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S3/Ep. 6: The Secret to Special Education Success That Nobody's Talking About
17 Plays10 days ago
Your child has an IEP or 504 plan. The accommodations are in place. The therapists are involved. So why aren't you seeing progress? The answer might have nothing to do with academics—and everything to do with emotional maturity.
Traci Glover, M.Ed., LSW, LPC, and Leena Weaver, Ed.S., NCSP, founders of Healing Children, reveal the truth educators and parents often miss: a 10-year-old functioning emotionally like a 3-year-old can't benefit from even the best IEP. Without frustration tolerance, emotional regulation, and developmental readiness, interventions fall flat.
Learn to recognize when behaviors are maturity-related (not defiance), how trauma and entitlement impact development, practical strategies for building emotional maturity through structure and boundaries, and why meeting children where they are developmentally—not chronologically—changes everything.
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Transcript
Introduction to Guardians of Hope
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to season three of the Guardians of Hope podcast. We are a community of parents, educators, health, legal, and tech experts dedicated to positively impacting children's lives.
00:00:10
Speaker
The thoughts and opinions of my guests are not my own. This is a platform for sharing. Welcome everyone. Today we are diving into a topic that is often overlooked in special education conversations. the critical role of maturity in a child's progress.
00:00:27
Speaker
Many parents and educators focus on academic accommodations, IEP goals, and therapeutic interventions. But understanding a child's emotional and development maturity can be the missing piece in helping them truly thrive.
Meet Tracy and Lena from Healing Children LLC
00:00:43
Speaker
thrive I'm honored to be joined by Tracy and Lena, founders of Healing Children LLC. Tracy is a licensed professional counselor and elementary school counselor, and Lena is a nationally certified school psychologist with extensive expertise in how trauma, entitlement, and life experiences impact the brain and child development.
00:01:07
Speaker
Their unique approach focuses on understanding the why behind behavior and creating healing environments that lead to genuine lasting progress for children.
00:01:18
Speaker
Tracy, Lina, thank you so much for joining me today. oh thank you so much for having us. We're super excited. It's a topic that we love to talk about. Same here. Thank you so much. So why don't we go ahead and get started by telling us about your background and how you both founded Healing Children.
00:01:37
Speaker
Yeah, so I've been a school counselor since 1999 Lena's been a school psych it's the same amount of time. We started working at the same school in 2001. And one and at that time, I was actually looking at getting out of education because and i just wasn't seeing the accountability with behavior and working with juvenile justice prior to being a school counselor. I knew if we didn't have accountability, we weren't going to see kids grow up the way they needed to and it was going to affect their mental health. And Lena, interestingly, was feeling the same way as we were working at the same school, kind of learning about each other and our philosophies, realizing we're on the same page. And so we dedicated our time studying trauma, attachment, entitlement, entitlement the brain development, and and started using different strategies. And we were seeing growth in the kids. And then people were asking us to come in and train and help them.
00:02:33
Speaker
and we thought, shoot. Why do I make this a business? sense And then we can so we can do this all over the place. um And so it was it just really was a passion because we went into education really expecting to see growth in kids. And when you're not, it's really, it's just disheartening and discouraging and you don't want to, you want to do something else. And so luckily we found each other and and we stayed in it and found a lot of success. And so that's healing children got started.
00:03:03
Speaker
We became an LLC in 2012, and then we started presenting in 2013.
00:03:08
Speaker
Very good story. I'd love to hear that. and And so nice to have you both on to talk about this.
Understanding Developmental vs. Emotional Maturity
00:03:14
Speaker
um the The first thing I want to address is when we talk about maturity in the context of special education, what exactly do we mean? How is it developmental or emotion? How is developmental or emotional maturity different from chronological age? And why does the distinction matter so much for children with special needs?
00:03:40
Speaker
And really, it it kind of matters for all kids in addition to kids with special needs. So when we're looking at maturity, Tracy and I, we look at a few different things. We we look at Eric Erickson's philosophy of maturity, which looks, he has different stages, like the social phase stages of development that looks at how do we mature and grow? So like, you know, birth to, you know, one, they're looking at trust versus mistrust. Like if I learned that the world is safe, then everything's okay. Then I moved to the next stage of maturity. And then we would look at autonomy versus shame and doubt, which is the toddler years. I'm learning how to be a little bit more autonomous. I'm learning to follow directions. And so really we look at the whole gamut of children from birth.
00:04:20
Speaker
And because we work with kids through high school, Well, with and with Eric Erickson too, um his stages, even though it was developed a long time ago, and there are some things that might be a little bit different because our course for society is different.
00:04:32
Speaker
It hasn't been debunked yet, even though it's been studied over and over again. And so he's really looking at, you have to learn a skill before you can move on to the next phase of maturity. yeah And so that we use that a lot to help us understand where kids might be at.
00:04:48
Speaker
And so we also look at foster client stages of conscious development, which looks at how our conscious is developed too. So when we're looking at kids and we're looking at maturity, especially in line with kids with special education or special needs, there's a few skills that really show us like, are we maturing?
Skills Defining Child Maturity
00:05:04
Speaker
Are we growing? So as we mature, we go from being an infant who we cry to get our needs met We have to rely on other people to meet all of our needs too. We're slowly learning how to meet our own needs. And we're learning how to handle frustration because frustration tolerance is a huge developmental stage. We're learning that learning new things. We feel frustrated.
00:05:23
Speaker
How can we manage that frustration? We work through it to continue learning, which is a huge thing for kids, especially kids who have disabilities because f fresh learning is hard. hard yeah And they have to learn, how do I manage those feelings of frustration? They're learning delayed gratification that um I don't always get what I want when I want it. They're learning how to handle no. They're learning to follow rules. They're learning to follow directions. And all of that's maturity. And as we mature, we gain confidence. And so what we're wanting for all of our kids, especially kids with special needs, is we want them to gain confidence in knowing what are my strengths and my weaknesses? Like, these are the things I'm good at.
00:06:03
Speaker
These are the things I struggle with. And as kids mature and they and have confidence, they're able to say, you know what? I have a hard time reading. I don't have to hide it. I don't have to throw a fit to make sure people don't know that I have a hard time reading. I can be honest about that.
00:06:17
Speaker
And then I can ask for the help and the supports that I need to overcome that. And what we want for all of our kids, regardless of their disability, we want them to go be going through that maturity um growth because the more mature they are, the better they're going to be able to handle the disabilities that they struggle with. Mm hmm.
00:06:35
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And it's, it's, an it's, it's just such an important piece to mental health because kids who are struggling with the maturity issue are not developing that confidence that we all want them to have. And then, and that they are going to need as they prepare for things like junior high and high school. And then of course the world of work as an adult and making, making sure they're meeting those milestones to get them prepared for, for what's ahead of them. And so the question about chronological age that you asked, we all are going to be growing in chronological age, regardless of whether we're maturing or not mature. or Emotionally maturing. Emotionally maturing. Yeah. And there might be some maturity that might happen naturally with just aging, but it's usually through experiences. It's usually through consistent accountability, cause and effect thinking, having a good caregiver, those role models. Those are all things that help us mature. And so, for example, in our job, often what I see is i might see a kid
00:07:33
Speaker
who is maybe chronologically 10 years old. And at 10 years old, we expect you to be able to start and finish tasks. Like you have initiation. That's one of Eric Erickson stages. You can start and finish tasks. You trust adults to take care of you. You follow directions. You're learning to share, take turns with your peers, get along with your peers. That's kind of what we expect for 10 year olds. If they don't have that maturity, what sometimes I see with maybe a 10 year old, is maybe they're still at that two to three-year-old developmental stage. So maybe their their frustration tolerance is poor. They throw a fit when they're asked to do something hard. They don't think that they should have to do anything hard. I even had one just the other day. You said, well, you're asking me to do stuff and it's ticking me off and I shouldn't have to do that. Well, that's something that you might hear more a two or three-year-old. Usually by the time they're 10, they're mature enough to understand we're going to be asked to do stuff we don't want to do.
00:08:26
Speaker
And we're going to be expected to do it. And so that I don't know if that answers your question about the difference between chronological age versus maturity. ria It does. It does. and And we'll go into it a little more because um we're talking specifically about children with special needs. But as you mentioned, this applies to everyone. um But I want to address the support that children with special needs get in the school system and maturity. So many parents receive either an IEP or a 504 plan. and expect to see the academic results around that or the the progress. But maturity plays a crucial role in whether these interventions <unk> actually work. So can you explain how a child's maturity level actually impacts their ability to benefit from these services to begin with?
Maturity and Educational Plans
00:09:20
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. Because I see this all the time because I work. So my world is special ed.
00:09:26
Speaker
And so I'm in that world a lot. And if I have a child, maybe they have a reading disability or they have a math disability. The kids who are really mature, who have that good frustration tolerance, they have delayed gratification. They have that confidence in that and understanding that we all have strengths and weaknesses, and it's not something to be ashamed about. And you're able to have those conversations. Those kids, when you provide them the support that they need, maybe you provide them extra help in reading.
00:09:55
Speaker
you give them accommodations, maybe they have extra time, extra time, or maybe for some of my kids, they learn how to use that technology around it. So maybe they have a reading pen that helps them read so that they can learn. They can still be reading like the history books, but their reading is not getting in the way, but because they have the maturity, they're going to access those tools. And then you're going to see learning and growth. Okay. What often happens with a lot of my kids, especially when they're initially in special education, or if they've had some they're not as mature, even if I put all of those accommodations in place, the minute they feel frustrated, the minute it looks hard, we're having them, they're throwing temper tantrums, they're throwing fits. So I can put all the right things in place for them. I can put all the accommodations in place for them, I mean, us as a school team, but they're not going to access those accommodations because they're not mature enough to access those accommodations. So sometimes we have to take some steps back to provide them the support to help them have the maturity
00:10:52
Speaker
to now access that. And so I don't know if I'll give you an example. I have, you know, trying, trying to keep the confidentiality, but also understand I have no a little guy, significant emotional issues. So some anxiety issues, um,
00:11:09
Speaker
And anytime something is hard, throws a fit, has destroyed classrooms because if you present him with something difficult, completely it has destroyed the classroom. And we really had to learn, teach him that the temper tantrum and destroying the classroom isn't how we meet his needs. So we had to do two different things. We had to teach him coping skills to how to handle feeling frustration frustrated, but also making sure that we're not accidentally reinforcing that temper tantrum by giving into the temper tantrum. And so through the last year year, we have really put in a lot of behavior support to help with that behavior.
00:11:45
Speaker
A year later, this child and now has pretty good coping skills, is doing great with math, but has significant reading difficulty to the point where I believe it's going to be a severe dyslexia issue.
00:11:57
Speaker
But now because we're seeing that maturity, we're not throwing fits every time something's hard. He is now at a point where we're going to be able to introduce the accommodations for reading. We're going those conversations about maybe other um other people who struggled with reading disabilities who've been very successful. You know, like you hear about Einstein. Yeah. Who, you know, had math yeah had reading disabilities from what we hear, but did great in math.
00:12:22
Speaker
We can start having those conversations now with him. and help him gain that confidence to advocate for himself now, because we've been able to work through that temper tantrum phase, that frustration, difficulty with frustration tolerance. But we had to go back.
00:12:36
Speaker
We had to provide different supports for him to work through that emotional immaturity for him to now access the supports that he needs for his disability.
Evaluations and Emotional vs. Learning Issues
00:12:46
Speaker
I have a quick follow-up question yeah if you don't mind. So when when you um get you have your child evaluated for an IEP or five or four, there's some specifications that they would fall into. Would a student who has a learning disability but um presents with temper tantrums and emotional dysregulation, would they also classify under an emotional disability? Would that give them support services? Is that how you come in um
00:13:21
Speaker
Can you explain to our audience? I don't know if if you um if I'm explaining that properly. Yeah, I know. you're You're explaining it great. Yeah, because when we evaluate, for me, I want to look at the whole picture of a kid.
00:13:31
Speaker
Because sometimes you have kids throwing fits and temper tantrums and you don't even realize they have learning disabilities because they're covering that up. They don't want you to know that. So every time you ask them to do something, they're clearing the classroom. And so you think, oh, this is an emotional problem. When it might be, I can't read and I don't want you to know I can't read. Well, and they may not even understand it very well yeah either. So, I mean, you've also got that issue with their kids. Yes. And so when I, when we go in and evaluate, we want to evaluate the whole picture.
00:13:59
Speaker
And so, yes, you can have a child. If I evaluate the whole picture that has, and and then we find that, yeah, they have emotional issues, but they also have learning issues. Cause I always look at that with kids who are having emotional issues is I also look at their learning issues to see if there's learning issues.
00:14:14
Speaker
underlying it as well. And they could qualify for both services. And legally, if a kid qualifies for an IEP, no matter what they qualify for, if they also have behavior issues, we're legally required to support those behavior issues through behavior plans and functional behavioral assessments to make sure we're meeting those needs as well.
00:14:32
Speaker
Understood. Yes. So, yeah, and I think it's and this is probably derailing the conversation. i tend to do that. So I'm sorry. But it's realizing we have to respond to that behavior first.
00:14:44
Speaker
Right. If you don't respond to the behavior, then you're not going to know what the needs are always. Did that make any sense? It isn't always like crystal clear on those things. And they still have to learn temper tantrums is not how I deal with problems.
00:14:58
Speaker
yeah That is something that I did when I was a baby to get my needs met because I i wasn't self-sufficient. Now I'm more independent. I can talk. I can walk. I can express myself. I might need some support with that. I might need help with that. Because my temper tantrums is not the way to do it. So we don't want them to use that mode. It's kind of an old mode of communication as they're in elementary because it's not going to lead to anything positive for them.
00:15:24
Speaker
They've got to learn to work through that. So i don't know. Right. No, it does help. it It's clear that they've outgrown or they should have outgrown on a maturity level, that type of coping um of, you know, that, that way of coping. So yeah absolutely. It makes complete sense. And thank you. um for answering that question. um I was going to ask, and and maybe this is just an add-on when we talk about the actual assessment um of children who need support services, how can parents and children recognize when these behaviors um are maturity related? And we covered that. Or is it willful defiance? That's another thing, right? What are the red flags or any types of patterns that we can look for to identify? And part of it you know, to me, willful defiance is also a part of maturity. Because if you think if you have like a three-year-old
00:16:25
Speaker
Sometimes they're willfully defined. That's what I learned as to being around her grandchildren. I like learned it once. oh okay. Now I'm seeing this again as a grandma, like a few some of this, some of this, you know, this oppositional defiance stuff they do as toddlers. They do as three-year-old because they're trying to figure out who they are and how they're separate from their parents. And so, um,
00:16:49
Speaker
what is that strategy we use? Paradoxical. Like a paradoxical technique works great with three-year-olds telling a three-year-old they can't do something that you actually want them to do, then they're going to go do it. Right. Cause that's. and Which is actually kind of entertaining. That's part of the stage yeah they're in. So sometimes willful defiance is a maturity issue.
00:17:05
Speaker
Um, and I think you're quite, okay. You might have to ask your question one more time. Cause I think it has to do with like, we were just looking for a like or willful defiance. right it is Right. And how do you, how do you tweeze those things out? How do you know, okay, this is a disability versus this is maturity. Now, if I have a kid that maybe it really is academics are hard.
00:17:31
Speaker
And so I'm getting a little defiant. I'm shutting down. If they're mature and you have that discussion with them and you help them recognize it, you'll, they'll stop the willful defiance.
00:17:41
Speaker
If they're mature and they're like, okay, somebody finally understands me. This is what's going on. They'll take advantage of the accommodations that are put in place. If they're not mature, they're not necessarily going to take advantage of those accommodations. Either that or for some kids, if they're severely disabled, if you have kids who have like like they're not they're nonverbal, those kind of things, they might need more accommodations more support. And so you're constantly working as a school team because you want the parents You want the parents to be very honest with their input with the school. You want the school to be very honest so that we can really tease that out.
00:18:18
Speaker
Is this a child that needs more accommodations? Maybe we're not giving enough accommodations. We don't want to overly accommodate because we want kids to grow as much as possible, but are they really for because of their disability needing more accommodations to help with that maturity and growth?
00:18:34
Speaker
Or is this a behavior issue and all of us need to get on the same page? Because otherwise, if one adult's holding them accountable and other adults feeling sorry for them because of their disability, then they're not holding them accountable. That's very confusing for the child. And we're not seeing the maturity happen. Well, and then you can start having undermining happening. So maybe you put a plan in place as a school team. and You've got one person who feels sorry for the child who's kind of undermining everybody else. And that could be anybody. That could be a teacher, a parent, administrator, anyone. And then
00:19:07
Speaker
that plan really falls apart and you don't see those kids mature like they need to because we're getting out of some of the accountability they need
Impact of Trauma and Structured Environments
00:19:14
Speaker
to grow up. So one of the things that Lena and I was trained by attachment therapists in Evergreen, Colorado, And they use Eric Erickson stages quite a bit. And when you're dealing with kids with attachment issues, they had a trauma or they call it a break in their attachment those first two years. And that can be abuse.
00:19:31
Speaker
That can be, it can even be adoption for some kids, depending on their temperament. It can be, you know, in utero drug use. It can be domestic violence. It can be severe medical. It can be all kinds of things where there was a trauma that happened early.
00:19:46
Speaker
And then it can erode their trust of the world. And so when Lena and I, we had a program for kids with emotional disturbance, they were labeled that on their IEP at our school. And so we took all of their health histories. We took Eric Erickson stages to see like the behaviors we were seeing and seeing like, okay, what stage would this be? And did they have a trauma? Like in those first two years, all of them did all of them had a trauma.
00:20:14
Speaker
And all of them had behaviors that would have been at that stage where that trauma happened. And so what that told us is that really impacts maturity. And then what can happen is, is if the adults are.
00:20:28
Speaker
Allowing the behavior. if We don't have a good behavior plan in place where there's some accountability around that behavior. They're not maturing out of it like they need to. And so and this is a very complicated discussion. But what we ended up doing is putting the supports in place. We put in some accountability. There was also a lot of teaching.
00:20:47
Speaker
There was a lot of emotional support given with groups. and counseling. um We saw some kids where they were completely unmanageable, even in the hospitals, grow into the point they graduated out of special ed.
00:21:01
Speaker
So I think it's just an important concept for us to realize that trauma and entitlement can get in the way of emotional development and maturity And that can be some of the behavior you're seeing. Sometimes it's a diagnosis too.
00:21:18
Speaker
Like sometimes they are battling depression and anxiety or ADHD. or other issues. And so sometimes it's both. So it's it's it's one of those things like Lena said, where we have to work as a team together to really figure out what it is it they need, get those boundaries in place, that support in place. And then you kind of see, okay, they're doing okay. They're able to meet the demands. I think when you're looking at maturity,
00:21:44
Speaker
um are they meeting the demands that are placed on them in the classroom and at home, right? Even special ed kids have to meet the demands that are placed on them that are within their ability.
00:21:56
Speaker
So with with the accommodation for We still want to meet those demands. we want to We want to see them meeting those demands. Like I said, we call it problem ownership, right? We all have responsibilities to their education. The educators do, the parents do, and the child does.
00:22:12
Speaker
And kids who are maturing like you want to see are meeting those demands. Because kids, honestly, they love to learn. They really do. So if we're if they're not doing that, then we've got to stop and look at why.
00:22:26
Speaker
What's going on there? And let's talk about what that looks like in the classroom or even at home meeting those ah ah expectations. What does it look like? I guess it differs ah depending on each child's progress and IEP and 504, but what are some of the biggest like things that parents, educators, and the teaching teams can look for that, you know, my audience can i use to identify at home
00:22:59
Speaker
Okay. I'm trying, cause I want to, cause it's such a big question because when you think kids that we work with, they they range from kids who have intellectual disabilities, who don't even have verbal skills, right?
00:23:11
Speaker
To kids who intellectually maybe are very, very bright that have dis disabilities. So it's such a huge range. um I think for parents, what you really want to be thinking about one is you want to think about the age of your child. um You want to be thinking about developmentally and emotionally, where should they be at this age? Like kind of recognize where that is. Where the typical is. where the Where is typical? Because if you don't know typical, you don't even know what you're doing, what you're working for. And then it's figuring out what structure and support can I put in place to help them get there?
00:23:41
Speaker
So if I have a child, maybe when we go back to the temper tantrum, let's say i have a child who throws a temper tantrum every time I ask them to do something. Maybe emotionally, they're like a two-year-old.
00:23:51
Speaker
Right. Maybe they're a 10 year old, but emotionally they're like a two year old. And that's when you really need to think about what level of freedom and structure do they need. So for us in the schools, what we do often is we look at if I have a kid who's emotionally like a two year old, I have to think about if I if a parent brought in their two year old into a school building, what level of supervision, structure and support with that two year old need?
00:24:16
Speaker
to mature. So I wouldn't let a two year old out at recess without any supervision. I wouldn't be sending a two year old to walk up and down the hall to go to the restroom without supervision. They don't have the maturity to handle that. So part of it is asking yourself, where's my child at with their maturity? And then I need to put that kind of structure in place for them. So some of the things that we'll do with kids is we do like structured recesses. Maybe they can't handle the same level of freedom as their peers outside at recess. So we have to structure that recess, whether it's, you know i have had some kids who the minute they're outside, they hurt somebody. They're not even ready to be outside. So maybe we have an area inside with supervision where they're playing with tasks. They're learning how to manage them themselves inside. Other kids, they can manage outside, but they need to be i with ears and eyes always with an adult. Or maybe they have certain areas of the playground they play on.
00:25:06
Speaker
Or in the school setting, I have to think about maybe I have to structure where they sit, where they line up. um I have to have supervision for them. They can't just leave the classroom. I have to really think about what level of structure and support do they need because and I provide that for them.
00:25:22
Speaker
And then with consistency and accountability, they start to mature and then I can start to give them more freedom and less structure to get them where they need to be. So you can do the same thing in the home setting, like asking yourself, where is my child at emotionally, maybe cognitively as well, if they have low cognitive abilities and disabilities.
00:25:40
Speaker
And where do I want them to be? But what structure and support I need to put in place? Like, so Tracy and I, we have the, we have a five, we call it the five minute reset or five minute plan. And this structured timeout that uses all of our components of the healing environment um that we can put in place.
00:25:56
Speaker
And so we'll talk about that too, but we yeah have that really work through those temper tantrums. And that can be used with kids. I've used it with this kids as young as preschool age to help them work through that. I've used it with kids in our extended resource room with cognitive delays as well. And we've modified it a little bit. Maybe we don't take five minutes, maybe it's three. Three minutes. Yeah. It's kind of like the time isn't as important as them learning to emotionally. Is that them learning to do some of that on their own or yeah they're developing that skill. Yeah.
00:26:23
Speaker
And so if I was a parent, I would really be looking at the environment that we have at home. Do I need to structure this environment more so that I, that I would with a child that's younger?
00:26:34
Speaker
to provide that level of support, make sure I'm consistently holding them accountable. I have consistent consequences, not with anger or shame. I'm not yelling or screaming. I'm keeping my cool, but I have consistent consequences so they can learn cause and effect thinking, but I might have to give them less freedom, even if they're older. So it's, it's, it's showing. so what we look at and we, we, we took some of this idea from Terry Levy and Michael Orleans, who are attachment therapists in Evergreen, Colorado. And they they call it the autonomy circle.
00:27:07
Speaker
And how it is is, it's like a spiral is how it is. And the baby is at the center of that, right? They have tons of support, tons of boundaries because they can't do anything on their own. And as they show they have knowledge, skills, self-control, and judgment, those boundaries move out, which means there is more freedom.
00:27:27
Speaker
So with freedom also comes responsibility, right? And they can manage those responsibilities. They can manage that freedom. They're ready. So kids, like if we have kids on the playground, this could be a special ed kid, or this could be a 504 kid, or this could be a gen ed kid. and they are chronically hitting kids, hurting kids, yelling at kids, not following adult directions, right? We've tried all of our tricks, nothing is working.
00:27:54
Speaker
Then they might be on a structured recess plan and that may be where they're on the blacktop for a while. That's where they get to play because there's more adult supervision and we can manage their behavior more. And what we tell the kids is, look, when we can trust that you can go out on the playground, you're not going to hurt anybody. You're following it all directions. That tells us you're ready to have more freedom. We can try that at some recesses. Once we see that you're consistently able to manage the blacktop, that tells us you're ready. So we have these conversations with the kids so that they understand what it is we're needing to see for them to have more freedom. And there's not any shame involved because we understand this is a maturity issue.
00:28:31
Speaker
This is them growing up. And we know that eventually they're going to get there. And we want them to get there. And we want to have a good relationship with them in the process. So that's kind of what that looks like on the school setting.
00:28:43
Speaker
And parents can do that at home. It's like they're not managing video games very well. They're not managing following adult directions. So that may be that they don't have access to video games or some of those things until you see that they can manage it. They can have some of those privileges and they can be respectful and appropriate. The majority of the time they're still kids, so they're not going to be perfect. We're not looking for that.
00:29:06
Speaker
We're looking for them to take some responsibility and ownership for when they make a mistake. So I don't know if that clarifies that a little bit. if It does. At the end of the day, it's all about growth. It's going through those stages, right? And and supporting those stages and milestones.
00:29:22
Speaker
And we find that by structuring their environment, they're not getting in trouble all the time. Because if you just give them the same freedom as ever, like if they're 10, but acting like a two-year-old and you give them the same freedom as a 10-year-old, they're getting in trouble all the time.
00:29:34
Speaker
Parents are getting called all the time. They're getting disciplined all the time. But if we structure their world, to a place where they can manage it, they're not getting in trouble all the time. We can teach them appropriate skills and slowly give them what they need. Well, we're kind of handing their issues to back to them.
00:29:49
Speaker
which is what we always want to be doing. I can't control them. I mean, it'd be nice sometimes. I don't really want to control them, but you know what I'm saying? Like they have to learn to control themselves. that And that is a that is a process that all of us have had to
Success Stories and Beliefs in Growth
00:30:03
Speaker
go through. yeah Every single one of us have had to go through that process. And we're still growing up, even as adults, we're maturing. And so we want them, we want to hand their issues back to them and let them figure it out with a lot of cariness, empathy, and support. But those boundaries are firm.
00:30:22
Speaker
They kind of call it the steel box with the velvet lining. that's That's what we want so that they start to have that growth. And we want we want to be a team on that because if we have one person letting them out of that steel box,
00:30:36
Speaker
it's like it didn't even exist. Like the boundary didn't happen. The boundary never happened. And so it's really important that all of the adults come together and figure out where those boundaries need to go with the kids. And we're not going to always agree that that is the reality. We all have our own issues or or histories or personalities and ideas and experiences with that child.
00:30:59
Speaker
But that's where Alina and I have found where we can come together, we can do what's in the best interest. And you do, you see growth all the time and it's so fun. Yeah. So fun. and And again, that can be like i when when we teach our educators, like that structure for some kids, maybe they just need a little bit of structure and for other kids, they need a lot. So some of our kids like that have a lot of cognitive delays, maybe they're nonverbal and they have lots of behaviors. They might be in a classroom with more adults,
00:31:29
Speaker
So there's less kids, more adults, they're doing more direct teaching, they have it an adult with them to kind of keep them where they need to be. And then as they mature and they're not running away from the classroom anymore, as they're as they're learning how to communicate a little bit, then they end up getting a little bit more freedom. So like in my extended resource room, we have you know ah a child that used to not have a lot of freedom, but now can go to all the recesses with his peers on his own, but then it has still has the academic support and extended resource room. But that was because We had to pull it all in, reteach, work on it, and slowly give them that freedom.
00:32:02
Speaker
Yeah. And that's what we want, right? We ultimately want kids out of the playground, having fun with their friends and being appropriate, knowing there might be some discipline here and there, but they're able to manage.
00:32:13
Speaker
Right there, that, that is what we want. So we're always working towards that, but some kids can be in and on again, off again, recess plans for a long time. It could be a couple of years for some until they work it out until they see like, okay, this isn't going anywhere. I have to work on it.
00:32:29
Speaker
I have to take some, we want them to take some of that responsibility of their own behavior Not of anybody else, it's just themselves. and And that leads me to my final question for you both. Yeah. And about what you look forward to, um like what gives you hope because you've been working with children with severe emotional and behavioral difficulties for quite some time. So what have you learned about their capacity to heal and mature and when they're given the right support, all of the examples that you've just provided?
00:33:05
Speaker
it's ah to me, that's amazing. Like I truly believe kids can heal immature. And because I believe that, and like, that's kind of the biggest thing that keeps us going because we do see it and you have to celebrate your wins. And sometimes you have to work with a team to be like, okay, this kid used to be physically assaulting us every day. He might still be throwing temper tantrums, but he's staying in his desk and not physically assaulting us. That's growth. Right. But it's that I have watched kids and we've seen kids go from needing full-time special education services to actually graduating without NIEP. We've watched kids this year alone. I've watched kids who are throwing temper tantrum eight hours a day who have gone weeks without throwing a temper tantrum.
00:33:48
Speaker
And then I've watched, like I said, the one kid who we couldn't even and talk to him about his disabilities. Now we can talk to em about his disabilities. Those are the things that give you hope. And I do have an inherent belief that kids can mature. they can grow and yes, for some kids with special needs, there might be some limited capacities for some of those kids, but we never wanna limit it more than we need to. We want them to be able to soar as far as they possibly can. That's right. Well, and we know, I think for Lena and I,
00:34:15
Speaker
we've we've we've watched all these kids make all these amazing you know amazing growth. That doesn't mean it's perfect. It doesn't mean that every single kid makes growth either. Like you can have amazing parents, amazing educators and have kids who still really struggle. So I don't want people to get this um unrealistic idea about things or start shaming themselves if they're really struggling with the child, because we know how hard that is, but we do see kids,
00:34:40
Speaker
make growth. And I think Lena and I always feel like there is a solution. We may not know what it is yet, but we keep working at it. Eventually we're going to figure it out. And I think we, i think we just love what we do. We love mental health and we love seeing that growth.
00:34:56
Speaker
And we love problem solving with teams, with teachers, with teachers and parents and, and working together and finding a way.
Resources and Future Collaborations
00:35:03
Speaker
How do people find you? What do you have a website or any type of resource for people to learn more?
00:35:10
Speaker
Absolutely. So we have our website, which is www.healingchildren.com. And we have online courses for educators where they could get credit through NNU.
00:35:22
Speaker
um we ah They could also get CEUs if they don't want to pay for credit. And we are going to have a webinar series for parents and educators together, which will be with us. We also have some people helping with middle school. And then we have an addiction specialist to help parents understand like when are they seeing a kid kind of dabbling into substance use and what can be done.
00:35:41
Speaker
How can they deal with that? And then dealing with the college age. We also, yeah. And we also do parent coaching. So if there's parents who just want some coaching on how to handle some things, we we do that as well too. And we do have parents who take our classes, even though they're geared toward educators. And we have a lot of educators who take those classes and then use those strategies at home as well too. so maybe they're not, we eventually will have parent classes on there too, but parents can take those as well too.
00:36:09
Speaker
Amazing. You're doing a wonderful job to support parents and educators. Thank you so much for taking the time to join us and to ah discuss maturity and special ed. And hopefully you can come back on and we can talk about other topics.
00:36:26
Speaker
Oh, that'd be awesome. We'd love that. Yes. be great. Thank you so much.