"No one can make you angry without your permission." This seems so untrue at first glance, but this is the power self control has over YOUR composure. You can choose to allow your students to make you angry with their behavior, or you can control yourself and maintain your composure and handle the situation in a productive way. If you become angry, frustrated, upset, etc... when your students behave in a way that you wish they wouldn't, then they are in control of you and your emotions rather than you. You have allowed them to take over your control. If you realize that it's not about you, and their behavior isn't about you, you can model for the child how to handle stressful events, and help them solve their problem. You have to maintain your composure to effectively model self control for your students and to teach them how to solve their problem. If you are uncomposed and unregulated, you are teaching children to handle their problems in their brain stem state of survival, which is impulsive and irrational. When you maintain your composure, and teach students how to breathe until they reach their frontal lobes, then they will learn to regulate themselves before addressing issues. The chances of your students solving their problems effectively increase dramatically, just by teaching them to maintain composure and not respond until they've left the survival state and reached the executive state. "YOU CANNOT TEACH A SKILL YOU DO NOT POSSESS." Becky Bailey. If you do not possess the skill of composure, you cannot teach it to your children and your students. Children learn how to handle stressful situations from the adults in their lives. Those kids who tantrum and yell and throw things are either led by the examples they've seen from adults in their lives, or in very young children who tantrum, they have strong emotions that they do not have the skills to control. Kids who use sarcasm in high stress situations, probably hear it from their parents. We MUST model for our students and children this skill of composure. It will not happen overnight, but when they see us handle stressful events in a composed manner, they will acquire that skill. When children are upset, we must "lend" them our skills. This means we must let them use our composure to find theirs.
The first thing you have to do to maintain your composure is to talk yourself through it - Be a Star - Stop. Take a deep breath. And. Relax. Repeat this as many times as it takes. You can also say "I'm safe. I'm Calm. I can handle this." to yourself. This tells the limbic system to turn off the adrenal alarm, your muscles to relax, and gives you the confidence to pursue a solution rationally. Once you are in the executive state, then you can help your students move up in brain states. You will say to a very upset, mad, frustrated, child "Breathe with me" while you take big deep breaths. Once they begin breathing you'll say to them "You're safe. Your're calm. You can handle this." If no luck, then your script will be "Your _____ is going like this ______. (This is when you will get a brief moment of eye contact - be sure your face is calm and inviting.) You seem ________. It's hard when _________. Breathe with me so I can help you solve this problem." Once the child is ready to talk about it "You wanted __________. You may not ______. When you want _____, say __________." We must teach the skill of self talk. Most of us self-talk, up to 77,000 thoughts per day. We must train our self-talk to only be helpful, instead of hurtful. We must be able to talk ourselves through difficult events.
BODY LANGUAGE & FACIAL EXPRESSIONS: One important thing to remember is you CANNOT fake composure. If you're not composed, your tone of voice, facial expressions, and body language say it all, no matter what the words are you are using. Your body language and facial expressions can set the whole mood of your classroom, especially when you're dealing with discipline issues. We will learn more about Mirror Neurons when we discuss empathy. You've always heard "It's not what you say, it's how you say it." That couldn't be more true. It really takes the value out of the Conscious Discipline language if you're saying it lethargically, or with frustration, or if your eyebrows are raised and your head shaking. Composure and self-regulation are the key components to effectively implmenting Conscious Discipline. If you cannot self-regulate, you cannot maintain composure. If you cannot maintain your composure, you cannot teach children how to. If you feel yourself losing your composure - practice pivoting. That's when you feel yourself about to address a situation with steam and frustration - you stop, pivot your thoughts and redirect them to productive composure BEFORE you address a child or a situation.
SELF-REGULATION: Please understand the skill of self-regulation and recognize it's value in yourself and your children/students. Self-regulation comes in many forms, for kids, it could be hiding, sucking a thumb, twirling hair, rubbing a blanket, etc... Please understand that kids will release those emotions either adaptively through self-regulation skills we teach (deep breathing) or maladaptively, like tantrums, throwing things, shutting down, avoidance, chewing on their shirts or pencils, etc... The most universal self-regulatory skills are self-talk, deep breathing, and becoming conscious of our thoughts and behaviors. It's also important you realize age appropriate self-regulatory skills. It's okay for kids to suck their thumbs, twirl their hair, etc... It's not okay for them to do anything destructive, like walking out of the classroom, chewing on things. At this point, we must teach a new, appropriate skill, like deep breathing, etc... We cannot simply punish for their dysfunctional attempts to self-regulate, we MUST teach them a new skill. Once we KNOW they possess those skills, and are choosing not to use them, that's where consequences come in. So, the key here is to learn to self-regulate to maintain composure and effectively handle all stressful events.
The first thing you have to do to maintain your composure is to talk yourself through it - Be a Star - Stop. Take a deep breath. And. Relax. Repeat this as many times as it takes. You can also say "I'm safe. I'm Calm. I can handle this." to yourself. This tells the limbic system to turn off the adrenal alarm, your muscles to relax, and gives you the confidence to pursue a solution rationally. Once you are in the executive state, then you can help your students move up in brain states. You will say to a very upset, mad, frustrated, child "Breathe with me" while you take big deep breaths. Once they begin breathing you'll say to them "You're safe. Your're calm. You can handle this." If no luck, then your script will be "Your _____ is going like this ______. (This is when you will get a brief moment of eye contact - be sure your face is calm and inviting.) You seem ________. It's hard when _________. Breathe with me so I can help you solve this problem." Once the child is ready to talk about it "You wanted __________. You may not ______. When you want _____, say __________." We must teach the skill of self talk. Most of us self-talk, up to 77,000 thoughts per day. We must train our self-talk to only be helpful, instead of hurtful. We must be able to talk ourselves through difficult events.
BODY LANGUAGE & FACIAL EXPRESSIONS: One important thing to remember is you CANNOT fake composure. If you're not composed, your tone of voice, facial expressions, and body language say it all, no matter what the words are you are using. Your body language and facial expressions can set the whole mood of your classroom, especially when you're dealing with discipline issues. We will learn more about Mirror Neurons when we discuss empathy. You've always heard "It's not what you say, it's how you say it." That couldn't be more true. It really takes the value out of the Conscious Discipline language if you're saying it lethargically, or with frustration, or if your eyebrows are raised and your head shaking. Composure and self-regulation are the key components to effectively implmenting Conscious Discipline. If you cannot self-regulate, you cannot maintain composure. If you cannot maintain your composure, you cannot teach children how to. If you feel yourself losing your composure - practice pivoting. That's when you feel yourself about to address a situation with steam and frustration - you stop, pivot your thoughts and redirect them to productive composure BEFORE you address a child or a situation.
SELF-REGULATION: Please understand the skill of self-regulation and recognize it's value in yourself and your children/students. Self-regulation comes in many forms, for kids, it could be hiding, sucking a thumb, twirling hair, rubbing a blanket, etc... Please understand that kids will release those emotions either adaptively through self-regulation skills we teach (deep breathing) or maladaptively, like tantrums, throwing things, shutting down, avoidance, chewing on their shirts or pencils, etc... The most universal self-regulatory skills are self-talk, deep breathing, and becoming conscious of our thoughts and behaviors. It's also important you realize age appropriate self-regulatory skills. It's okay for kids to suck their thumbs, twirl their hair, etc... It's not okay for them to do anything destructive, like walking out of the classroom, chewing on things. At this point, we must teach a new, appropriate skill, like deep breathing, etc... We cannot simply punish for their dysfunctional attempts to self-regulate, we MUST teach them a new skill. Once we KNOW they possess those skills, and are choosing not to use them, that's where consequences come in. So, the key here is to learn to self-regulate to maintain composure and effectively handle all stressful events.