Lost at School: Why Our Kids with Behavioral Challenges are Falling Through the Cracks and How We Can Help Them - Couverture souple

"No one in America has thought more deeply about the problems of disruptive children in school than Ross Greene. In his brilliant new book, he goes inside the minds of children and school personnel to explain why old-fashioned school discipline and Zero Tolerance policies have failed. Then he offers original and tested new strategies for working with the most behaviorally challenging children. Every teacher and administrator who has ever felt that traditional discipline isn't working should read Lost in School." -- Dr. Michael Thompson, school consultant, co-author, Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys and author, Best Friends/Worst Enemies: Understanding the Social World of Children

"We cannot ignore difficult student behaviors any longer. Dr. Greene's book is a timely contribution to the literature on how schools must support ALL students, and his approach fits well with Response to Intervention (RTI)." -- Rachel Brown-Chidsey, Ph.D., NCSP Associate Professor, School Psychology Program, University of Southern Maine, coauthor, Response to Intervention: Principles and Strategies for Effective Practice

"In his new and dynamic book Dr. Ross Greene presents an innovative and field-tested approach to understanding and guiding troubled students. He encourages and challenges the reader to recognize that the child HAS a problem as opposed to the widely-held view that the child IS a problem. Dr. Greene gives a voice to a group of children who are often misunderstood and miseducated. He provides invaluable information and insights that will enable you to give challenging kids the care that they need and deserve. Those kids -- and the adults who care for them -- are in Dr. Greene's debt." -- Richard D. Lavoie, M.A., M.Ed., author, It's So Much Work To Be Your Friend: Helping the Child with Learning Disabilities Find Social Success and The Motivation Breakthrough: 6 Secrets to Turning On the Tuned-out Kid

"Dr. Greene removes all doubt: Even with challenging kids, rewards and punitive 'consequences' can (and should) be replaced with collaborative problem-solving. Lost at School is a detailed and immensely practical guide whose approach makes much more sense than behavior management plans and other tactics of control. It's hard to imagine any educators, counselors, or parents who wouldn't benefit from reading this book. And their kids will benefit even more." -- Alfie Kohn, author of Beyond Discipline and Punished by Rewards

"A positive and practical approach for teachers who want to work to redemptively with kids whose classroom behavior is an impediment to academic and social success." -- Carol Ann Tomlinson, Ed.D., Curry School of Education, University of Virginia

From a distinguished clinician, pioneer in working with behaviorally challenging kids, and author of the acclaimed The Explosive Child comes a groundbreaking approach for understanding and helping these kids and transforming school discipline.

Frequent visits to the principal's office. Detentions. Suspensions. Expulsions. These are the established tools of school discipline for kids who don't abide by school rules, have a hard time getting along with other kids, don't seem to respect authority, don't seem interested in learning, and are disrupting the learning of their classmates. But there's a big problem with these strategies: They are ineffective for most of the students to whom they are applied.

It's time for a change in course.

Here, Dr. Ross W. Greene presents an enlightened, clear-cut, and practical alternative. Relying on research from the neurosciences, Dr. Greene offers a new conceptual framework for understanding the difficulties of kids with behavioral challenges and explains why traditional discipline isn't effective at addressing these difficulties. Emphasizing the revolutionarily simple and positive notion that kids do well if they can, he persuasively argues that kids with behavioral challenges are not attention-seeking, manipulative, limit-testing, coercive, or unmotivated, but that they lack the skills to behave adaptively. And when adults recognize the true factors underlying difficult behavior and teach kids the skills in increments they can handle, the results are astounding: The kids overcome their obstacles; the frustration of teachers, parents, and classmates diminishes; and the well-being and learning of all students are enhanced.

In Lost at School, Dr. Greene describes how his road-tested, evidence-based approach -- called Collaborative Problem Solving -- can help challenging kids at school.

His lively, compelling narrative includes:

• tools to identify the triggers and lagging skills underlying challenging behavior.

• explicit guidance on how to radically improve interactions with challenging kids -- along with many examples showing how it's done.

• dialogues, Q & A's, and the story, which runs through the book, of one child and his teachers, parents, and school.

• practical guidance for successful planning and collaboration among teachers, parents, administrations, and kids.

Backed by years of experience and research, and written with a powerful sense of hope and achievable change, Lost at School gives teachers and parents the realistic strategies and information to impact the classroom experience of every challenging kid.