Infancy is considered to be a free from care time of life. The truth is, however, is that many children and adolescents experience emotional and behavioral difficulties that are real and painful rising up.
Students with emotional behavioral disorder (EBD) often have difficulty integrating into the mainstream education environment
and are frequently placed in exclusionary settings that offer greater behavioral support than general education settings.
Students with EBD are more likely to be placed in restrictive settings than youth with any other disability classification. Emotional Behavior Disorders
Defining EBD or identifying Normal behavior is influenced by various factors:
* Our personal beliefs, standards, and values contribute to our perceptions of others and their behaviors.
* Our tolerance for certain behaviors varies with our standards and values and level of emotional fitness at the time the behaviors are exhibited.
Emotionally and behaviorally disordered children are, by definition, challenged with serious problems to overcome. They include physiological abnormalities (genetically transmitted or acquired), chaotic home environments, and school environments that are often inconsistent. The behavioral repertoires of almost all these children are inadequate to deal effectively with such challenging circumstances. school psychologists, teachers, and others who work with such children are faced with difficult decisions each day. In our research, it has come to Arthur and I that different professionals view EBD in different ways by means of treatment plans which are merely shaped by the professionals training, their experience, and their philosophy about the prognosis of a childs disorder.
Over the years, the Federal government estimated that two percent of the schooled-age population was emotionally disturbed. Only one percent of the school population is actually identified as emotionally disturbed for special education purposes. The federal government estimates that 3-5% of the school age population is emotionally disturbed. One percent of the school population is actually identified with EBD for special education purposes and many students are not receiving services.
Juvenile delinquency and conduct disorder present problems in estimating prevalence. About one-third U.S youths are referred to a juvenile court in any given year. Disabling conditions of various kinds are much more common among juvenile delinquents than among the general population. Viewpoints differ as to whether juvenile delinquent youths should be automatically being considered to have EBD.
If schools are to address the educational problems of delinquent and antisocial children, then the number served by special education must increase dramatically. EBD in children and youths have varied tremendously because there has been no standard, reliable, screening instrument or definition.
Characteristics
Externalizing Behavior: involves striking out against others; aggressive or disruptive behavior that is observable behavior directed toward others.
Internalizing Behavior: involves mental or emotional conflicts, such as depression and anxiety.
Some researchers have found more specific disorders, but all of the more specific disorders can be located on these two primary dimensions.
A child may exhibit several behaviors associated with internalizing problems (e.g., short attention span, poor concentration) and several of those associated with externalizing problems as well (e.g., fighting, disruptive behavior, annoying others)
Comorbidity-the co-occurrence of two or more conditions in the same individual is not unusual. Strong moves have been made in some states and localities to interpret social maladjustment as conduct disorder aggressive, disruptive, antisocial behavior.
The federal government estimates that about one third of children with emotional or behavioral disorders have another disability as well.
Certain characteristics may indicate behavior disorders in relating appropriately to peers, siblings, parents, and teachers. They may also have difficulty responding to academic and social tasks as well. Most children find it difficult to maintain friendships so they seek out others like themselves. They do this because they feel unconnected to other peer groups. They have a hard time with interpersonal relationships, educational progress and life at home.
This emotions and behaviors may be influenced by genetic, neurological, or biochemical factors or by a combination of these.
Very good parents sometimes have children with serious emotional or behavioral disorders, and incompetent, neglectful, or abusive parents sometimes have children with no significant emotional or behavioral disorders. Sensitivity to childrens needs, love-oriented methods of dealing with misbehavior, and positive reinforcement (attention and praise) for appropriate behavior tends to promote desirable behavior in children.
Parents who are generally lax in disciplining their children but are hostile, rejecting, cruel, and inconsistent in dealing with misbehavior are likely to have aggressive, delinquent children. Broken, disorganized homes in which the parents themselves have arrest records or are violent are particularly likely to foster delinquency and lack of social competence.
Educators must be aware that most parents of youngsters with emotional or behavioral disorders want their children to behave more appropriately and will do anything they can to help them. These parents need support resources not blame or criticism for dealing with very difficult family circumstances.
Some children already have emotional or behavioral disorders when they begin school; others develop such disorders during their school years, perhaps in part because of damaging experiences in the classroom itself. children who exhibit disorders when they enter school may become better or worse according to how they are managed in the classroom.
The school can contribute to the development of emotional problems in several rather specific ways. For instance, teachers might be insensitive to childrens individuality, perhaps requiring a mindless conformity to rules and routines.
Educators and parents alike might hold too high or too low expectations for the childs achievement or conduct, and they might communicate to the child who disappoints them that the child is inadequate or undesirable.
Discipline in the school might be too lax, too rigid, or inconsistent. Instruction might be offered in skills for which the child has no real or imagined use.
The school environment might be such that the misbehaving child is rewarded with recognition and special attention (even if that attention is criticism or punishment), whereas the child who behaves properly is ignored.
Finally, teachers and peers might be models of misconduct the child might misbehave by imitating them. Teachers must ask themselves questions about their academic instruction, expectations, and approaches to behavior management.
The patterns of behavior that signal problems for the preschool child are those that bring them into frequent conflict with, or keep them aloof from, their parents or caretakers and their siblings or peers. Many children who are referred to clinics for disruptive behavior when they are seven to twelve years of age showed clear signs of behavior problems by the time they were three or four or even younger.
In summary to early intervention, a behavioral approach implies defining and measuring the childs behaviors and rearranging the environment to teach and support more appropriate conduct. It is possible to identify at an early age those children who are at high risk for emotional or behavioral disorders.
These children exhibit extreme aggression or social withdrawal and may be socially rejected or identify with deviant peers. They should be identified as early as possible, and their parents and teachers should learn how to teach them essential social skills and how to manage their problem behavior using positive, nonviolent procedures.
If children with emotional or behavioral disorders are identified very early and intervention is sufficiently comprehensive, intense, and sustained, then there is a good chance that they can recover and exhibit developmentally normal patterns of behavior.
Nevertheless, research suggests that in practice, early intervention typically does not occur. In fact, intervention does not usually begin until the child has exhibited an extremely disabling pattern of behavior for several years.
If children with emotional or behavioral disorders are identified very early and intervention is sufficiently comprehensive, intense, and sustained, then there is a good chance that they can recover and exhibit developmentally normal patterns of behavior.
Nevertheless, research suggests that in practice, early intervention typically does not occur. In fact, intervention does not usually begin until the child has exhibited an extremely disabling pattern of behavior for several years.
The understanding and support of professionals can have a profound and positive impact. They need effective tools to use, appropriate resources for support, and assurance that they and their child are accepted. Professionals and families must carefully evaluate a childs behaviors. The focus must be on promoting positive behavior and preventing challenging behaviors.
When intervention is needed, such services must be development, individual, and culturally appropriate. Families should be considered as integral participants to all decisions related to the planning and strategies of available services.
Prevention in children may well engage in challenging behavior that quite often can be eliminated by a change in adult behavior. It is possible that the child is reacting to lack of attention from an adult or unrealistic expectation.
By changing adult behavior, we may prevent a childs need to engage in challenging behavior.
Prevention means that the important adults in the childs life have to look at the childs behavior in the classroom, home, or community setting in which these places might be maintaining the childs challenging behavior.
relaxation: calm yourself with music, reading or by practicing specific relaxation techniques such as meditation or yoga. Diet: low in fat, high in carbohydrates, particularly fresh fruits and vegetables. Avoid caffeine and alcohol. Communicate: share your concerns and goals with your loved ones. exercise: exercise on a regular basis to trigger the release of endorphin to enhance your mood and self-esteem.
Some Effective Strategies:
G Systematic, database interventions (interventions that are applied systematically and consistently and that are based on reliable research data, not unsubstantiated theory).
Provision for practice of new skills (skills are not taught in isolation but are applied directly in everyday situations through modeling, rehearsal, and guided practice).
Multi component treatment as many different interventions as are necessary to meet the multiple needs of students (e.g., social skills training, academic remediation, medication, counseling or psychotherapy, and family treatment or parent training)
Programming for transfer and maintenance interventions designed to promote transfer of learning to new situations, recognizing that quick fixes nearly always fail to produce generalized change.
Commitment to sustained intervention interventions designed with the realization that many emotional or behavioral disorders are developmental disabilities and will not be eliminated.
Individualized education plan (IEP) IDEA requires an IEP to be drawn up by the educational team for each exceptional child; the IEP must include a statement of present educational performance, instructional goals, educational services to be provided, and criteria and procedures for determining that the instructional objectives are being met. Treatment matched to the problem (interventions that are designed to meet the needs of individual students and their particular life circumstances, not general formulas that ignore the nature, complexity, and severity of the problem).
Functional Behavior Assessment (FBA) Evaluation that consists of finding out the consequences (what purpose the behavior serves), antecedents (what triggers the behavior), and setting events (contextual factors) that maintain inappropriate behaviors; this information can help teachers plan educationally for student. Positive Behavior Support (PBS) Systematic use of the science of behavior to find ways of supporting desirable behavior of an individual rather than punishing the undesirable behavior; positive reinforcement (rewarding) procedures that are intended to support a students appropriate or desirable behavior.
Under the law, FBA means that educators attempt to determine and alter factors that account for the students misconduct. Apparently, the intent of the law is to require teachers to assess the students behavior in ways that lead to the selection of effective intervention strategies.
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