What do you think?
Rate this book
Challenging Behavior in Young Children: Understanding, Preventing, and Responding Effectively
Renowned authors Barbara Kaiser and Judy Sklar Rasminsky once again help teachers to discover effective ways to address challenging behavior in the classroom! Making full use of Barbara Kaiser's 30 years of experience as a child care director and teacher, the Second Edition of Challenging Behavior in Young Children provides an in-depth look into the latest research on understanding and preventing challenging behavior and offers practical and effective strategies for responding to it, including positive behavior support and functional assessment, as mandated by IDEA. Based on the authors' 40-page booklet Meeting the Challenge (1999), this new edition maintains the personal touch and real-life examples teachers have grown to rely on. It includes new chapters on relationships and inclusion as well as the latest information on risk and protective factors, culture, the brain, self-reflection, working with families, and bullying. Challenging Behavior in Young Children emphasizes the teacher's role in the behavior of children, helping students and educators to reflect on their own values, feelings, and actions. of young children.
302 pages, Paperback
First published October 22, 2002
10 people are currently reading
133 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 22, 2023
The core message of this text is a good one. Essentially, most if not all problematic behavior has a root cause. Challenging behavior can be overcome with positive caring relationships paired with strategic thoughtful strategies. This is a wonderful message of hope that all teachers should be on board with. However, I felt that this book encouraged racial profiling, and at times, all out racism. It also had some inconsistent advice that I took issue with.
At the beginning, the racism was very subtle and I thought I was maybe being a bit over sensitive. The text starts out by saying when you adjust for socio-economic situations, African American children are not at any more risk than White children. Sure, makes sense. But then it goes on multiple times to say that your African American kids are more likely to be at risk than your other students with no mention of the socio-economic status. I thought this could use closer editing to say "low income" instead. It was a subtle annoyance.
Then we got to the "Culture" Chapter, and oh boy! I have never been more shocked reading a textbook. We are told that while White children suffer when punished corporally at home, African American children apparently thrive. (The book implies this might be because their parenting traditions evolved out of keeping slave children from being beaten by slave masters.) This is despite the book stating later that "you would never endorse hitting a child." When discussing classroom discipline, the authors suggest you need to be stern and authoritative with Black students or they will not respect you. Don't try to be kind and "chummy" with them (though they recommend this with other children), because it's their culture. We are repeatedly told that African American boys are especially hyperactive.
Hilariously, in other parts of the book the authors cite studies showing that African American youth are sensitive to perceived unfairness, and are disproportionately diagnosed with learning disorders, particularly boys. The authors take a puzzled tone about why or what could cause this.
In the name of cultural sensitivity, we are treated to a summary of some other cultural backgrounds teachers may find in the classroom. While there is some accurate information, I found most of it inaccurate, unrelated to culture, or caricature to the point of being insulting or even harmful. (While not an expert, I majored in Linguistics in college, lived in various countries abroad for several years, and taught ESL. So I think I'm qualified to comment on at least some of this).
Accurate and helpful information: some cultures find it uncomfortable to maintain constant eye contact, they may be more or less direct in their communication style, differing levels of respect for authority, whether or not it's okay to ask questions, physical closeness towards people and attitudes around touching.
Caricatures, stereotypes, and advice that are unhelpful and harmful:
-Lumping Chinese, Japanese, Pacific Islanders and Indians all together as "Asian." The reader is told to call on the Asian student in class extra often even if they don't raise their hand, because they may be shy or their culture says to not stand out.
-Don't call on Indian Americans, because it will be impossible for them to perform when singled out, because their culture values the group (I'm not exaggerating, the author actually says that it may be "impossible" for an "Indian American boy" to present something themselves during circle time).
-Don't put Middle Eastern girls in co-ed groups for activities after age 7, because that's important in radical Islam culture.
-Be firm with Black kids ("they may respond more readily to an intense, stern look and clear commands." pg 115)
-Latino parents are often stressed out illegals and "as a result they can find little time or energy to interact with their children and may treat them harshly." (pg 114)
I think the authors would have been better served by highlighting risks in general rather than literally handing future educators a manual on how to racially profile their students. For example, it's helpful to say that stressed out parents have less emotional resources to put towards their children. Things that stress out parents are: divorce, having enough money, working all the time, precarious immigration status. That is a helpful and more neutral statement than what read to me as essentially "Hey! If your student is black or hispanic, they're probably going to be a bigger problem compared to your nice (quiet) Asian kids and well off white kids. Especially the boys!" I'm ranting now. The author says repeatedly that to calm down you should take deep breaths and count backwards from ten. I'll do that and then continue this review...
I think what bothered me the most (aside from how racist it was!) was that there was no discussion of trying to integrate these kids or teach them about the different cultural norms that would allow them to succeed and make friends. For chapters talking about kids with learning difficulties, they recommend teaching them explicitly what kind of behavior is expected (ie meet my eyes when I'm talking to you.). But when it came to culture, the authors shied away and said to do whatever they do in the child's home culture (ie don't meet the Asian child's eyes when talking to them).
This sets the children up for failure if you want them to succeed in the school setting and upper-class America (or as the book puts it "White European American Culture"). It also reinforces the idea that said minority child is different and should be treated differently than their peers. There's also some very questionable ethics to this as well, depending on the cultural norm in question. I found it upsetting that the authors would recommend against putting Middle Eastern girls in a mixed gender group.
There were also some weird stories and examples of things the author ascribed to culture which felt like reaching to me. The teacher describes asking young children to describe attributes of an egg. One child says that her grandma cooks with eggs, and another says that eggs are white. The author claims that the first one (using eggs for cooking) is a typical response from a Latina child because it somehow encompasses a more holistic view of eggs? I don't know, it seemed like a pretty typical kid response about eggs to me!
There was another part too where the authors describe a hypothetical day at school where you tell the children "We'll go to recess after we finish reading." Then the reader is told "This will seem arbitrary to your American Indian student and you will have to explain why." It is arbitrary! That kid is smart! (PS if this is an Indian American thing, kudos to them for teaching their kids to be smart!)
Other stuff about the book, not centered on race and culture that bothered me:
The authors talk about how bad violent TV is and how aggressive American children are, when only a chapter earlier they talk about how Chinese children are allowed to pretend to shoot each other and they don't become aggressive adults. I think the authors are against violent TV, but didn't really have good supporting evidence for it.
The chapter on bullying fell flat for me. They said that recent research shows that 50% of bullies are socially and emotionally aware and just do it for the power. Because of this, teaching about empathy isn't really effective, but they didn't offer good alternatives for what to do instead other than create an "anti-bullying culture." I was particularly bothered by the advice to not fight back when attacked, because "Fighting back escalates aggression, endangers the child who's intervening, and reinforces the idea that it's an appropriate way to resolve problems." (p269)
This essentially teaches kids not to fight back and wait for someone to rescue them. Personally, I think self defense is very important, and an appropriate use of violence, so I dislike this on principle. But even using the books own arguments, this is problematic advice: 1) As explained earlier in the chapter, bullies look for victims who will passively take abuse and slowly escalate after a few test runs to see who allows them to bully them. Assertiveness is the number one protective trait in determining who is or isn't bullied. 2) The book itself says that rescuers (called "defenders") are rare. You are essentially teaching children to wait for someone that may never come.
I've been especially harsh on this book because it's on a required reading list for education majors at the local university (University of Central Arkansas, if anyone is wondering). In that context, I've evaluated it more in terms of if I thought it was good training for future teachers or not. There are some good bits of practical advice in here, but I was too bothered by how the authors treated culture to appreciate them fully.
At the beginning, the racism was very subtle and I thought I was maybe being a bit over sensitive. The text starts out by saying when you adjust for socio-economic situations, African American children are not at any more risk than White children. Sure, makes sense. But then it goes on multiple times to say that your African American kids are more likely to be at risk than your other students with no mention of the socio-economic status. I thought this could use closer editing to say "low income" instead. It was a subtle annoyance.
Then we got to the "Culture" Chapter, and oh boy! I have never been more shocked reading a textbook. We are told that while White children suffer when punished corporally at home, African American children apparently thrive. (The book implies this might be because their parenting traditions evolved out of keeping slave children from being beaten by slave masters.) This is despite the book stating later that "you would never endorse hitting a child." When discussing classroom discipline, the authors suggest you need to be stern and authoritative with Black students or they will not respect you. Don't try to be kind and "chummy" with them (though they recommend this with other children), because it's their culture. We are repeatedly told that African American boys are especially hyperactive.
Hilariously, in other parts of the book the authors cite studies showing that African American youth are sensitive to perceived unfairness, and are disproportionately diagnosed with learning disorders, particularly boys. The authors take a puzzled tone about why or what could cause this.
In the name of cultural sensitivity, we are treated to a summary of some other cultural backgrounds teachers may find in the classroom. While there is some accurate information, I found most of it inaccurate, unrelated to culture, or caricature to the point of being insulting or even harmful. (While not an expert, I majored in Linguistics in college, lived in various countries abroad for several years, and taught ESL. So I think I'm qualified to comment on at least some of this).
Accurate and helpful information: some cultures find it uncomfortable to maintain constant eye contact, they may be more or less direct in their communication style, differing levels of respect for authority, whether or not it's okay to ask questions, physical closeness towards people and attitudes around touching.
Caricatures, stereotypes, and advice that are unhelpful and harmful:
-Lumping Chinese, Japanese, Pacific Islanders and Indians all together as "Asian." The reader is told to call on the Asian student in class extra often even if they don't raise their hand, because they may be shy or their culture says to not stand out.
-Don't call on Indian Americans, because it will be impossible for them to perform when singled out, because their culture values the group (I'm not exaggerating, the author actually says that it may be "impossible" for an "Indian American boy" to present something themselves during circle time).
-Don't put Middle Eastern girls in co-ed groups for activities after age 7, because that's important in radical Islam culture.
-Be firm with Black kids ("they may respond more readily to an intense, stern look and clear commands." pg 115)
-Latino parents are often stressed out illegals and "as a result they can find little time or energy to interact with their children and may treat them harshly." (pg 114)
I think the authors would have been better served by highlighting risks in general rather than literally handing future educators a manual on how to racially profile their students. For example, it's helpful to say that stressed out parents have less emotional resources to put towards their children. Things that stress out parents are: divorce, having enough money, working all the time, precarious immigration status. That is a helpful and more neutral statement than what read to me as essentially "Hey! If your student is black or hispanic, they're probably going to be a bigger problem compared to your nice (quiet) Asian kids and well off white kids. Especially the boys!" I'm ranting now. The author says repeatedly that to calm down you should take deep breaths and count backwards from ten. I'll do that and then continue this review...
I think what bothered me the most (aside from how racist it was!) was that there was no discussion of trying to integrate these kids or teach them about the different cultural norms that would allow them to succeed and make friends. For chapters talking about kids with learning difficulties, they recommend teaching them explicitly what kind of behavior is expected (ie meet my eyes when I'm talking to you.). But when it came to culture, the authors shied away and said to do whatever they do in the child's home culture (ie don't meet the Asian child's eyes when talking to them).
This sets the children up for failure if you want them to succeed in the school setting and upper-class America (or as the book puts it "White European American Culture"). It also reinforces the idea that said minority child is different and should be treated differently than their peers. There's also some very questionable ethics to this as well, depending on the cultural norm in question. I found it upsetting that the authors would recommend against putting Middle Eastern girls in a mixed gender group.
There were also some weird stories and examples of things the author ascribed to culture which felt like reaching to me. The teacher describes asking young children to describe attributes of an egg. One child says that her grandma cooks with eggs, and another says that eggs are white. The author claims that the first one (using eggs for cooking) is a typical response from a Latina child because it somehow encompasses a more holistic view of eggs? I don't know, it seemed like a pretty typical kid response about eggs to me!
There was another part too where the authors describe a hypothetical day at school where you tell the children "We'll go to recess after we finish reading." Then the reader is told "This will seem arbitrary to your American Indian student and you will have to explain why." It is arbitrary! That kid is smart! (PS if this is an Indian American thing, kudos to them for teaching their kids to be smart!)
Other stuff about the book, not centered on race and culture that bothered me:
The authors talk about how bad violent TV is and how aggressive American children are, when only a chapter earlier they talk about how Chinese children are allowed to pretend to shoot each other and they don't become aggressive adults. I think the authors are against violent TV, but didn't really have good supporting evidence for it.
The chapter on bullying fell flat for me. They said that recent research shows that 50% of bullies are socially and emotionally aware and just do it for the power. Because of this, teaching about empathy isn't really effective, but they didn't offer good alternatives for what to do instead other than create an "anti-bullying culture." I was particularly bothered by the advice to not fight back when attacked, because "Fighting back escalates aggression, endangers the child who's intervening, and reinforces the idea that it's an appropriate way to resolve problems." (p269)
This essentially teaches kids not to fight back and wait for someone to rescue them. Personally, I think self defense is very important, and an appropriate use of violence, so I dislike this on principle. But even using the books own arguments, this is problematic advice: 1) As explained earlier in the chapter, bullies look for victims who will passively take abuse and slowly escalate after a few test runs to see who allows them to bully them. Assertiveness is the number one protective trait in determining who is or isn't bullied. 2) The book itself says that rescuers (called "defenders") are rare. You are essentially teaching children to wait for someone that may never come.
I've been especially harsh on this book because it's on a required reading list for education majors at the local university (University of Central Arkansas, if anyone is wondering). In that context, I've evaluated it more in terms of if I thought it was good training for future teachers or not. There are some good bits of practical advice in here, but I was too bothered by how the authors treated culture to appreciate them fully.
Read
July 11, 2019textbook
March 23, 2011
There are some great ideas in this book, I think it will become a very useful reference book in the future.
April 24, 2012
Full of helpful information that I find myself referring back to.
Read
July 29, 20161 copy
Read
September 2, 20161 copy
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews