Helping The Behaviorally Challenging Child
PROGRAMS
Parenting Programs
Our parenting (caregiver) program has four components: the Introductory Parent Training, the Role Play Workshop, an ongoing Parent Support Group, and Individualized Education Plan Coaching. All four program offerings are available year-round and are run by individuals that have been specifically trained and certified in the CPS approach. Class sizes are limited to facilitate participation and optimize learning. Courses are primarily offered in-person but are also available via live video conferencing. The Introductory Parent Training consists of 12 hours of group training plus a 1-hour individual coaching session. Participants are provided with visuals and other materials to support their learning and are strongly encouraged to take advantage of home-learning opportunities between sessions. Objectives of the Introductory Parent Training are as follows: • Consideration of the philosophical underpinnings of the Collaborative Problem Solving®(CPS) approach. • Discussions on how traditional approaches to address maladaptive behavior have been ineffective for people with moderate to severe social, emotional, behavioral, and life challenges. • Identify how the Collaborative Problem Solving®(CPS) approach assesses challenges in living. • Begin to see challenging behavior as a by-product of lagging skills vs. will. • Begin identifying a highly specific list of problems to be solved in living. • Identify key cognitive skills necessary for handling demands that life puts in front of us. • Identify the steps necessary to be effective at Collaborative Problem Solving® and what goals the Collaborative Problem Solving® process accomplishes. • Identify where cognitive skills are taught in the Collaborative Problem Solving® process. The second offering within our program is the 4-week Role Play Workshop. Research has shown that the effectiveness of CPS increases when implemented with fidelity. As such, the Role Play Workshop is a perfect complement to the Introductory Parent Training. It provides individuals with prior exposure to CPS an opportunity to practice learned skills in a small group setting. During each 90-minute session of the workshop, participants role-play the use of Collaborative Problem Solving® (CPS) to address a specific challenge impacting their child. Participants are also given tools to practice utilizing CPS between sessions. By the end of the last session, participants will have identified a specific problem to be solved, hypothesized about the underlying lagging skills, understood their child’s concerns, articulated their own concerns, and engaged in a collaborative discussion with their child to durably solve the problem. The third offering within our caregiver program is the Parent Support Group. The Parent Support Group provides a non-judgmental forum for caregivers of behaviorally challenging children to connect with one another to feel supported and understood. We help caregivers shed feelings of shame and isolation often associated with raising a challenging child. It is also a forum for receiving ongoing support for implementing CPS in the home. Our fourth offering is Individualized Education Plan Coaching. Under this program, we coach parents to become more effective advocates for their children’s behavioral support needs within academic settings. We collaborate with parents, teachers, and specialists to determine appropriate behavior related goals and design effective behavior intervention plans that reflect the CPS philosophy. The curriculum for our programs is based upon the Collaborative Problem Solving® (CPS) model developed by the Department of Psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital. CPS is a neuroscience-based, trauma-informed paradigm for addressing challenging behavior in children and youth. It is based on the premise that behavior is communication. Further, challenging behavior arises from skill deficits in the following areas: language and communication, attention and working memory, cognitive flexibility, emotional and self-regulation, and social skills. In other words, behavior is a matter of “skill, not will.” CPS is a structured problem-solving approach which provides opportunities to practice and therefore develop the five key skill areas noted above. Our program participants receive in-depth training to assess skill deficits then identify and predict situations which are likely to precipitate challenges as a result of the identified skill deficits. Participants are also trained to prioritize which challenges to address first and create an intervention plan. Finally, they are guided through the process of working collaboratively with the child to create durable solutions.
The approach we use produces positive, evidence-based results. According to research published by Massachusetts General Hospital, CPS has demonstrated numerous positive outcomes for the families served, including 73% reduction in oppositional behaviors during school, 74% average reduction in the use of seclusion, 25% reduction in school office referrals, 71% fewer self-inflicted injuries, significant improvement in children’s executive functioning skills, measurable reduction in teacher and parent stress, and marked improvements in parent-child relationships and emotional well-being. Most importantly, CPS is an effective intervention for children and youth who do not respond positively to conventional behavior management approaches. Unlike traditional models of discipline that assume maladaptive behaviors are best remedied with force or extrinsic motivators, the CPS approach taught by our program avoids the use of power, control, or imposed systems of rewards and consequences to compel compliance; instead, it focuses on teaching and developing skills that at-risk youth need to succeed.
Data collected within our own agency also reveal positive results. Program outcomes are evaluated using self-report measures developed by Drs. Lu Wang and Alisha R. Pollastri of Think:Kids, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School. The self-report measures have been named the Collaborative Problem Solving Adherence & Impact Measures (CPS-AIMs), and they provided data regarding the efficacy and sustainability of Collaborative Problem Solving® (CPS).
Our programs support youth through a structured process scaffolded by adults. As such, the first measurable outcome focused on the efficacy of the program itself to effectively communicate the principles of CPS to its participants, who will require a solid foundation in the CPS model to utilize the model accurately and consistently in their crucial support of their children. This iss measured using a 7-point Likert scale in which a higher score indicates greater adherence to the model’s “skill not will” philosophy. By leaning into the philosophy, caregivers are able to understand their children’s behavior as a reflection of lagging neurocognitive skills. On this measure, during a recent measurement period, participants demonstrated a 1.6 point, or 52%, favorable increase after completing our 6-week program.
The second measurable outcome assessed the perceptions of caregivers regarding their personal competency and capacity to apply the CPS model effectively. Specifically, the measure captures the level of predictability of their child’s behavior. Like the first measure, caregivers’ self-reported ability to predict their child’s behavior and competently apply the model is measured using a 7-point Likert scale. On this measure, participants demonstrated a 1.59 point, or 48%, favorable increase after completing our 6-week program.
The third measurable outcome focuses on the perceived stress levels of the caregivers who participated in our programs. Also measured using a 7-point Likert scale, participants reported a 0.93 point, or 39%, reduction in self-reported stress levels. Impressively, our parenting course participants reported a 92% increase in how often they work collaboratively with their child to help their child meet expectations, as opposed to resorting to consequences as a means of compelling compliance.
With respect to our Individualized Education Plan Coaching program, participants reported an increase in their ability to secure special education services for their child(ren). They also reported a decline in suspensions and other punitive consequences experienced at school.
CONTACT
Helping The Behaviorally Challenging Child
145 W. Main Street
Suite 260
Tustin, California 92780
Elisa Brown