by Carrie Suchy

Created on: May 14, 2008

Oh Please Don't Make Me Feel Forced to Call Your Parents Again!

Some of the most difficult conversations I find myself in on a daily basis involve communicating with parents of students in my classroom. Finding a nonjudgmental account of problem behavior is a extremely difficult position to be in. I have a set approach that I follow for each conversation that works well no matter how severe the behavior problem . Among the many approaches I have used and considered using, an approach that puzzled me to learn was using a positive approach to improve the conversation. I had reached a point where I thought, " the strategies I have used up to this point haven't worked, so what do I have to lose?"

It was another ordinary day in my classroom. Many students were preparing to leave the classroom for the day, emptying their mailboxes, getting their jackets and back- packs from the rear of the room. Johnny races across the room sliding on his knees from one end of the room all the way across to the other side. I sighed to myself and thought......"Oh please don't make me feel forced to call your parents again!" After an extremely long day, and several phone calls throughout the year, my thoughts were that I would rather be shot in the foot then have another difficult conversation with these parents.

I closed my eyes for a moment and reminded myself that I was going to try a positive approach the conversation this time. I called the parents and stated to them that Johnny was on task all day, completed a majority of his school work, and even got to pass out papers towards the end of the day. The parents stated how pleased they were to hear something positive about "their Johnny." I felt that I had then "paved the road" and eased the parents in to the difficult conversation that I had been completely agonizing over. I told the parents that although Johnny had so many remarkable improvements in his behavior, I had an issue at the end of the day with his actions. The parents were extremely supportive by the time I mentioned the behavior problem due to the fact they had heard what they wanted to hear, the positive portion of the conversation before the negative portion of the conversation. Notice also that the ratio in the positive portion of the conversation completely out weighs the negative portion of the conversation.

It is a well known fact that all parents want to hear good things about their children. If you can "pave the road" for what you feel may be a difficult conversation, by setting them up for success in the beginning, you will no longer agonize over any conversation presuming to be difficult!

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