Connection Seekers Wanted
What are some challenging behaviors you have observed in young children? How do they make you feel? When parents and caregivers are asked these questions, they are quick to identify experiences caring for their child that seem demanding or difficult and note the feelings of stress, confusion, or overwhelm that tend to arise. How would you answer these questions?
The writer Henry David Thoreau said, “The question is not what you look at, but how you look and whether you see.”
What does that quote mean for our topic on challenging behaviors? Are we really seeing what’s going on with our child, or are we only feeling our frustration? When our own stress gets in the way, it clouds our perception, and we may react instead of respond. As we see the child more clearly, we can better acknowledge what they need and sensitively work toward meeting it. What is it that young children need most? Connection. Children need consistent, sensitive, and responsive caregiving, especially when they are upset. Each child needs an individualized approach. To better understand a child’s behavior, we can explore considerations based on their ages and stages of development and temperamental traits.
Ages & stages of development Young children progress through their ages & stages of development from infancy, toddlerhood, early childhood, school-age, and then continue onto adolescence. Be sure to care for the whole child as they are moving through developmental milestones related to the physical, social, emotional, language, intellectual, and self-help domains. Screening for healthy development is recommended.
Each of the ages and stages come with different priorities, needs, and interests. Babies are working on their ability to trust that their needs will get met. They benefit from lots of cuddling, care and comfort by consistent caregivers, and stimulation in a protected environment. Toddlers are mastering autonomy and independence. They thrive on limited choices, safe environments to explore, and warm interactions with secure adults. Preschoolers are taking greater initiative and learning how things work. They are empowered when adults provide a caring presence that supports developing self-confidence and good self-esteem in engaging activities and investigation.
Temperament Temperament is part of our personality and is present at birth. Temperament determines how a child reacts to experiences or to stimuli (sights and sounds), how they will regulate that reaction, and how others may react toward them. Recognizing a child’s individualized approach to the world can help caregivers anticipate and meet their daily needs. Temperamental traits include activity, regularity, initial reaction, adaptability, intensity, mood, distractibility, persistence-attention span, and sensory threshold. If we bundle some of these traits together, we may see different categories of temperament emerge. Children with Flexible temperament tend to be friendly and outgoing, adjusts easily to new people and routines, and accepts frustrations with little fuss. These children may benefit from encouragement to assert themselves, establish boundaries, and get needs met if they are too flexible. Those with Feisty temperament can react to frustration with tantrums, in constant movement, and have inconsistent routines, such as bedtime and eating. To support feisty children, provide them with consistency, predictability, support, and positive guidance. Be sure to stay calm and connected. The children who present with the Fearful or slow-to-warm temperament prefer to observe from the sidelines rather than actively participate, will withdraw from or quietly refuse new situations and people, and prefer consistent routines. Offer patience, time to adjust to changes, and reassurance when fearful.
Guiding from our values
How caregivers decide to guide and respond to their unique young child has a lot to do with their values and the long-term goals they want for that child. Imagine your child growing into an adult and consider the hopes you carry for their ultimate success and well-being.
What do you picture in your mind?
What skills, experiences, and knowledge do you envision them having as they reach adulthood?
Given their age and stage of development and temperament, how can you support your child in everyday moments as they learn and grow towards this cherished vision over time?
How can you be good models for what you want them to become?
How do you continue to build connection even when it’s hard?
One effective parenting practice that fosters connection during upset moments with the child is emotion coaching. The five steps of emotion coaching are:
1. Be aware of emotions (tune into your child's feelings and your own)
2. Connect with your child
3. Listen actively
4. Name emotions (label what they are feeling)
5. Find good solutions (help them problem-solve).
Although guiding a young child through their big feelings may not be easy, the benefits of cultivating trust and connection are well worth the effort!
Aoife Rose Magee, PhD, earned a doctoral degree in Special Education from the University of Oregon Early Intervention Program. Her personal and professional interests have been largely focused on the social-emotional development of young children and how positive parenting and teaching practices may contribute to healthy development, promote resiliency, and mediate risk factors. Aoife is a professional development specialist for students and practitioners in the areas of Early Childhood Education, Early Intervention/Early Childhood Special Education and Parenting Education. Aoife serves as a Master Trainer for the Oregon Registry and frequently provides community based and private workshops for early childhood educators, parenting educators, and other professionals. For more than thirty years, she worked directly with families as a parenting educator, and she is a former Oregon Parenting Education Collaborative Hub Coordinator for the Parenting Success Network. She currently teaches as a full-time faculty in the Early Childhood Education Program at Lane Community College. She is also the mother of a fantastic young adult son and enjoys nature and creative pursuits in her spare time.