1. Challenging behavior reporting and guidance
Waldo community action partners head start
Last year was really rough. We saw a dramatic increase in challenging behavior, and we weren’t equipped to handle it. We heard you. You needed something more, something different.
This is what we came up with.
We are still learning. Still trying to figure out how to best support you. We are wanting to learn with you, and through you. You are the face of our agency, and experience these behaviors day in and day out. We can’t understand what we are truly up against without open communication with you.
August 18, 2017
Melissa Bastien & Jordanne Doyon

2. Communication through Behaviors
All behaviors are communicating something!
They are an act of love, or a cry for love.
Unsafe or inappropriate behaviors are almost always signaling distress or unmet needs.
What are your children trying to communicate to you? Think about that as you are facing these challenging behaviors.

3. Disruptive: Yelling, asking repetitive questions
Levels of Severity
Disruptive: Yelling, asking repetitive questions
Dangerous: Slapping, scratching
Very Dangerous: Choking, punching
These behaviors can be divided into three levels of severity: disruptive behaviors, dangerous behaviors and very dangerous behaviors.
Disruptive will be your child who loves to tell you and all the children what they did at gram’s that weekend. The kid who shrieks just to hear himself and watch his classmates cover his ears.
Dangerous Behaviors would be pushing or open hand hitting when a friend takes their toy, or invades their space. This will be your kid who is your Parana, and enjoys tasting his friends without breaking skin.
Now biting could turn into very dangerous behaviors when they are breaking the skin. Or they are bolting toward the busy intersection. Punching, black eyes, the whole gambit.
All three of these categories, context is going to be important when determining what category. Running in the hallway vs. running toward the road. Throwing foam blocks vs wooden blocks. Biting breaking skin vs. not breaking skin. Slapping vs. Punching.
Context, could also be the child’s history. Knowing their story and the trauma and challenges that they are facing.
Your awareness of the severity of the behavior will help lead to a more appropriate response. Beginning to think about what happened/what is happening to them instead of what is wrong with them.

4. So what do we do?

5. Reporting and documentation
All dangerous/very dangerous behaviors must have a Child Incident Report.
All behaviors that fall under dangerous/very dangerous must have a Child Incident Report. Dawn will be speaking about the Incident reporting process, but we have them on 3 sheet NCR paper, one for the parent, one for Dawn, and one for the child file. They need to be turned in weekly through inter office mail, unless dangerous or very dangerous behaviors.

6. Chapter 33: Use of restraints
Only trained staff may use restraints!
Chapter 33 Incident Reports must be filled out when a restraint is used.
The use of restraints will only be done by trained staff. In case you didn’t know, none of you have been trained by Waldo CAP to do them. If a restraint is used, a Chapter 33 incident Report will be filled out. These forms can be received through Melissa or Jessie.

7. Positive guidance
Every child will have a Positive Guidance Plan. This will be filled out by the teacher or the FA at the first home visit or the first day in programming. The plan will go in the Special Services section of the Child File.
We know that every child is different, and that’s why we individualize. We need to individual Conscious Discipline as well to meet their needs and where they are at. There are lots of ways to say the same message, so how can you say your message to a child the right way for them?

8. Individualized behavior support Plan
When we are seeing repetitive and continuous challenging behaviors, we should begin to look at creating an Individual Behavior Support Plan. Some of you may be familiar with Safety Plans. We realized through these that they are directed at very dangerous behaviors, but repetitive and continuous disruptive behaviors can also have a huge impact on the classroom. Because of that, we have created the Individual Behavior Support Plan that can be used no matter what level of severity the behavior is.
Meet for a case conference, and if necessary, a Family Team Meeting. Pull together the team players in this, like service providers, family members, site supervisors, FAs, and/or corresponding coordinators.
We want to talk about specific behaviors and their patterns and frequency. What is this child trying to communicate to us? What are they getting out of it? What are the triggers? More importantly, what do we want to see instead? What is that replacement behavior? It is going to be a step by step progress to get to that desired behavior, or how do we get there? How are we going to celebrate every successful step?
Plans need to be read and followed by all staff in the classroom. Teaching staff, you need to make sure that any subs in your room know about the plan and what their role is within that plan.
A copy needs to be in the Special Services Tracking Section of the Child, and a copy sent to Melissa.
Behaviors change. Sometimes they get worse before they get better. Sometimes preventative measures and action steps may appear to be ineffective. Behaviors will change as we take steps toward the desirable behaviors. The plan needs to be updated, and the team needs to be pulled back together to re-evaluate the plan.

9. Is this going to solve everything?
Nope.
Again, we are learning with you. Keep open communication so that tools we need for success can continue to be build and adjusted.