let's teach what it looks like before we ask people to do it.  Or when we're getting so excited to say something because it's our turn to talk.  What does it mean for it to be your turn to talk?  Let's try that hand raising trick, right?  Or, what I've seen one person do - cover your box.  You have to cover your mouth while your hand is up and then, once your hand goes down, then the box is opened and you get to talk now.  So again, teaching what it looks like to do these appropriate responses.  

Visual versus auditory.  And we've talked about this a little bit.  But when you're saying that you're talking too loud, well, what's some kind of visual we compare with that if we realizing that this child maybe doesn't have a good concept of what too loud or too quiet is?  Well, kids certainly love the remote controls for their electronic devices and they know how to turn the volume up and down on those, so can we use that remote control to control the volume and their voice.  

And I've heard this very effectively paired with, You're talking at a level eight, but turn your voice down to a three so that it matches mine.  And giving a standard for it along with the visual is very, very effective.  Again, taking pictures of things extremely except effective tool for what does it look like for things to be like we just said they should be.  And most often people have devices right in their pocket that can snap a picture while they're talking about it.  

Traffic lights.  Isn't it interesting that a traffic light could be a very effective visual tool?  Because if we're talking about interrupting and words, overflowing on one another and turn taking and speaking in all of these things, most often we know what a traffic light does, right?  When it's red, I have to stop because someone else has a green light.  Well, isn't it interesting, we can do this with our conversation as well.  There can be a green light for when it's general conversation time; a yellow light to warn you to get quieter; and a red light when all the general conversation needs to stop because someone else has the right of way.  Now it's the teacher's turn to talk because everyone else has a red light, otherwise, our words are bumping into each other causing a crash. 

Because how many kids don't know what it means when you say Stop interrupting me Don't interrupt.  Maybe they don't know what an interrupt is.  So let's give a visual for what this looks like and not cause any more was traffic crashes with our words and actually just put a traffic light together in the room.  

How about that time timer?  Again, making things visual in a very real way makes it much more concrete and understandable and much more effective as a strategy.  

Sometimes it's helpful just to do the unexpected.  A little spritz of water in the face, when someone's just a little out of line or off track can just shock them for a moment.  And it's actually quite fun sometimes. I've been in a classroom with a teacher who just seemed to carry one around just to make sure that everyone was still paying attention to him and listening to him, and watching for his spray in the face.  So they all knew they might get it at some point, because they didn't know when they were watching him every moment that he was talking.  And it worked quite well to keep everyone's attention.

Sometimes throwing on a pair of shades or saying, Hey, did you just see that purple dinosaur come across the hall.  And actually, I've been in a few ministry settings where a dinosaur did just walk down the hall.  But anyway, it can be sometimes just having something unexpected pop up, that can redirect the attention and the energy in the room and sometimes quell those behaviors.  

Now, if you're really stuck, try bringing a wrapped gift into the room.  And suddenly, every child's eyes have gotten bigger and are staring at that bow.  And they want to know is that present for me?  Who's it for; what's inside?  And so if you have a big idea for the day, maybe put it in a wrapped box, and allow everyone to slowly open it up and find out what's inside and you'll have everyone engaged once again.  

Having a sense of humor is actually a great strategy.  Sometimes we just need to laugh at ourselves, and unleash some of the energy that we have going on.  Did you know that actually there is solid research saying that laughter actually opens up learning releases stress is just a great thing for everyone?  It's good medicine, right?  Having a sense of humor actually goes a long way and getting through some of the challenging situations we find ourselves in.

That's something else I want to spend a few minutes on is this idea of asking ourselves, what is the function of the behavior?  You see, form follows function.  And quite often, as we talked about behavior being a method of communication, sometimes it's also in a way a self-medication.  It's the individual trying to meet their own needs because they can't express to you what it is that they need, or they can't get what they need from what's available to them.  And so when we think about trying to redirect or stop certain behaviors, sometimes we need to take a minute, and not only think about what's being communicated through this behavior, but what is the behavior doing for this child or for this individual?  Is it giving them access to something?  Is it giving them attention that they crave?  Is it giving them access to not having to hear the Bible story, for example.  So what is it doing for them and are there are things that we need to think about putting in place to replace their own way of solving this problem, so that they get what they need, without having this behavior be the way that they get it.  

So this causes us sometimes to have to think along with the individual.  And we'll think along with individuals for various reasons, and I want to talk some more about some of these strategies next time, but want to say that it's a really great idea to pull them into the moment where you're going, alright, this behavior is not working for our setting.  You know, what's happening here is obviously disrupting a class. You've upset so and so or, you know, everyone else is doing this activity and you're not joining in and we're having to have this discussion or, you know, you're spending a lot of time sort of outside of class.  This isn't what we want to have for you.  So we need to think together about how are we going to make this better?  What do you need?  What is it that is working for you?  What is it that you see is not working?  How can we figure this out together?  Help them to be a part of the solution and not just part of the problem. 

So thinking along with the child who is having these challenging behaviors is definitely a good strategy at every point.  And it's not necessarily giving up control.  If we go back to that idea of offense and defense, right?  We tend to think about if we're asking them to be part of the thinking of the solution that we're giving them control, putting them on the offense.  But what's actually happening is that we're just creating a much more healthy environment for them to have the ability to self-regulate because so often we have challenging behaviors, because a child is not, does not have the ability to regulate their own emotions, their own actions, and things are happening quicker than they can react to well, and so by giving them a piece of the choice and a time to think through this with you, you're helping to coach them through being able to now do this as well.  

So next time we're going to talk about some enforceable statements, which we’ll explain then; some stop and think techniques that you could use to work with an individual and some of those defense strategies.  So, hope you're enjoying this week and we'll see you next time.