Committee for Children Blog

Book Review: Challenging Behavior in Elementary and Middle School

by Barbara Kaiser and Judy Sklar Rasminsky
Reading Level: Adult

In the introduction to their award-winning Challenging Behavior in Elementary and Middle School, authors Barbara Kaiser and Judy Sklar Rasminsky write: “As a teacher or future teacher, you have two choices. Either you can create an environment that welcomes [students] and teaches them how to become the best people they can possibly be, or you can reinforce their growing suspicion that they will never belong, have nothing to offer, and cannot learn or cope with the demands of school.” In the following 300-plus pages, they go on to demonstrate precisely how to make that first choice. The book is intended as a manual for teachers (both practicing and pre-service), with a goal of providing facts and skills needed to understand and prevent challenging behavior, respond to it effectively when it does occur, and teach appropriate alternatives.

Theoretical and Practical Approaches

Theoretical and Practical Challenging Behavior is divided into two main sections: theoretical and practical. In the first four chapters, the authors provide background information on aggression and antisocial behavior, risk factors, protective factors, and the brain's role in behavior. The remaining ten chapters offer strategies for preventing and managing challenging behavior. These chapters focus on the following:

  • Relationships (with students and their families)

  • Culture

  • Social context

  • Physical space

  • Guidance and discipline

  • WEVAS (Working Effectively with Violent and Aggressive States)

  • Assessment and positive behavior support

  • Inclusion of children with special needs

  • Working with families

  • Bullying

Discussion Questions

The book, while rigorously research-based and packed with practical suggestions, also draws in readers on a personal level with interwoven stories about Jazmine and Andrew, two children with challenging behavior problems; vignettes from real classrooms; and short descriptions of interdisciplinary studies and programs (including Committee for Children's Second Step and Steps to Respect programs). Each chapter closes with discussion questions: “What Do You Think?” and “What Would You Do?”; and suggested readings. Educators and teachers-to-be are engaged and challenged, encouraged not only to absorb the information Kaiser and Rasminsky provide, but to place themselves and their students in the picture. In the chapter titled “Guidance and Other Discipline Strategies, for example, the authors ask the following questions (among others): “How does your relationship with a student affect your choice of strategy [for guidance]? How does the relationship help or hinder you when challenging behavior is involved?” In addition, in the “What Would You Do?” section of the same chapter, a highly complex social situation is presented to readers, involving Jazmine (one of the book's representatives of challenging behavior) and other classmates on the playground. The reader is challenged to come up with his or her own solution to the situation.

Classroom-Tested Techniques

Any reader who commits to reading and responding to Challenging Behavior in Elementary and Middle School is sure to come away with a renewed vigor for teaching all his or her students in the best possible way. Readers will refill their educational bag of tricks with research-based, classroom-tested techniques to address the needs of even the most difficult behaviors. The authors are well aware of the dangerously cyclical nature of having a child with challenging behavior in the classroom. Not only is this child at risk for missing out on the social and academic experience of school, but the other students in the room are affected as well. Rather than resorting to sending a student who behaves aggressively or disruptively to the principal's office, teachers will find new methods of involving this child in the classroom's activities. These evidence-based skills and tools will benefit every child, not just those who try educators' patience the most.
 
Challenging Behavior in Elementary and Middle School was the winner of the 2009 Textbook Excellence Award—Texty—from the Text and Academic Authors Association. The authors also collaborated on Challenging Behavior in Young Children, winner of the 2007 Texty.

Buy Challenging Behavior in Elementary and Middle School now.

Buy Challenging Behavior in Young Children now.