Give Kids Purpose!
Date: April 10th, 2024
Too often kids wonder what their purpose is in school. So, we need to give them a purpose!
Ask Polly Bath: Too Rigid? Too Wishy Washy?
Date: December 31st, 2023
Polly answers the question: “I sometimes let kids walk all over me and when I see it happening, I immediately over-correct and set strict rules and expectations! What’s a good balance between being too rigid or too wishy washy?”
Ask Polly Bath: Anticipating Escalation
Date: December 9th, 2023
Polly answers the question: “I have a kid who sometimes escalates during activities, or refuses to go to classes, or shuts down when presented with tasks. Why is this? Is it the teacher, the content, the environment, the kid’s life experiences? Logical consequences work sometimes. But is it possible to do something proactively that would actually decrease these behaviors?”
Ask Polly Bath: I’ve Got a Runner!
Date: November 26th, 2023
Polly answers the question: “I work in a self-contained, more restrictive program. We have one kid who has a history of being a ‘runner.’ I want to prevent this but I realize that I can’t possibly block doors or be at two doors at once. How can we prepare for this in advance? And how can we respond so the running stops eventually?”
Social Skills Impact Behavior!
Date: August 16th, 2023
Behaviors happen when kids don’t have social skills. In order to prevent these behaviors, we need to purposefully teach social skills.
Ask Polly Bath: Pack of Kids with Bad Behaviors?
Date: July 1st, 2023
Polly answers the question: “We have a pack of kids in our middle school who feed off each other! They wander the halls, cause trouble, they make snarky comments to teachers. And it’s getting harder and harder to muster up the energy to deal with them! How can we get this group to stop?”
Prevent Behaviors from Becoming Safety Issues
Date: March 22nd, 2023
What do we need to do in order to prevent behaviors from becoming safety issues?
Teach Transition Skills or Suffer the Consequences!
Date: October 4th, 2022
Transitions between classes tend to create behaviors. Why? Because we don’t give kids the few minutes they need to mentally prepare themselves for the next thing.
Disorganization Is Not Bad Behavior!
Date: September 13th, 2022
Organization is a cognitive skill. It’s not bad behavior when a kid is disorganized!
Ask Polly: How Do I Settle Kids After Lunch and Recess?
Date: August 21st, 2022
Polly answers the question: “Every time we have to shift gears or especially when my 4th graders come back from lunch and recess, it’s a nightmare! How can I get them to settle in quicker?”
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