Some years ago, I had to work with a child with behavioural problems in one primary school. He could actually turn the whole school upside down if he wanted to. He didn’t like to stay in class, so there was alot of work that needed to be done on this young man 😊! But he was a clever kid…

How on earth was I supposed to integrate this child back into the school system when he doesn’t want to be in school? OK…read on let’s go through a summary of what happened 😉

I had to befriend him to find out what he likes and used positive reinforcement technique on him. In the sense that what he likes was used to design a reward system for him (his positive behaviour was rewarded using what he likes)… Gradually, his antisocial behaviour began to reduce, I was able to get this clever kid back into class (although he had his own separate desk and table instead of sitting with his peers but was still a plus as long as he was inside the class compared to before where he doesn’t want to be in school or in class), and other improvements followed.

*Positive reinforcement is the practise of rewarding behaviour when itoccurs in order to build or encourage a pattern of behaviour*

What is the moral of this story? Punishment might not necessarily work in all cases when dealing with some children, so as an authority figure to a child, try positive reinforcenent sometimes 😉, it could be praising them for any good behaviour you notice (exaggerate the praise sometimes like you just saw what you have never seen in your life 😁😁😁) or design a token economy for them for example they get stickers or a recorded thick (marked good) on a diary for good behaviour or for doing what they are asked to do and so on and after certain number of stickers or thick, they can get a prize, trust me with time as you continue to reward their positive behaviour the negative behaviour will gradually diminish. Listen, within every stubborn child, there is that part within him or her that wants to hear “welldone” from you and the more they hear it after showing a good behaviour, the more they want hear it regularly by exhibiting more positive behaviour..so it’s a win win situation 😊… The way I show excitement when the children get a desired result, you observing or listening to us might be watching me like “what is wrong with this woman?” Some of the short praise song that burst out of my lips when a student answer a question correctly (to express I am pleased), I have no idea where it comes from 😁😁😁… it’s not my fault, their excitement make me excited and my excitement makes them excited so it’s a win win situation for both parties involved 😉