Nap Time

Nap time seems to be a struggle with so many teachers.  I have seen teachers spend MOST of nap time trying to get everyone to sleep then, once nap is over, try just as hard to WAKE EVERYONE UP!  If they would just take a step back, they would realize that those children who went to sleep last are typically the last to wake up…by an equal amount of time.

I see many strategies employed during nap time.  There are the teachers who pat backs roughly, knocking the breath out of the child at each blow.  If you are a back patter, remember that you are not trying to knock them out, but create a gentle repetitive rhythm that will RELAX the child into a deep sleep.

Then there are the teachers who are face rubbers.  I’ve seen some teachers again rub a face so roughly the children seem to be going cross eyed and their head is bouncing around.  Please note, if you are a face rubber, it is a gentle caress with a light touch.  It is meant to be RELAXING and again not meant to knock the kid out because they are dizzy from their head bouncing around.

There are also those who are the rockers.  These teachers like to hold the children and rock front to back or side to side.  Yes, I have seen teachers ruin this approach as well.  This is meant to be a gentle rocking or swaying motion to, again, RELAX the child; not a time to swing the child quickly back and forth in quick jerky motions.  We are not trying to make the kid pass out from dizzying effects as if on a roller coaster.

Nap time should be a no stress time.  Gentle music, calm face rubbing, gentle patting, and gentle rocking motions.  This isn’t a battle of the wills.  Children aren’t forced to sleep, they are helped to calm and relax themselves so they easily slip into that sleep.

Oh, and if they DON’T sleep?  That’s okay, too.  Give them something quite to do on their mats like read a book or play with a handful of legos.  I mean, seriously?  That’s just a two hour time out if you don’t allow them to do anything and you spend the time yelling at them for playing with their blanket, talking to themselves too loud, etc…

It’s not a race

The other day I did a training on circle time for one of the centers.  There was a need for me to do this because, although they had all the components to circle there, the children were not interested at all.  There may have been 4 to 5 children joining circle each day.

The thing is, that these teachers had EVERYTHING that SHOULD have had the children running over.  They had awesome fun songs.  They choose amazingly engaging books.  They even have some fun activities to be included like taste tests, group games, and one even had the group draw a picture of a body with each child choosing a different part of the body.

The problem?  They all were racing through circle time.  It was almost like they were racing to see who could get through circle the fastest.  A circle that should have taken 15 to 20 minutes given all the activities that were involved, was taking less than 10.  I’m not even exaggerating. 

Children weren’t joining circle because it wasn’t inviting to them.  For some, it was over stimulating at the pace it went.  For others, it wasn’t personable enough.  Those who stayed at circle were those children that just kind of go with the flow of the teachers every day.

The problem was that the children wouldn’t sit for long so the teachers tried to get in as much as they could while the children were sitting.  The children got less interested because of the pace.  Do you see the problem?  It’s an endless cycle.  I think if I hadn’t come in to help those teachers may have tried to squeeze 20 minutes of activity into less than 5 minutes.

Not to worry, Jenni to the recue!  Circle time is at a much more reasonable pace and the children are enjoying it so much better!

Discipline

I know we’ve covered this before but I find the need to cover it often because, well, it’s a constant challenge.

Discipline comes from the root word disciple which means TO TEACH.  The thing you should be teaching?  SELF CONTROL

Discipline is all about self control.  If you are a disciplines adult, you are a person who can accomplish tasks on your own, you know the rules and limits of society, and you don’t need to be reminded of those rules…you follow them.

There are a few reasons the children “misbehave” (for lack of a better word).  Each on of these reasons have fairly simple solutions.  Let’s look at these reasons and solutions, shall we?

Attention:  Many times children act out because they want you to pay attention to them.  It’s as simple as that.  If they are looking for attention and can’t seem to get eye contact from you, they will pick up a block and throw it knowing that you will HAVE to pay attention to them. 

The fix is simple, give them attention BEFORE they need it.  If you know a child is going to need your attention, make that child your special helper in setting up activities or have that child, along with a small group of others, go with you to the center library to pick some new books out for the classroom library.

Boredom:  If they can’t find something to do, or don’t know what to do, they will FIND something to do…and MOST of the time it will be something that you DON’T want them to do. 

There are two fixes.  First, have plenty of INTERESTING activities available to them.  Set up the environment with many self-directed activities that are interesting to them.  Second, when you see a child wandering around not focused on an activity, go to them and bring them to an activity.  Don’t just tell them “Find something to do” because…they WILL find something to do, and you won’t like it.

Too low expectations:  Many times we don’t give the children enough credit and we don’t expect enough out of them.  We put out activities that we think are going to interest them, but in reality they interest them but, since they complete the task quickly, they get bored with it and…well, we’ve already discussed boredom.

Simply fix this by knowing the children and challenging them.  Put out puzzles that have several levels of a challenge.  I one time had 500 piece jigsaw puzzles out in my classroom because I had a child who could finish those in a day. other puzzles were way too simple for him.  Know what they can do and then make the activity one level more challenging for them.

Too high expectations:  Yes, if behaviors can be influenced by too low of an expectations, they can also be triggered by to high of an expectation.  If you put out activities that are too high of an expectation children will get frustrated and move away from that activity, they will then get bored…see above.

Again, know your children’s development and challenge them but if they seem to get easily frustrated from this activity, bring it down a notch.  You want to challenge them, not frustrate them.  I have never again had 500 piece jigsaw puzzles in a classroom because no other child has ever been at that level.  Anyone else would have been extremely frustrated.

Language Development:  When children can’t communicate, they get frustrated and will lash out aggressively.  This is why there is more biting in the toddler rooms than in the preschool rooms.  Toddlers are just learning to talk.  When you have a child with a speech IEP or any language delay, you will have a child who might lash out physically to get what they need or want.

This one takes a lot more work.  You need to support their language development.  Give them the words that they should say.  When they don’t or can’t say them, support them by staying on their eye level and turning to the other child and saying the words for that child.  You need to be a little careful because you don’t want them to rely on you solving their problems or getting their needs and wants met; but you want to empower them to do it on their own.  So you want to give them the words a few different ways and pausing between each opportunity to give them the chance to speak before talking for them.

Socially Inept:  ALL preschool children are socially inept.  Therefore, we TEACH them how to socialize.  Many times the conflicts and behaviors arise because they don’t know how to socialize.  A child will hit another child in order to initiate a game of chase.

Like the language, give them the words and behaviors they need.  “If you want to play with him ask, can I play, too?  Or ask, want to chase me?”  The ONLY way they are going to learn to socialize is by TEACHING them to socialize.  It takes a LONG time and a LOT of work…be patient.  They will get it, but you MUST be consistent and must not solve the problem for you but give them the words they need in order to enter proper social scenarios.

So, there you have it, the reasons and solutions to why children struggle with behaviors in the classroom and how to best help them.