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SGL Notes Newsletters>
Solid Ground Learning Notes - vol. 140
February 5, 2008
As promised, here is part two of two of the Reaching
Troubled Kids newsletters.
If the traditional way of teaching doesn't work with
troubled kids, what do we do with them?
Reaching Troubled Kids - Part 2
According to Dr. Gordon Neufeld, you need to reach them
before you can teach them.
The relationship is what matters.
With a lot of patience, understanding and trust, we can
hope that the academic learning will follow. Sometimes it
doesn't because these kids have been so deeply wounded.
The primary reason these kids have stopped developing into
emergent individuals is that they have put up such huge
walls around their vulnerability.
They claim not to care . . . about anything, . . . or
anyone; however, they are fragile beings afraid of caring.
When you like someone, it sets you up for hurt.
As teachers and coaches, often when we start forming
relationships with these kids, they will try to buck us off
. . . because forming a relationship is frightening.
Dr. Gordon Neufeld points out that the behaviour problems
are just the 'tip of the iceberg'. It is a result of what
is lacking or missing in the child's functioning. It isn't
what we see, but what we don't see that tells the story.
We can only make sense of the troubled behaviour and
unrealized learning potentials when we appreciate where
these kids have become 'stuck'.
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