Be consistent!

There is no point having one person doing one thing or everyone doing different things when it comes to behaviour management. As with any child who has Mum doing one thing and Dad doing the opposite, an Angel just can't resist playing one parent off against the other. The other possibility is that you will have a confused and frustrated child who is going to take it out on somebody.

Quite a lot of the things that our son or daughter does are attempts to communicate. The next time you get a slap on the face or a bite on the hand, it may be that they are trying to get your attention. As your son or daughter is unable to communicate verbally they resort to pre-verbal communication. The more you talk to your Son or daughter the more you will learn about them and HOW they communicate. You will become more intuitive in recognising their attempts to communicate and respond appropriately to them. Your Son or daughter just loves attention. You will also learn to recognise the difference between them trying to communicate and unacceptable behaviour.

Is it a medical problem?

Always ask yourself this before assuming that you are seeing a behaviour as there could be a medical reason for what you are seeing. E.g; If your son or daughter is banging their head they may be trying to overcome the pain of a toothache or earache.

Well actually you can't - you have to replace it with a more acceptable behaviour.

By using "Positive Behaviour Strategies/Intervention/Modification/Management" (they all mean more or less the same thing).

Expect to see an increase in the behaviour before things start to change

Simply put you have learnt that if you turn the kettle on it will eventually boil (provided you have enough water in it). If nothing happens what would you do? That's right you'd try again. You have just used a behaviour. There is no difference with someone who is using unacceptable behaviour - they'd just try again and again until they realised that it doesn't work anymore. Then they would try something different to try and get the same result - just like you would with the kettle.

Literally volumes have been written on this subject. Briefly it is when you teach the behaviour you want to see and reinforce it by using rewards. Remember when you were a child and got something you wanted …… after you cleaned your room? No clean room and no reward? That is Positive Behaviour Management.

Just as you won't get rich overnight, your Son or daughter may take a while to pick up the behaviour that your are teaching them. It can take a lot of patience and could even be frustrating. Some things take years for them to learn other things they pick up pretty quickly (show me an Angel who didn't learn the first time the effect of playing with the remote control for the TV or video!)

If you still feel that nothing works, now is the time to get serious and learn your ABC.

Antecedent - what happened immediately before the behaviour?

Behaviour - what it is you are observing that you want to change?

Consequence - what happened after the behaviour?

Why the need for the ABC? Because this is the sort of information that the professionals you will be dealing with, will ask for.

By following the ABC you learn to identify the signs that tell you that a behaviour is about to occur, you learn what works in changing the behaviour and the consequences that work for you.

The most useful instant quick fix to behaviours. You get your son or daughter to focus onto something else that needs them to concentrate enough so that they stop using the behaviour. Not always successful as they can be very single minded when they want to be. Diversion or re-direction is not a long-term solution to change behaviour, as it may not be able to be used everywhere, as every situation is different.

Try turning it into a game - this is a form of diversion or re-direction, however this is more positive as you've changed it into a game.

This can be used with behaviours that you know are attention seeking. It can be a big ask if you're being hit to get your attention. But if you turn away and move yourself out of reach then it hasn't worked, bet your son or daughter will try something else!

Especially in regard to assaultive behaviours. The victim is removed from the scene and a lot of fuss is made of them.

This is hard, because they are in a situation that they are not comfortable with and want to get away from it. There are even angels who despise water and will do anything to be away from it. The problem here is that they have learnt through reinforcement to dislike what is happening. How do you change that? Try other methods that make it easier for them to adapt and learn to accept what is happening as positive rather than negative. E.g; an angel who hates having their hair brushed - try water with some conditioner mixed in a spray bottle, sprayed onto the hair before brushing or combing. Try not to test their attention span for too long - keep it short and simple.

It still doesn't work.

The next step will involve a psychologist and/or a behaviour intervention program team.

Inala - Gentle Teaching for severe behaviour problems

College of William & Mary - Behavior Influence Techniques

Challenging Behavior: A Model for Breaking the Barriers to Social and Community Integration

Behavior Home Page, Kentucky

Centre for Effective Collaboration and Practice - Functional Behaviour Assessments