Dr. Ross Greene – How to solve problems with kids instead of trying to fix their behavior

1. About Dr. Ross Greene
2. Why you need to listen to your child’s concerns instead of asking them about their behavior
3. What to do when your young child is having trouble meeting your expectations
4. The best time to discuss unmet expectations with your child (and when not to have these conversations)
5. Why punishment or “consequences” don’t work
6. How lagging skills can explain bad behavior, and how to teach your child these skills
7. The most important parenting mentality
8. Action steps

Ross W. Greene, Ph.D., is the New York Times bestselling author of the influential books The Explosive Child, Lost at School, Lost and Found, and Raising Human Beings.

He is the originator of the model of care described in those books, now called Collaborative & Proactive Solutions (CPS).

Dr. Greene was on the faculty at Harvard Medical School for over 20 years and is now founding director of the non-profit Lives in the Balance, which provides a vast array of free, web-based resources on the CPS model.

He has appeared in a wide range of media, including The Oprah Show, Good Morning America, The Morning Show, National Public Radio, Mother Jones magazine, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, and the Boston Globe. Dr. Greene lectures and consults widely throughout the world and lives in Portland, Maine.

You can find more about Dr. Ross Greene at his website.

Dr. Greene shares how to talk to your child when they are having a recurring problem meeting one of your expectations (like sitting at table during dinner).

Sue Meintjes: What are the practical steps that we can take to help our kids meet these expectations? How can we as parents help our kids meet these unmet expectations?

Dr. Ross Greene: Well, we can ask them what’s hard about meeting the expectation, and then we often hear things we didn’t know anything about. Then it also becomes clear why these solutions we’ve been imposing wouldn’t address what’s really getting in the kids’ way.

Sue Meintjes: That makes sense. We have this situation with our 4-year-old daughter, who doesn’t want to sit down for dinner. Last night she ended up not eating her dinner because she didn’t want to sit down, and it turned into a big emotional conflict between us and her.

Dr. Ross Greene: Quite simply, the first thing I would think about is “Do you think she’s capable of sitting on her chair during dinner?”

If your answer is no, then my next question would be “Then why do you have that expectation?”

If your answer is yes, then I would find a time for you and your daughter to sit down and for you to talk with her and learn about what’s hard for her about meeting a particular expectation, namely sitting at the table during dinner.

That’s what you do.

If you think about it, many of the problems our children have are recurring and predictable. Here Dr. Greene shares why these problems should be identified and solved proactively.

Sue Meintjes: And this discussion has to happen when she is calm, not while the problem is occurring?

Dr. Ross Greene: Absolutely. Otherwise, you’re in the heat of the moment and that’s not going to go as well.

Sue Meintjes: Ok. So, it is all about looking at why our children are having difficulty meeting the expectations, and then how we can collaboratively solve these problems along with our children?

Dr. Ross Greene: You got it.

Sue Meintjes: Do you have tips for what parents can do to make this easier, especially in the heat of the moment when emotions are running high?

Dr. Ross Greene: Well, the best thing you can do is not have these conversations in the heat of the moment. That’s when emotions are running high.

One of the things we’re doing in this model is we’re having parents make a list of every expectation a child is having difficulty reliably meeting. And that makes those problems predictable. And that means that those problems can be solved proactively. And that means that we’re very good at helping parents get out of the heat of the moment.

If it does happen, we might say something like “Oops. Looks like there’s something going on that I didn’t know about. Tell me what’s going on.”

You can do it in the heat of the moment, it’s just not ideal. Our goal is to get people out of the heat of the moment.

Sue Meintjes: What do you think about consequences? For example, part of our problem last night was that we have a rule that if you don’t sit in your chair, you don’t get dessert. But it feels like that is making the situation worse instead of better.

Dr. Ross Greene: Well, that that’s because consequences don’t solve problems. They only modify behavior, and you’ve just heard what I would suggest instead of doing that.

Why collaboratively and proactively solving problems with your child naturally teaches them the skills that they are lacking (which are often the ones causing the concerning behavior in the first place).

Sue Meintjes: I really like that, and think it is a very important message. In your books, you talk about why it is important to identify lagging skills in your children. Can you share how that is important in terms of what we have spoken about?

Dr. Ross Greene: Lagging skills explain why a kid is responding so poorly to problems and frustrations. So, it’s important to identify a kid’s lagging skills too.

The general, global skills that these kids are lacking are in the realms of flexibility/adaptability, frustration tolerance, problem solving, and emotion regulation.

Sue Meintjes: Can children learn those skills, or is it rather a matter of brain development and maturity?

Dr. Ross Greene: I think that those skills can be improved, yes. Things can always be better.

But when you are solving problems collaboratively and proactively with kids, those skills are being practiced, modeled, and enhanced. So, you may actually not need to do any additional skills training beyond solving problems collaboratively and proactively.

All of that is in the context of solving problems collaboratively and proactively.

Sue Meintjes: Before we wrap-up, is there anything else that you want to share with parents?

Dr. Ross Greene: Sure. The mentality of the CPS model is “kids do well if they can.” That is very different than “kids do well if they want to.”

If this kid could do well, this kid would do well. And that’s the most important mentality for parents and other caregivers to have.