How to Deal with the Needs of your Special Child

By: Dr. Noel Swanson

Listed below are concerns from parents of special needs children:

1. How do special needs children understand cause and effect and also rewards versus punishments? Do they understand the same as other children?

Strangely enough, it doesn't matter! Every living creature has an awareness of reward and punishment at some level. Take as lowly a creature as a cockroach. Roaches hate light and love darkness. Being in light is unpleasant, being in darkness is pleasant. Of course they don't use words like that - they are probably not even "conscious" of liking or not liking. But the result is the same:

If you turn on the lights you will see roaches scrambling towards darkness under a couch or a crack in the wall. They sense the light and know that a feeling of punishment is headed their way. They understand if they head towards darkness they are going towards a reward. This repeated reward makes them head for the darkness right away.

Roaches don't have a memory and can't be trained like humans can. Canines can be instructed because they have a great memory. They know, for example, if they hear the word "sit" they will sit down in order to receive a treat or reward.

The more sophisticated the creature, the better their memory and analytical skills, and the greater their awareness of time (i.e. that future events will happen) then the more complex the varieties of reward and punishment that can be used.

What reward and punishments should you dole out? Easy. Try first by experimenting with different rewards and punishments based on your own experience. Have a system of rewards and punishments that will affect your child's behavior. Make sure that you are consistent. If their behavior changes then you have accomplished your goal. If it does not then take these two things into consideration:

a) either the rewards/punishments were not sufficiently motivating (again, see the book for details) or

b) they were unable to make a connection between the behavior and the consequent reward or punishment. For example, if the time interval between behavior and consequence is too long, then the younger or less able child may not be able to connect the two.

So, when you see that your system is not working. You step back, have a think about it, modify it, and then try again. Ultimately you will either succeed in changing the behavior, or you won't. Which leads to the second question:

You have tried all of the tips you can think of and your child's behavior hasn't changed. For example, maybe your child had PDD. You are required to complete a few hours of physical therapy with your child eacy day. However, your child doesn't want to do the physical therapy.

You try everything you can think of and read the book thoroughly. You try different reward and punishment systems to no avail. You have struggled to make physical therapy appear like a fun time. No matter what you do, you are not accomplishing the physical therapy session every day.

What can you do about this? You have two choices including:

a. You could become all bent out of shape about it. You get mad at yourself for your apparent failure. You feel like you are no service to your child. You want to find the magic cure that will help your child do his physical therapy.

b. You stop and evaluate your situation. You take a deep breath and look at things practically and logically. You are okay with the fact that half the time the physical therapy session may not happen, but this is still an improvement from how much physical therapy your child was accomplishing last year.

Is (a.) or (b.) the more productive option?

The downfall of (a.) is that you will amp up your stress level which affects everyone negatively. You are not having a good time and your results won't improve this way.

The reality is that there is, perhaps, nothing on Earth that would motivate Tim to do those exercise 100% of the time. Sorry. But we live in an imperfect world, and maybe the child in the wheelchair really will never walk. We would all wish it were different. But if that is how it is, then that is how it is.

Therefore, you should pay attention to your child's specific needs. Strive to define success off of what you are provided with and not an ideal. When you do this, you will alleviate stress and the results you want will happen. If things still don't improve would you want to have: a) 1/2 performance and we are all upset? b) 1/2 performance and we are all feeling good?

Don't try to fight battles you cannnot win!

Article Source: http://www.bettergolfarticles.com

You can find many more of Dr. Noel Swanson free parenting articles on his website. While you are there, make sure you also sign up for his free newsletter: www.good-child-guide.com

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