You are just about to wrap up a tiring day at work when your cell phone rings. You look down and it’s your child’s school calling……. again. You sigh, hesitate and reluctantly press “Answer Call”. You barely say a word and just listen with the occasional “aha, oh, okay.” 10 minutes have elapsed, you write down a date and time and quickly say good-bye. Your heart is beating, the principal has asked you to come for… “The Meeting.”
Feeling overwhelmed and not sure what to expect or say during a meeting with your school support team is very typical. Here are 7 questions to ask your child’s school support team when you are called in to discuss your child’s behaviours:
1.What are my child’s strengths?
What is working well? What and when does he/she do their best while at school? Hopefully, the meeting has started with answers to these questions, highlighting your child’s strengths and abilities. If it doesn’t, be sure to ask. It’s very easy to get caught up in the negative behaviours of the student but it’s extremely important to identify what they do best while they are at school. This is vital information when developing a positive behaviour support plan. An effective positive behaviour support plan will use positive reinforcements, their strengths and learning styles to motivate and develop lagging skills
2. What do you think are the causes behind the behaviour?
Behaviours do not occur because a child is just “bad”. Negative behaviours are the child’s way of communicating that a need is not being met. It’s their way of showing they are mad, angry or frustrated. Aggression, lying, stealing, defiance are all outer actions of something else happening within your child. The support team may have ideas and may need to get information from you to verify those ideas for the cause. In the midst of talking about your child, it is important to remember to talk to your child. Ask them why the behaviour is happening. They may be able to articulate what’s occurring and together solutions can be discussed which will help your child feel better.
3.Has there been any data collected on his/her behaviour? What documentation do you have?
Collecting data about the behaviours of concern are extremely important. It allows you to review incidents to see if there are any patterns in behaviour. It also gives an idea on how often the behaviour occurs and is great documentation that can be given to your doctor or psycho-educational consultant. However, just tracking the number of times the behaviour occurs isn’t always helpful. More information as to what was happening, who was around, what time of day, what happened right before the behaviour occurred are all vital pieces of information that must be considered in order to find behavioural patterns as well as gain a better understanding of why the behaviours may be occurring. If data hasn’t been collected ask if data collection could be started. There are many options of behaviour data collection sheet available for free online.Once again, collecting information on the behaviour is very important to creating an effective plan to tackle negative behaviours. It also helps the teaching staff to see if the behaviour is decreasing and allows them to be accurate and not just guess or assume things about the behaviour.
4. When does this behaviour seem to occur the most?
Is the behaviour occurring every time it is time for outdoor play, at the end of the day, or during gym class? Does the behaviour seem to occur during particular subjects or specific activities? If so, further exploration may reveal that your child maybe having difficulties in that subject, maybe having issues with peers, may feel bored, and/or need lessons to be more engaging. Data collection will also reveal this information and help unravel why this behaviour could possibly be happening.
5. What skills do you think my child needs to build on in order to be successful?
Negative behaviour typically reveals there is a lagging skill that the child has not developed and uses the negative behaviour to compensate. For example, handling unpredictability, expressing concerns, appreciating how his/her behaviour is affecting other people needs. These are all skills that your child may have difficulties with and need to be strategically taught. It’s important that lagging skills are identified in order to determine what skills need to be learned and/or reinforced
6. How are we as a team going to work on teaching these skills?
Coming up with a solution (which should be the goal of the meeting) is a collaborative effort. You as the parent and the school support team need to work together to ensure your child’s success. For example, during math class your child becomes disruptive, shouts at the teacher, rips up math worksheets and distracts his peers around him. It is discovered that your son finds math extremely difficult and uses this behaviour as a way to escape the task. The goal would be:
- teach him to recognize when he needs a break
- teach him how to appropriately ask for help.
7. What additional accommodations can be made to ensure success?
There are many ways the teaching team can help your child be successful in class. Instructional, environmental and assessment strategies can be created specifically for your child to help him/her with academic challenges they may be facing within the classroom. Explore how and when these accommodations could be implemented. Here is a list of examples:
Instructional:
- Graphic organizers
- Videotape instructions
- Concrete/hands-on materials
- Reinforcement incentives
- Note taking assistance
Environmental:
- Closer proximity to teacher
- Alternative work space
- Use of headphones to reduce noise
- Study carrel
Assessment:
- Answers to be dictated
- Additional time
- Oral testing
- Choice of test format (multiple-choice, essay, true-false)
- Alternate ways to evaluate (projects or oral presentations instead of written tests)
Written by: Marlene Spence BA, BST
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