Challenging Behaviors on the Rise

04/03/2015

Challenging Behaviors on the Rise

Allow for the possibility that the best of you is still inside you, waiting to emerge.
Lin Manuel Miranda

"Signs point to an increase in challenging and difficult behaviors in young children, such as excessive tantrums, lack of impulse control, and aggression with peers," writes Michelle Forrester and Kay Albrecht in their book, S.E.T. Social Emotional Tools for Life. "Experienced teachers report that working with children is more difficult now than in the past, and that they are faced with behaviors that don't seem responsive to teaching techniques that have worked before.

"Psychologists, pediatricians, and early childhood intervention specialists confirm this reported increase in the number of children with developmental disorders. As diagnostic techniques improve, these disorders are being identified earlier. Autism is just one example of a developmental disorder that is on the rise. The rate of autism is 1 in 88, up from 1 in 2,500 twenty years ago. This pervasive developmental disorder is characterized by a range of delays in the emotional, social, language, physical and/or cognitive domains of development. It includes disturbances in one's ability to relate to others, and is often accompanied by language delays and sometimes by cognitive impairment."

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