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I know there are some parents familiar with this approach and I had a few questions.

I registered for an intensive five part on-line course in the Nutured Heart Approach.

The course was supposed to be available tomorrow but now the release has been delayed and the course won't be available until later in the month.

I was hoping to be familiar with the program earlier because next week I am meeting with my son's teacher to discuss the upcoming school year.

Can the strategies in the Nutured Heart Approach be used the classroom? If so, what suggestions could I make? I should note, they are willing to work with us and try different things with him. Coming to the meeting with suggestions won't put them on the defensive.

It absolutely can work in school...in fact I have a sheet of elem, middle and high school samples of credit systems and potential school rewards. The first and foremost caveat of the approach is "stand #1: I refuse to be drawn into energizing energy". Essentially, that you will not reward a child with strong emotions and reactions for their misbehavior. Glasser believes children are fascinated with our reactions....and will evoke them to get our "energy". Instead, he asks parents to take stand #2: "I refuse not to pull the child into success", by actively recognizing them in everydsy actions, by naming positive qualities, and by giving s pay-off when rules are not broken. Glasser suggests a credit system, point system where a child earn points for following rules, extra positive choices and completing chores. The points are cashed in for
things like Tv time, allowance, and special outings. Stand #3: "Here are the rules and here's what happens" is the final part. Glasser suggests time-outs given while a parent stays completely neutral...possibly followed by bigger consequences for bigger midbehavior. The trick is take away the energy payoff a child normally gets from misbehaving.

I can send you the credit chart if you PM me.

BTW...I think this approach is REALLY hard yo maintain longterm. Who wants to live by chart forever? I suggest getting familiar with 123 Magic as well. Glasser does not want parents to give warnings before consequences (especially energized and SHOUTED warnings). But I think the downfall of his system is that some kids are so extraordinarily impulsive that they cannot always catch themselves. I see this with my son who may do or begin any number of idiotic things (ride the dog, wash his hands in his water glass, float food in the dog's water bowl to test its buoyancy) merely because it seemed like a good idea right at the moment he conceived it. Giving nuetral warning counts helps him give pause to think things through and self-correct. But if I get emotional...then they payoff IS the counting.

123 Magic was suggested by a psychologist for my son. It's worked pretty well, and is a very simple system to use. We like it.

We ordered the Difficult Child seminar on DVD and will be watching it soon. I'm interested to hear what you think of their online workshop!

I have ordered the transforming the difficult child workbook, but I didn't know about the reward system.

I also don't believe that reward systems are ideal long-term, because the reward always needs to get bigger to have the same impact. It also means that you are creating false consequences for actions, as opposed to your child learning to make their own choices and accept the natural consequences that life offers for this. This way also gives the child the space to practice making choices and learning from their mistakes, which is something that my perfectionist control freak really is struggling with - but he is thriving with this approach. It's a lot harder and longer this way round, but I am seeing results slowly but surely that let me know my child is starting to consider possibilities before doing, that he is starting to recognise real life consequences without me imposing on his ability to choose for himself.

I do agree with the idea of not energising negative situations though - yelling, shouting, screaming, emotionally charged verbalising is not helpful, nor does it engender learning or co-operative behaviour. It also doesn't demonstrate the behaviours that you want your child to internalise and do - our example is more powerful than our words.

I look forward to getting the workbook and working through the rest of it.

Hey,
I know there is a lot of advice out there, but what has worked very well for us (at home) is a pretty much common-sense technique explained and taught by Positive Parenting Solutions (available online, and recommended by one of a long string of psychologists--the string is for various reasons). This is the basic idea we follow and it works great for DD8--you give the kid a choice whenever possible, discuss (or remind) what will happen with each choice, lay out the consequences of making a 'bad' choice, and let the natural/logical consequences follow! However, you *must* follow through promptly. We have done this and it has really helped give DD a sense of autonomy and responsibility, although it is definitely an ongoing process. But the technique seems to fit with us, and her.
Best of luck,
Dbat

We use this approach, but we only used the credit system for about 4 months. Lots of families never use the credit system.

The key is to energetically recognize all the small successes. Lots of gifted parents have enough perfectionism and intensity going that this isn't easy. But that's what makes it so powerful.

This approach never aims to eliminate kids from doing stupid things. So there is no need to give warnings because the goal isn't to prevent all misbehavior. The goal is to help the child develop inner resources so that they slow down and thing things through without adult guidance.

The 'punishment' is a really brief 'moment of reflection.' It was really hard for me to get in the habit of saying 'Stop' to my kid, because I remembered so vividly how much I hated being said 'Stop' to as a kid. But I have learned, slowly, how to say 'Reset' - which sort of means, 'You have crossed a line. Cease this behavior now. Recenter yourself.' And my son has learned to do this. Now I don't even say anything, I just break eyecontact, and he recenters.

What I particularly love is that I don't have to tell him what he boundary he crossed. He can figure that out himself. How cool is that?

My guess, Evemomma, is that what you call a warning is functioning very similarly to what I would call a reset. It sounds like it's working for you so that's great. You are keeping yourself from getting emotional over the negative stuff, and I'll bet you are giving the emotional payoff when the behavior is good. So to me, that's the heart of 'Transforming.'
Smiles,
Grinity

KJP - I'm so disappointed to hear that the Intensive will be delayed.
It can be used in the classroom, but I wouldn't ask the school to use it until you have it up and running at home. Not sure why, exactly.

If you have observed that your child needs a lot more positive energetic specific praise than other kids, tell them that.
If you have observed that your child 'gets a thrill' out of the emotional charge of negative attention, give an example, and ask them to make the negatives emotion-fee as possible.

Meanwhile - just keep noticing all the stuff your kid is doing right. You can say it aloud if you feel confident, or just smile and enjoy it in your mind. Our kids are supersensitive so just enjoying them quietly can be the right place to start. You don't have to wait for the online course. Start now! We'll help!

Smiles,
Grinity

What I really got out of it is that you're not trying to make them "behave next time", you're never going to give that one lecture or make that one punishment so memorable that they "think about it next time". What you are going to do is halt the spiral that humans tend to do after they mess up and you're going to make it a family habit on the parents side.
The reward system, I really butchered it, and it worked for a while and really gave us a good conversation starter for my husband's main gripe with the boy, which was, "you don't do what I say and yet you want me to do something when you ask". My butchery was that I made two coin purses and gave Wyatt eight quarters. If he Messed up I took one of his pieces of eight. If he had five pieces of eight he could ask for anything and maybe I'd say yes, maybe I'd say no. (play outside, go to the park, watch tv). If he had less than five pieces of eight the answer is "no". They get replaced every night unless he goes lower than 3 pieces left in which case he does something to earn them back.

I quit doing this because the book says don't do a credit system that takes away from the kid, I'm trying to figure out how to simplify the system in the book. Jack's mom posted a good system where you give a coin for every random increment (30 min) of time spent in good behavior, which is traded for tv, park, etc. That is more in line with TNH. I want to get more in line with the system because it's easy to share with other adults. The hubby liked the pieces of eight. When I explained the pieces of 8 to a neighbor (who asked how I discipline) he said i was grounding.

La Tex
Do you use the 'reset?'
Are you using the recognitions?
If you are doing both of those consistently, you may not need a credit system at all.
Or you can give him a penny everytime you give a recognition, and retire the day's pennys to a big jar at bedtime. The retired pennies wouldn't need to be used for anything, just a symbol to remind him of all the good choices he's made. Or you could let him add them up to a super reward, but my understanding is that the credit system is about 2 things, mainly:
1) To remind you to use the recognitions.
2) To create within you child the idea that he is doing so many things right. This is just like why people won't litter on a beautifully manicured lawn. If a person is 'almost' at a goal, they will find it most comfortable to work hard to get to the goal. Women who are judged to be close to our current idea of physical beauty spend more money on their appearance than women who would be judged to be farther away. (Someone told me that was studied, but I haven't got a link. I'd love one though.) I think the idea is called 'Cognitive Dissonance.' So if I think I'm a thoughtful kid who does things right, I feel creepy doing something thoughtless.

It's fine to 'ground' your child from this point of view. HG says that all punishments are a form of grounding, he thinks even spanking is mostly adversive because while you are being spanked, you aren't 'on life's playing field having fun.' Time outs are obviously grounding. So are 'sit there until you write 10 times, I shall not...' And if you want to keep grounding him until he's earned his 5 pennies for his purse, that's ok because it reminds you to recognize him at least 5 times, and gets him started on the right foot. But be sure to keep up the verbal recognitions even after he's earned his eight. It's like you are giving him an eight cent daily allowance.

There are hundreds of credit systems out there. Transforming is the only parenting approach I know where they recognize that most punishments that work pretty well for regular kids to help them 'learn a lesson' teach intense kids to misbehave more. Also that intense kids act out in order to get the energy jolt that they get while being punished, so that for this to work, one HAS to provide emotionally charged positive recognitions.

Imagine a kid who has eaten nothing but junk food their whole life. Living in a house with nothing but junk food. You can't just remove the junk food and expect the child to thrive. You have to go to the store and buy healthy food and get it to the table. Even if junk food is bad for a kid, no food at all is worse.

Remember http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagger_of_the_Mind Classic Trek Episode? I remember watching it as a kid and thinking 'yes, I've experienced that.' I think that's the sort of think our kids are feeling when they decide that 'junk attention' is better than no attention.

Love and More Love,
Grinity