The Power of Words Responsive Classroom: Positive Language Emily Leonard

Responsive Classroom Approach:

Focus for Today General Guidelines for Language Listening o Why listening to children is important o Two strategies to try Direct Language o Rephrasing The 3 R’s of Positive Language o Reinforce o Remind o Redirect

General Guidelines Be direct and authentic Show faith in children’s ability and intentions Keep it action oriented Keep it brief Know when to be silent

Why Listen Listening helps us know our child Our listening helps children learn about themselves Listening strengthens parent-child relationships Listening helps us ask more effective questions Our listening teaches children to take their learning and behavior seriously Our listening helps children become better communicators

Two Listening Strategies to Try Pausing o The best way to become a better listener is to allow more wait time before responding o Knowing there will be a pause, frees us up to listen more completely o During the pause, think through your response and consider your language

Two Listening Strategies to Try Paraphrasing o Encourages students to make sure what they said was what they meant o It allows us (adults) to make sure we’ve understood students correctly. o Prevents miscommunication o Leads us and children to think more deeply about a topic and consider other perspectives

Reinforcing, Reminding, Redirecting Reinforcing: to encourage students to continue the behavior Reminding: to guide students back to the expected behavior when the expectation has been clearly established previously Redirecting: to redirect children quickly back to a safe behavior

Reinforcing Effective reinforcing language… o Name the specific behavior o Use a warm and positive tone o Emphasize description over personal approval o Find positives to name for all children o Avoid naming some individuals as examples for others

Reinforcing Name concrete and specific behaviors. When we say “good job cleaning up” or “nice work” the child might not realize which behavior they should continue to do in the future. INSTEAD of: “Good job cleaning up.” TRY: “You remembered to put away all the toys you got out this afternoon and put them back neatly on the shelf.”

Reinforcing Replacing general praise with specific description When we say “good job” or “wow” the value of our comment is less and the child might not be aware of which behavior we are encouraging. INSTEAD of: “Nice job.” TRY: “I noticed you turned off the tv the first time I asked.”

Reinforcing De-emphasize your personal approval. Focus on and emphasize what your child did. Otherwise children begin to focus on behaving to please adults instead of behaving because it’s appropriate. INSTEAD of: “I’m so pleased with the way you helped your brother get on his shoes” TRY: “You helped your brother put on his shoes. That helps us get out the door in the morning.”

Reinforcing Find positives to reinforce in all children. Each child has strengths. With our language we can show children we appreciate their positive actions and attitudes. INSTEAD of: Only commenting on ‘big’ behaviors and products TRY: noticing and commenting on subtle behaviors and your child’s process

Reinforcing Avoid holding one child up as an example for others. The child used as the example might feel proud or embarrassed. The other children will feel criticized or as if you value them less. INSTEAD of: “See how Alex is getting in bed. You should do that, too.” TRY: to Alex privately: ”You got in bed just like I asked, which shows you’re being responsible.”