The Trouble With Kids These Days - BC Teachers' Federation...by Gordon Neufeld Learning requires a...

SEA Magazine, Spring 2003 15

EDITOR'S NOTE:This year's keynote address at our annual conference was so wellreceived, we asked Gordon if he would mind providing us with a

written version. For those that would like an opportunity for a greaterexposure to this material, he will be offering a Week Intensive thissummer specifically designed for those who work with stuck kids.This course will be held in the Planetarium complex in Vancouver

from July 21st to 25th. Details are available on his website:www.GordonNeufeld.com. Many of us are looking forward to his

book HOLD ON TO YOUR KIDS, to be released by Knopf Publishingin January, 2004. Although directed primarily towards parents, the

principles of attachment he discusses will be equally applicable to teaching.

The TroubleWith Kids

These Daysby Gordon Neufeld

Learning requires a context – one that is natural and not just imposed from the outside. This would become obvious ifwe could strip away all that is contrived, such as the school that brings teachersand students together under the sameroof, the schedule that brings them toshare the same space at the same time,and the curriculum that governs theirinteraction. It is not enough to put anadult trained to teach into the sameroom as a child in need of learning andadd a plan, a schedule and somematerials. What is required is something natural to weave together what the

teacher is offering and what the childrequires. Unfortunately, changes insociety have put the natural contexts for learning into jeopardy. The context thatwe impose tends to camouflage the lackof a natural context and so thesefundamental deficiencies often goundetected.

As long as a viable context forlearning exists, there would be noreason to become conscious of it. Butour lack of awareness backfires whenthese contexts go missing and childrenhave trouble learning and behaving. We

16 SEA Magazine, Spring 2003

inevitably respond by teaching harderinstead of restoring a natural context for learning.

From a developmental perspective,there are four natural contexts forlearning. Three of these contexts areprovided by innate developmentalprocesses that may or may not be activein a particular child or in a particularsituation. To get a sense of thesecontexts, I would invite you to imagineyourself in a setting in which youhappened upon a child in need oflearning but had none of the contrivedstructures of education to fall backupon. I shall brieflyintroduce thesethree naturalcontexts for learning.

If the child wecame upon was toask a question of us,convey some interest in the world aroundthem, seek themeaning of someevent, try to fig uresomething out - we would have anatural context for our teachings. Thetrick would be to weave together ouranswers with their questions, ourinformation with their interests, ourexplanations with their desire to fig urethings out, our challenges with theiraspirations. Once we figured out how to do that, an even greater challengewould be to get this to happen within aschool setting. There is a more basicprob lem how ever: not all children areventuring forth intellectually and thosethat do are not always in a curious

frame of mind. Curiosity is a fruit of theemergent process - that developmentalprocess responsible for renderingchildren viable as separate beings. It is apsychological luxury not all children can afford. There must be some freedomfrom attachment hunger, sufficientfulfillment of the dependency needs,enough tolerance of vulnerability to feelsatiated, and enough security of homebase to venture forth. Many childrenhave little interest in anything that doesnot serve their attachment needs. Forsuch children, much of our teaching isirrelevant.

If the child weencountered wastrying to solve aprob lem thatrequired takingsomething else intoconsideration, ourteaching would finda context if a) thechild was capable ofcognitive dissonanceand mixed feelingsand b) the teaching

involved drawing attention to themissing element. Most learning requiresthe ability to con sid er differing aspectsor dimensions simultaneously. Whetherthe prob lem is a scientific one, a socialone, a moral one or a communicationone - the answer usually involves taking more than one thing into consideration.This is also true in making choices,discerning themes, understandingirony, pursuing fairness and in learningto cooperate. The child who wants tosolve a prob lem and is capable ofintegrative functioning provides the


teacher with an opportunity to weavetogether separate dimensions, differingperspectives, conflicting ideas oropposing dynamics. The trick is to getthis to happen on a timetable andwithin the school setting. A more basicprob lem is that not all children arecapable of mixing separate elementsinto consciousness. These children mayhave conflicting ideas or experienceopposing dynamics, but the innerconflict fails to spark any sense ofdissonance. It is true that many children develop integrativecapacities by age six but it is also true that manysixteen –year-olds stilllack it. Such children arealso intemperate inexperience andexpression, black andwhite in their thinking,impulsive in theirbehaviour, lacking inperspective, one-dimensional in theirprocessing, esoteric intheir communication and inconsiderate in theirrelating. We are forever confrontingthem with the element they did not con -sid er but to no avail. Our teaching fallson ears that are deaf to anythingperceived as different than that whichthey already know or feel. The prob lemis that the integration of separateelements requires prior differentiationor separation of those elements. This isknown as the orthogenetic principle indevelopment and applies across alldomains: biological, cognitive,emotional and social. The

nonintegrative mind provides nonatural context for helping them takesomething else into consideration.

If one should encounter a childengaged in trying to make somethingwork that isn't or trying to getsomething right but making mistakes, or if the child is frustrated in trying tomake something happen or achievesome objective - we again have an entrypoint for teaching. Our instinct in such a scenario is to point out the error of their

way or the futility of their course of action. We mayeven impose someconsequences to bringhome the point that theyare heading in the wrongdirection. Correction iswhat teachers do bestand most are very goodat it. The prob lem is thatmany children do notlearn from their mistakesor from the error of theirways. To learn from what doesn't work, futilitymust sink in. This is not acognitive process but an

emotional process, involving vulnerablefeelings that many children aredefended against. It is only whenfrustration dissolves into feelings offutility that correction takes root andconsequences bear fruit. Although thisadaptive process is innate, it can gomissing very early in life. Such childrenget stuck in the things that don't workas well as any learning disabilities thatexist. These children fail to learn fromconsequences, benefit from theirmistakes or transcend their handicaps.


They do things over and over again that do not work, persevering in theirineffective behaviour and unfruitfullearning strategies. They cannot movefrom 'mad' to 'sad', lack appropriatesadness and disappointment and fail togrieve in the wake of loss. When theadaptive process is missing, there is nocontext for correction.

When children lack adaptive,emergent and integrative functioning,not only are we deprived of threesignificant contexts for teaching, butalso they are rendered prone to a host of learning and behaviour problems,including aggression and boredom. Themost common reason for developmental arrest is for children to be defendedagainst the vulnerability of theirexperience. These defended learners can also have problems with attention andwith being invested emotionally inthings that could set them up fordisappointment. Not only do theirbrains tune out anything that wouldmake them feel vulnerable but alsodivest themselves of feelings that would engender a sense of vulnerability. Suchchildren are often taken to mutteringthings like “doesn't matter”, “I don'tcare”, “whatever”.

When children lack these naturalcontexts for learning, covering up thisvoid with schooling and schedules onlysets them and us up for frustration andfailure. It is not the school or structurethat is the prob lem but the lack of anatural context for learning to occur.Unfortunately, educators have tendedto be developmentally idealistic, simplyassuming that these contexts exist. Thetrouble with kids these days is that more

and more seem to be lacking a naturalcontext to teach. We can no longerafford this developmental idealism.

Fortunately, there is still one othercontext for learning - attachment. Infact, this context is by far the mostpowerful of all. Moreover, unlike theother three developmental contexts, this one always exists for a child in someform or another. It is the default contextfor learning, one could say, accountingfor more learning in the first four yearsof life than all of one's formal schoolingput together. The difficulty is that theattachment context is often highlyspecific and could well exclude theteacher in question. Yet, when childrenare lacking the other natural contexts for learning, this is our only hope and ourbest bet.

To reiterate, when children arenonemergent, nonadaptive andnonintegrative, they learn only forreasons of attachment or from thosethey are attached to. They are stuck inthe attachment dynamic. Everythingelse is irrelevant and psychologicallymeaningless. In other words, if a childisn't naturally engaged by ourTEACHING, he or she must at least beengaged by the TEACHER. It is notenough to be related to the child inquestion, the child must have arelationship with us. Our challenge is to cultivate this kind of connection withthe children who need it.

In other words, it is not enough to get this kind of child and a teacher into thesame room at the same time and forceinteraction. The kind of proximity thatfacilitates learning is not that which is


imposed on the child, but that which isPURSUED by the child. The pursuit ofproximity can take many forms: seeking to be with, seeking to be like, seeking tobe liked, wanting to matter to, feelingaffection for, feeling loyal towards,experiencing a sense of belonging with,wanting to be known by, desire forcontact with, seeking connection to, and so on. It is this pursuit of proximity with the teacher that provides a powerfuland potent context for learning.

Take language for example. Childrenare designed to learn totalk for reasons ofattachment and fromthose they are attachedto. The greatest influence over their language, forgood or for bad, will befrom those they seek tobe with and to be like.The greatest motivationto write for nonemergent children will also be toconnect with those theyare attached to. Whenchildren have inadequate or disordered attachments, theyinevitably exhibit some form oflanguage or communication prob lem aswell. The implications for the learning of language, but oral and written, areprofound.

Teaching through the context ofattachment is fundamentally differentthan teaching through the more maturecontexts of emergence, adaptation andintegration. When teaching theemergent child, we can allow them totake the lead with their interests andquestions and follow up with our

information and answers. Whenteaching the adaptive child, we can letthe child lead with his errors andmistakes and follow up with ourcorrection. When teaching integrativechildren, we can let them lead with oneapproach or perspective to a prob lemand then confront them with theelement not considered. When it comesto stuck kids how ever, there is nothingto follow so we must lead. And the onlyway of leading is through attachment.When children become attached to us,

their instincts are topreserve proximity withus and thus to follow.They follow by attendingto us, taking our cues forhow to act and how to be, taking our side wherethere is conflict, beingloyal to us, attempting toplease us, trying to meas -ure up to ourexpectations, conformingto our values, assumingour perspectives,preserving a connection

to us, doing our bidding and makingthings work for us. When it comes tothe context of attachment, it is theteacher who must be in the lead.

This goes contrary to some idealisticphilosophies of education - sometimeseuphemistically called child-centered -that attempt to put the child into thelead in the learning process. Thisapproach would not be such a prob lemif the child were venturing forth intolearning on his own. A stuck child isnot, no matter what his age. Theconcept of leading, how ever, is more in


keeping with the spirit of pedagogy.The word pedagogue has its roots inancient Greece and was originally theword for the one who led the childrento school. It literally means a leader ofchildren. Children only follow those they are attached to. In order to be a leader of children, one must first cultivate theprerequisite attachment and thenproceed to take the lead.

There was a time when children wholacked the more mature contexts forlearning automatically attachedthemselves to the adults in charge.Children did not need to be collected;they spontaneously attached themselves to their teachers. Only the mostunattachable teachers were left out ofthe attachment loop and renderedineffective by default. That time of self-attaching to teachers has past. For themost part, children no longerspontaneously seek their teachers tosubstitute for their parents and to act astheir psychological compass points.There has been a subtle but documented shift in the attachment patterns ofchildren in the last fifty years that isseeing them select their peers as theones they would prefer to be with andto be like. That is the trouble with kidsthese days - the ones most in need of acontext of attachment to learn are theones most reticent to attach to theirteachers or the ones most likely to berevolving around their peers. Thesechildren are not learning any less thenthe children of yesteryear, but whatthey are learning is not on anycurriculum.

The point is that stuck kids weremeant to attach to those responsible for

them and it has always been the job ofculture to make sure that this happened. Society, how ever, has taken aneconomic turn and children'sattachments have been left unprotected. Stuck kids are now sent out of theirvillages of attachment to adults theyhave had no pre vious relationship with.Stuck kids do not learn from strangersnor are they meant to learn about things that seem strange to them. Unless wecan recreate this context of attachment,our teaching will be in vain.

What has led to the unraveling ofchild-adult attachments is a subject toobig to address here. Suffice it to say thatchildren have never experienced somuch separation from their parents;families and supporting casts havenever been so small; extended familieshave never been so fragmented;relatives and teachers have never beenso inaccessible. Stuck kids cannottolerate attachment voids and move tofill it in some way or another, be it witheach other or with television or withcomputer games. Stuck kids are proneto getting stuck on each other and onceso attached, become resistant to contactand connection with their teachers.Instead of being easier to es tab lish arapport with, stuck kids are becomingmuch harder to engage.

Furthermore, today's children are notas likely to attach to the roles that aremeant to shoehorn them into society.When the identity of a child is based, inpart, from being a student, the role ofteacher and student can be interwovento pro vide a context for learning. Fewerkids attach to the role of student thesedays and so the coupling of teacher and


student often fails to take place. It ispartially because of this loss of rolerelationships that we need tocompensate by cultivating personalrelationships.

We as teachers can no longer ride onthe coat tails of strong adult orientationin society. Goslings are followinggoslings, so to speak, and not themother goose. Our children'sattachment instincts have becomeskewed and with that their learning. Toadd to the confusion, many parents andeducators and even researchers arefollowing these children, taking theircues from them as to what matters mostand what they need.Instead of leadingthem into learningthrough the contextof attachment, weare following theminto chaos andtrouble.

When kids wholack a maturecontext for learningfail to attach to their teachers, theybecome highly prone to variouslearning and behaviour problems.Because they are creatures ofattachment, their attachment instinctsare highly elevated.

One of these instincts is theattachment alarm. When a child is facedwith separation from those attached to,anxiety mounts. If too defended againstthe vulnerability of this alarm, it isexperienced as agitation instead ofapprehension. Either way, it greatly

interferes with cognitive functioningand intellectual performance. Forimmature students who are notattached to their teachers, this anxiety islikely to dumb them down significantlyand interfere with their ability to attendand concentrate. Alarm problems aremushrooming in our schools and takinga toll on learning. Those sensitivechildren who cannot tolerate thevulnerability of alarm often becomenumb to these feelings and tune outwhat alarms. They lose their feelings ofnervousness and stop talking aboutwhat scares them. Once they become

defended against thevulnerability ofalarm, their brainsare no longer able tomove them tocaution. As a result,these children are apt to get into troubleand fail to stay out ofharm's way.

Another of theelevated attachmentinstincts is shyness. If children have

inherited this trait, they are inclined toshy away from those they are notattached to. Their shy instincts havethem resisting contact, looking away,replying minimally and listening poorly. Some even become functionally mute. It simply does not feel right for thesechildren to interact with those who arenot part of their attachment village. It isinteresting that no matter how shy onemay be, one never feels shy with thoseattached to. Shyness was obviouslymeant to keep the immature child close


to home and within their village ofattachment. In our fragmented society,we no longer honour shyness. In fact,we are more likely to shame it orperceive it as a char ac ter flaw or a socialimpediment. It certainly interferes withthe task of teaching children who arenot attaching to us. When childrenattach to each other, they lose theirshyness to each other giving the falseimpression of developmental progress.Instead, this loss of shyness with peersis often accompanied by even greaterresistance to interaction with adults.Shyness is meant to disable a child andrender them immune to learning. It isNature's way of keeping children freefrom the influence of strangers.Unfortunately, those strangers are toooften ourselves. Rather than pushingthrough the shyness, we should becultivating the kind of connection thatresolves that shyness and renders themreceptive to our teaching.

Another attachment instinct thatwreaks havoc when out of context iscounterwill – a defensive resistance toperceived coercion. It simply does notfeel right for a child to the bidding ofanyone he or she is not attached to. Themore dependent a child is uponattachments to function, the moreintense will be the counterwill. Likeshyness and anxiety, this instinct wasmeant to render children resistant to the influence of those not attached to. Mostchildren grow out of impulsivecounterwill: the integrative child cankeep these impulses in check; theadaptive child knows the futility ofresisting those in charge; the emergentchild is not likely to feel as coerced. The

stuck child how ever is highly sensitizedto feeling pushed and pulled aroundand counterwill only increases with age. It is only when the attachment instinctsare directly engaged that an immaturechild is receptive to direction andguidance. Given that attachments toteachers are on the wane, counterwill iscorrespondingly on the rise. The morechildren attach to each other, the moreadults are countered and resisted. Thecontrived structure of school has madeus blind to this basic human dynamic.Our naive assumption that children arenaturally compliant has led tounrealistic expectations on both teachers and students. There is nothing wrongwith an unattached child who resistsbeing told what to do and how to think.There is also nothing wrong with ateacher who cannot teach or managesuch a child. What is wrong is a societythat is failing to keep attachmentsaligned. What is also wrong is that weare failing to compensate for this bycreating the context that would evokenatural learning and natural compliance in our students.

Still another prob lem that results from the failure of students to attach to theirteachers is bullying. When creatures ofattachment come together, be theydogs, monkeys, elephants or stuck kids,the first item of business attachment-wise is to find their positionhierarchically. The primary purpose ofattachment is to facilitate dependence.In order to do this, the parties involvedmust be arranged hierarchically intodominant and dependent, leader andfollower, caring and needy.

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The Trouble With Kids These Daysby Gordon Neufeld

When one of the parties is an adultand the other is a child, thearrangement is fairly obvious, althoughthe attachment can become inverted ifthe parent fails to take the lead or needsto be taken care of. When childrenbecome attached to children, the prob -lem of attachment dominance is just asurgent but not as straightforward. Some children will instinctively seek todominate and others to depend. Thedominant become prescriptive andbossy, ordering others around. If thecaring instincts are evoked, how ever,these alpha children can also be likemother hens, making things work forthose they are attached to, looking outfor them, sticking up for them andtaking care of them. Unfortunately,many kids who become attached totheir peers also become defendedagainst the vulnerability of suchattachments. As a result, they alsobecome defended against thevulnerability of caring. Such childrenseek to dominate, not through takingcare of others, but through exploitingthe vulnerability of others. These are the children who become bullies. The rootof the bullying prob lem, therefore, is the absence of strong attachments to adults.In the school setting, this would be theteacher. The same thing happens tojuvenile monkeys or even juvenileelephants when deprived of adultattachment. What catches our attentionis the meanness of the bully and the

need to lord it over others. What wemiss is the absence of being embeddedin a hierarchical attachment withsomeone who can take the lead andwho assumes the responsibility forcaring.

Again, our naive developmentalidealism has led us to believe thatchildren will learn to get along throughinteracting with each other. Interactionamong equals should lead to egalitarianvalues, or so we have been told. On thecontrary, the only thing that is auto- mat ic when creatures of attachment areplaced together is that a pecking orderevolves. Their only chance for equalityis to revolve around the adults incharge, like planets around a sun. Themore we matter to them, the less theymatter to each other. The less theymatter to each other, the better they will be able to get along without seekingdominance or rolling over insubmission.

In short, the failure of stuck studentsto attach to their teachers is creatingmonumental problems for all involved,both in learning and in behaviour. Theanswer is not in teaching harder nor inbecoming stricter. The solution lies increating a context of attachment to teach those children who lack the moremature contexts of emergence, ofadaptation and of integration. If we areto cre ate a context for teaching stuckstudents, we must first collect thesestudents and then safeguard theirrelationships to us.

We all possess instincts to collectchildren, but these instincts are mostlikely to be activated when the children


are infants and when the infants are our own. Some teachers are incrediblyintuitive about collecting the children in their care but we can no longer afford to leave this important task tohappenchance. Our challenge is tobring these instincts into consciousnessin order that they may serve us whenwe need them, not when just when ourstudents happen to push the rightbuttons in us. The hardest children tocollect are usually the ones most in need of being collected.

This collecting dance usually involvesfour steps or movements. These highlyengaging behaviours are quitetransparent in adult interactions withinfants as well as in the greeting ritualsof ancient cultures. The trick is totranspose them to fit the situations andcircumstances we encounter in theschool setting.

The first step involves getting in thechild's face in a friendly way in anattempt to collect the eyes, a smile and a nod. With older children, with children

who are shy, or with those somewhatdefended against the vulnerability ofcontact, the first approach should bemuch less direct, but still involve getting into their space in a friendly way. It isnot so much what one says or what onedoes that is as important as findingone's way to the desired effect. Oncechildren are older, our tendency is toget in their face when there is trouble.The more trouble or troubled a child is,or the more troubles a child has, themore important it is that we invest the

time and energy increating a contextwithin which to work with the child. Tohave a relationshipwith a child is notenough, especiallywith a nonintegrative child, because theycan only operate outof one dynamic at atime. These childrenneed to be collectedcontinually and prior to other kinds ofinteraction, including asking them to put

away their books. In other words, wemust engage them bef ore we can teachthem or collect them bef ore we candirect them. To skip this step with animmature child is to ask for trouble.When the attachment instincts are notengaged, there will be no inclination toattend to us, be good for us, take thecues from us, meas ure up to ourexpectations or do our bidding. In fact,when the attachment instincts are notactively engaged, attempts to influence


or direct them can be highlyprovocative, pushing their buttons toresist and counter or at least work torule.

The second step in collecting theinfant is to give them something of oursto hold on to. This usually involvessomething like placing our index fingerin the palm of their hand. If theattachment instincts are ready to beengaged, the hand will close over ourfinger. They are now holding on to usand invested in keeping us close. Thisstep obviously needs some transposingfor the school setting. The essence of the interaction is to pro vide something ofours to hold on to so that in holding onto what we have given them they willbe holding on to us. The most effectiveinteraction involves feeding theirattachment hunger. What they need issome friendly attention, communication of interest, and signs of significance;indications that they matter to us.Attachment theorists placecommunication of enjoyment, warmthand delight at the very top of the list.What some children will hold on to is asense of sameness or having somethingin common. Praise doesn't work because it originates in their behaviour andbecause they cannot hold on to it if they fail to meas ure up. What attachmenthungry children need most is some signthat they are invited to exist in ourpresence. Sometimes all it takes is atwinkle in the eye, a gesture ofrecognition, a warm tone in the voice.The point is that unless we give themsomething to attach themselves to,attachment will not happen. Only when they are holding on to what we are

providing will they be inclined tofollow.

The third step in collecting children is to invite their dependence. For theinfant who is old enough, this gesturemay involve extending our arms in anoffer to pick them up. The implicitmessage is that they can depend uponus, lean upon us, trust in us to help,look to us for assistance. It is an essential step in consummating attachmentbecause the purpose of attachment is tofacilitate dependence. Master teachersdo this intuitively. This step also firmlyestablishes attachment dominance. Theact of inviting dependence, how ever,runs contrary to the developmentalidealism prevalent in our society,especially in educational circles. Weprize independence, not dependence.We are afraid that if we do things forchildren that they could or should dofor themselves, that they will neverlearn to stand on their own two feet.This attitude is already prevalent among parents of preschoolers. I cannot countthe number of parents who haveexpressed concern to me about gettingtheir preschoolers to dress themselves.My question to them is always the same: does your child want to dress herself?That is where the prob lem lies. Wecannot push independence in children.Until their dependency needs aresufficiently met, there is no bias tobecome viable as a separate being. Ourjob as parents and teachers is NOT tomake them independent but togenerously invite their dependence. It is Nature's job to shift the energy fromattachment to emergence, fromdependence to independence. Up until


such a time as the child wants to dresshimself, wants to fig ure things out byhimself, wants to find his ownmeanings, wants to learn for himself,wants to be the origin of his own ideas -we best invite them to lean upon us.Without taking this step, we not onlythwart attachment but jeopardize ourposition of dominance or lead.

The final step in collecting a childinvolves helping them to get theirbearings. There is no need more basic to humans than that of orienting - locatingoneself physically and psychologically:where am I? who am I? who is that?what is this? how does that work? Toassume the role of human COMPASSPOINT in their life is to not only toinvite their dependency but to evokethe instincts to keep close and topreserve connection. Again, we arerather intuitive about this withyoungsters but as children get older, weare likely to become lazy, leaving themto orient themselves or depend uponothers to get their bearings. This is asimple yet highly effective way ofengaging the attachment instincts andwell worth the few moments it takes. Ifa child accepts your orienting, he or shewill automatically be inclined to attendto you and take the cues from you as tohow to be and what to do. Again, to getthem to follow is to take the lead ingiving them a sense of where they are,who they are and what is going tohappen. It might seem a bit arrogant toact as if one is their 'North Pole', butsomeone needs to serve that function. Ifnot us, then who.

To reiterate, children who lack amature context to learn are creatures of

attachment by default and need to becollected bef ore they can be workedwith. To fail to collect them is to fail tocre ate the only context available forteaching them and thus set the stage forfrustration and failure. The fact thatthey have such intense attachmentneeds should be in our favour when itcomes to collecting them. To skip thisattachment forestep is a developmentalfaux pas Nature is not likely to forgive.We must remember that stuck kids were never meant to be taught or managedoutside the context of attachment, so the first step is to cre ate this context.

Once an attachment has formed andwe have found ways to activate thisattachment when needed, we must alsosafeguard their relationship to us. Ifanything is sacred in teaching, it wouldbe the relationship of stuck kids to theirteachers. To safeguard a context ofattachment, we must place context overcurriculum, attachment overachievement, connection over conductand relationship over behaviour. Wecannot expect them to preserve arelationship that does not seem to beimportant to us as that would involve atolerance of vulnerability beyond theircapacity. Ultimatums that put thestudent's sense of connection to us atstake are bound to backfire. When itcomes to stuck kids, the bottom linemust not be behaviour or academicperformance, but the relational contextwithin which to work with thesechildren.

A context of attachment not onlyenables us to weave together ourteaching and their learnings but alsoenables us to work on their behaviour.


Most modes of discipline depend uponadaptive and integrative functioning. To learn from consequences, futility mustsink in. To get a child to think twice,they must be capable of cognitivedissonance. It is not enough to give achild something to think about, thechild must be able to hold on to thatthought when feeling the impulse toact. The processes by which disciplineworks are missing in the stuck child.The prevailing practice is to take whatworks with children who do not haveproblems and apply them to childrenwho do. Nothing could be moremistaken or more illogical. The onlycontext for dealing with the behaviourof stuck kids is again the context ofattachment. When children lackintegrative functioning, it doesn't workto demand that they get along, not berude, be nice, not be mean, not disrupt,control themselves. Mature behaviourneeds to be scripted like a directorscripts his actors. One cannot get a child to BE mature but at least we can get achild to ACT mature in a specificsituation, given the child is taking hiscues from us and our scripting isadequate. Preschool teachers are oftenintuitive about this process since theirchildren are incapable of truecooperation, spontaneous consideration, preserving fairness and taking turns ontheir own. When children are stillpreschoolers in integrative functioning,no matter what their age, appropriatebehaviour is better orchestrated thanexpected, choreographered thandemanded.

Likewise, we can use the context ofattachment to solicit good intentions.

The behaviour that we seek is often outof reach for the stuck child. As long aswe harp on it, we also get stuck infruitless demands. The first step is to get them heading in the right direction,even though good intentions may notbe enough. If we use our influence toget their hands on the steering wheel,aiming for the desired behaviour, weare free to come along side as coach and consultant. It is always important withthe stuck child to get on the same sideof the prob lem. No headway can bemade by being adversarial. Soliciting agood intention on their part aids in theprocess of getting into the right posture. Furthermore, when good intentions areformed, each failure helps to reveal theimpediments and prepares the way toaddress the root of the prob lem.

Scripting good behaviour andsoliciting good intentions are twoalternative forms of discipline thatdepend upon a good workingattachment and at the same time areattachment-friendly. Again, the pointhere is that the first issue in dealingwith a stuck child is not what to do, butwho we are to them. Unless they areseeking to preserve proximity with us,we will have little to work with nomatter how skilled and compassionatewe may be.

A context of attachment will alsoenable us to get at the root of the prob -lem of stuckness. The lack of a maturecontext for learning is usually indicativeof an underlying defendedness againstthe vulnerability of their existence andexperience. Their vulnerability may bepalpable to us but they do not actuallyfeel their vulnerability nor the feelings


and perceptions that go with it. To getthese children unstuck involvessoftening their defenses againstvulnerability. Again, this requires astrong context of attachment. A safeattachment functions in a number ofways to help reverse this defensivehardening and desensitization. First ofall, a safe attachment acts as a shieldagainst external stress. The more wematter to them, the less it matters whatothers think or feel about them. A warm attachment also creates a safe place tobe vulnerable. And finally, a strongattachment enables us to lead them intothe vulnerable territory of thoughts andfeelings that would otherwise be tunedout and numbed out. It enables us toreflect their expression and experiencein a slightly more vulnerable way and to touch the little bruises with gentlenessand compassion. We must leave the bigwounds alone as the vulnerabilitywould simply be too great. Given astrong attachment, a warm invitation toexperience the vulnerability of life cantruly make a difference. Children needto know that it is okay to be upset, tohave hurt feelings, to feel insecure, tofeel nervous and scared, to feel one'sbumps and bruises. Children need toknow that vulnerable feelings andthoughts can actually be endured. It isonly as the defenses soften that theother contexts for learning will evolveand the child will become lessdependent upon the sole context ofattachment.

In conclusion, the trouble with kidsthese days is two-fold. First of all, theyare getting stuck developmentally,depriving us of the ideal contexts for

teaching. Secondly, these stuck kids areno longer automatically attaching to us,depriving us of the only alternativecontext for learning that would work for them.

The challenge for special educationteachers these days is also two-fold. First of all, we must let go of what doesn'twork. It doesn't work to teach harder. Itdoesn't work to focus on curriculum. Itdoesn't work to use modes of disciplinethat work with kids who don't haveproblems. It doesn't work to beconsistent if that means we are doingthe same thing over and over again thatdoesn't work. I am reminded ofEinstein's definition of insanity here:doing the same things over and overagain and expecting different results. Itis only when we stop doing whatdoesn't work that we will have a chanceof discovering what does. It is likewalking a blind maze: the mostimportant part of the process is feelingthe futility of what doesn't work.Otherwise we will become stuck railingagainst things that we cannot change. In this way, special education teachersmust be grown, not trained. There is nosubstitute for experience, especially ifthat experience involves the feelings ofsadness and disappointment when ourefforts are in vain. It is only when thishappens that we adapt and discover yet another path to try. The problems ofstuck kids are highly complex and thereare no easy answers. Special educationcannot be scripted, it can only evolveout of suffering and futility. There is noshort cut and it is definitely not painfree.


The second thing wemust do is to cultivate acontext of attachment with our students. It is not what we do but who we are tothe child that will cre ate acontext for learning. Forlearning to occur, we mustbe their home base, theircompass point, theircomforter, their cue-giver.For learning to occur, wemust be perceived as ananswer to their needs forcontact and connection. Ifthere is any single message for those who work withstuck kids, it would be towork at the attachmentand let the attachmentwork for you. When itcomes to stuck kids, wemust win their hearts toopen their minds.

I trust these thoughts on attachment and specialeducation will resonatewith your deepestintuitions and pro vide you with some conceptualunderpinnings for whatyou may already know but may not have had wordsfor. I also hope they willpro vide you with someexplanations for both yourfailures and your successes and increase the prob abil -ity of the latter. Today'sstudents may be in trouble but there is a way through. u

BCTF Websitehttp://www.bctf.bc.ca

BC SEA Website:http://www.bctf.bc.ca/psas/sea/

LATA Website:http://www/bctf.bc.ca

All Kinds of Minds—Dr. Mel Levinehttp://www.allkindsofminds.org/

Special Education Technology B.C.http://www.setbc.org/

Learning Disabilities Assoc. of Vancouver Linkshttp://www.idav.ca/links.html

The Trouble With Kids These Days - BC Teachers' Federation...by Gordon Neufeld Learning requires a...

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