When Dr. Gottman began his research with children, exploring and identifying the best methods for raising an emotionally intelligent child, most of the psychological literature available on parenting was restricted to the managing of a childs misbehavior. Emotion coaching is a fine idea. Rather than he getting totally out of control, he ran from the room, sat on the steps and calmed himself. What if we didn't take good things for granted, and recognized all the kindness we receive from others? When he finished I thanked him for telling me and for handling himself in a calm fashion. It was originally developed in the USA by a psychologist John Gottman and is gaining ground in the UK as an effective way to nurture mental health and wellbeing in … 4. Attachment and Learning Session 3 – Strategies Emotion Coaching 2. Emotion Coaching Based on research by John Gottman (1997) in America Research suggests Emotion Coaching is a key to happy, resilient, and well-adjusted children and young people Emotion Coaching is helping children and young people to understand the different emotions they experience, why they occur, and how to handle them 16 http://www.languageoflistening.com. I can’t tell you how often I hear myself, my husband, and other parents tell their kids dismissively “C’mon, it’s just not that big of a deal” when something makes their child angry or sad. How emotion coaching contributes to healthy brain development and has a positive impact on behaviour regulation; The benefits for the teacher, the pupil and the school in adopting an emotion coaching strategy to manage behavior; Use emotion coaching skills in a classroom setting We don’t always have to be teaching and coaching. I think you’ve described the process well… but for my son (and, based on some research I’ve read lately, perhaps for many boys), there’s a bit of a glitch in that process:  there needs to be a nice long “cooling-off” pause between the expression of the feeling on his part, and the identification of it by me. I am very sad and very cross and I want them round NOW! Become a fan of Raising Happiness on Facebook. Step 3 Is done later…when the child is calm: tell the child about one positive quality you saw them exhibit (pick it out of whatever negative other stuff was going on and only mention the positive.) The basic goal of emotion coaching is to Eek! Greater Good He didn’t hit it hard enough to really break it, but the glass being old..well, it gave way…just enough to crack all over the place, but not fall out. I don’t think so. She needs only to think of the first step, empathy. Having a healthy baseline for yourself is important to being able to coach emotions in your child as well. “Emotion Coaches” accept emotions, even those seen as negative, as a fact of life and ... For example, it is okay to feel angry, but it is not okay to hit others when you are angry. Before and after school, this is the first thing my 5th grade son talks about every single day, and this started two years ago. http://www.handinhandparenting.org/csArticles/articles/000005/000537.htm Waaaaah!’ But what most touched my heart was that he was so honest standing up for his behavior and earnest in accepting the consequences without argument or another meltdown. Terrible feelings like jealousy and fear and greed are invitations to grow, to understand ourselves better and to become a better person. Only, one day I got a tantrum rage from one of my (4 year old) twin daughters. There’s some really interesting research on consequences that make them somewhat iffy even with the logical ones – certainly if applied religiously, the results can be a major backfire. Hmm. I talk about this on the “How much screen time is too much?” post: http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/half_full/?p=359 Emotion coaching employs a relational approach to enabling children to support and manage their own behaviour. My parents taught me how to ‘fight fair’ and how to resolve conflict BY fighting in front of me, skillfully and appropriately. So even during the problem solving, I was labeling and validating more of her feelings: lonely, embarrassed, hungry, tired. Don’t physically, emotionally, sexually, verbally, or psychologically abuse your child. This first step to coping with negative emotions (in yourself, your children, or in your mother-in-law) is to figure out what they are feeling and to accept those feelings. I agree — and I LOVE the example you give above about letting your son calm down before doing any emotion coaching…, Christine Carter | 12:03 pm, March 23, 2009 | Link. I’m looking forward to sharing your site with his godmother and to reading more of your blogs. With that said, you can imagine all the various disciplinary actions and efforts I’ve had to make to find something that worked for him on a consistant basis. http://www.handinhandparenting.org/about/parenting-by-connection.html Moves are made to problem solve and engage in solution-focused strategies. We do not X. I’m already engaged, so no reason to try to parent ‘from across the room’ (where big empty threats usually come in, IMHO). This is based on the work of Gottman and colleagues (Gottman et al, 1996), who argued that traditional behaviourist approaches ignored the internal experience of the child and only offered external frameworks without helping the child to manage their […] Emotion coaching raises kids who are more emotionally intelligent and better at regulating their emotions. From a few seconds of feeling our child’s state directly we will be much more able to empathize and naturally respond in a way that is loving and effective. Son (crawls into my lap) He shook his head silently. Natasha | 12:12 pm, March 23, 2009 | Link, I have a question on another topic — electronic games and luxury cell phones. Ignore your child if he or she throws a tantrum. Emotion Coaching starts by recognizing your child’s feelings. Wow, you are really loving that book!). Consider seeking professional help if you find that a particular emotional range creates crisis reactions in you as a parent (including chemical dependency or addiction to self-medicate around those emotions), or if you find yourself unable to identify or relate to certain feelings. Son:  “Yeah…” Have fewer infectious illnesses. You’ll also become more attuned to her emotions, and perhaps able to preempt some of her meltdowns by helping her identify what she is feeling before her emotions get so big. Sarah is a GP and has extensive experience working in CAMHS. Instead of dealing with the bad behavior right away (time out!) You can do so by transforming “BUT to BECAUSE”. I don’t agree with David. I have two…Devon and Kyle. Etc. The trick for us is that although I am using a time-out here, and may even call it a time-out, it’s mostly designed to remove him from the situation long enough to get him calm enough that he won’t fight against anything and everything I do. Ask yourself these five questions when setting 2021 goals. Do not fail to carry out a punishment when it’s called for. ?”) Asking her to do a routing chore – emptying her lunch box or setting the table got no positive response either. Yale hired a head coach; Harvard did not. Say Molly is feeling bad because she got into some trouble at school for talking too much in class (no idea where she might have gotten that tendency). I am very sad and very cross and I want them round NOW! !” (said while red in the face and wild-eyed). That, IMHO, is totally valid. I also did a video on screen time that gives a little more information, here: http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/half_full/?p=494, Christine Carter | 4:28 pm, March 23, 2009 | Link, Karli, Finally, help your child solve the problem. I believe this technique is working for two reasons, his outbursts are so far apart at this point that he’s bordering on ‘typical’ if you will in his reactions and he’s also learning – well it appears that he’s learning- to handle a stressful situation in a much more acceptable fashion. It is true, there are many parenting issues that need to be adressed but The Greater Good has a specific focus and a specific audience (most likely unintentionally in terms of the audience). Emotion coaching has been researched for decades by Dr. John Gottman, a clinical psychologist out of the University of Washington. So, why not do the same things with ourselves? They take time to see things from the child's perspective, and make the child feel understood and respected. Feelings are okay and no one should be judged or criticized for feeling a certain way. The three steps below are adapted from Gottman's book Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child, which I can't recommend highly enough. I have also validated how Molly has been feeling: she knows I think it is okay to have felt all those "bad" things. In other words, don’t say, “Why can’t you be more like your sister?” Best to you. We also need to emotion coach our kids. Problem-solving and skills-building prevent more down the road than consequences, as far as I’m aware (research-wise). So the approach of ‘follow this process’ doesn’t compute very well. Thank you! Hi Liz, :: Fine line for me, here – if I smile, and my child likes to see me smile, is that a bribe? The plan is under revision right now, but our vision and mission remain the same. ), Step one (SAY WHAT YOU SEE) is to describe what you see, looking at it from the child’s perspective. Here’s the description of the approach: Problem solve/Brainstorm (or 5, then 4), Julia | 11:57 pm, September 28, 2009 | Link, Julia, your post was very helpful! All said, i always learn alot from your posts. Hi Christine, He studies factors that help or harm relationships. If you follow the emotion coaching process, you will find out about that, quite clearly. Step Two: Deal with the Bad Behavior (if applicable) We talked about how sad and lonely she felt doing her work alone when the other kids were working together, and how embarrassed she felt by being singled out. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t communicate with them when they are able to communicate. :: Maintain your own emotional function as a baseline for ensuring you don’t require your children to pick up your emotional burdens. Do not threaten punishments you are unwilling or incapable of carrying out. So, David, speaking to you (as well as trying to highlight how this may function for other readers): There are a lot of do/don’t issues listed in your comment that are barriers to good parenting. There is a light at the end of the emotional outburst tunnel — but it doesn’t mean that there will no longer be emotional outbursts! ", Molly: "YES!! The approach is called “Parenting By Connection” The Executive Director, Patty Wipfler has been doing this for over 20 years and her work has transformed many situations in my life being a mother of a 4 year old and 7 year old. So I may react angrily, recognize (out loud) that I’m reacting, and then give myself a ‘time out’ to calm down, and follow that with reflecting why I reacted that way, and how to help myself manage my process better the next time. etc. David | 6:48 pm, November 20, 2009 | Link, Natasha | 11:29 pm, November 20, 2009 | Link. – a baby who smiles back when you smile at her, – a 1-year-old who expresses emotions to communicate basic needs, like crying to indicate he has a wet diaper, –a 2-year old who communicates needs with both emotions and body language, –a 3-year old who tries to share her feelings with you verbally Don’t fight or argue with your spouse in front of the children if it’s the kind of thing that would frighten the average child. My son is on the Autism Spectrum – really unidentified absolutely in terms of where exactly he falls, but he is high functioning. (“WHAT!?? I love this website and I love that you are bringing the work of parenting into the forefront, as just that…work, and a job that is hard, important, and rewarding. Absolute lines are not useful, IMHO – a process of discovery that gets to the bottom of the situation and develops skill and function is, IME, much more effective than a cookie-cutter approach. :: See above. I tell her that she needs to go to her room and have a 5 minute time-out, and I make it clear that these behaviors are not okay: "It is okay to feel angry and frustrated, but it is never okay to throw things or call people mean names. I do agree with the Hand in Hand folks that establishing a connection first (“collecting your child” in Gordon Neufeld’s language) is key. Responsibility for one’s actions is required. I have some empathy for David, because the structure of the information doesn’t translate well for him. One thing we at Hand in Hand add to the approach you describe above comes before Step One. rather than “don’t throw your pajamas on the floor” we say “please put your pajamas in the laundry.”). If I say to my daughter, ‘You seem sad/angry’ at least half the time she will say ‘no I’m NOT!’ (in a furious manner). Once he’s calmed down he searches me out and we get back to where ever we were before the outburst. In fact, one of the parenting strategies we are often told about is that, rather than simply tell our kids not to do something, we tell them to do something else (i.e. Inappropriate behaviours are not condoned in Emotion Coaching and when the child is calmer, incidents are discussed in a more rational and productive manner. 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