Class #5: The Halfway Point

We’ve reached the halfway point. Our classes will be completed in 34 days, and our first homestudy appointment is in 5 days.

Wow.

Class #5 covered a LOT of information. We learned that there is a difference between Punishment and Discipline. Punishment is “a behavior designed to stop a behavior”, and is associated with causing pain.

Discipline is “training intended to produce a specified character or pattern of behavior.” The word discipline comes from the Latin word, discere, meaning “to learn.”

We also learned there is a difference between RISK and SAFETY. Risk was described as having railroad tracks running through your backyard and you let your kids play around it. There’s a risk that something might happen to them. Safety is described as tying your child to those tracks. When determining whether a child is to be removed from a home, it needs to be determined whether what the RISK level is and what the SAFETY LEVEL is.

We then did an activity where we had to take 9 post-its, three each of three colors. All around the room were different discipline techniques to help children and youth manage their behaviors. On the post-it notes, we had to write down three childhood behaviors that really “push our buttons.” We were to write it down three times on the same colored post-it note.

My three (which ironically, happened to be the same three my husband wrote down):

1. Our 11-year old daughter whining.
2. Our 16-year old daughter talking back.
3. Our 16-year old son not doing his homework on time.

So I had 3 post-its of each of these. Each of us had to go around the room and place our post-it note on one discipline technique we thought we be a good solution to the behavior problem we wrote down:

1. Be a Role Model
2. Provide The Child With a Time Out
3. Provide Positive Reinforcement
4. Take Away Privileges
5. Provide Natural and logical Consequences
6. Ignore the behavior
7. Ensure that Restitution Occurs
8. Hold Family Meetings
9. Develop Behavior Charts
10. Grandma’s Rules (Do “this” and you’ll get to do “that”)
11. Help the Child Understand Feelings
12. Replace Negative Time with Positive Time
13. Provide Alternatives for Destructive Acting-Out Behaviors
14. Make a Plan for Change With A Child
15. Make a Plan for Change with the Child and a Professional

This activity helped us to realize that there are so many other solutions to helping not just foster and adoptive children, but our own children as well. We don’t have to resort to yelling matches, spanking, or other physical forms of punishment like we had when we were kids– because as we’re learning– physical punishment isn’t only against the law when fostering children– it doesn’t work on them anyways. They’ve been through too much already.

We then went through case studies of several real-life foster children and determined what discipline strategies would work best on them and why. We’re all quickly becoming experts! I can see that this PS-MAPP manual is going to be referred to often once we are matched with a child!

Homework for this week? LOTS of reading this week.

1. Roles and Responsibilities for Assuring Safety in Foster Care
2. Safety and Crisis Definitions in Iowa Department of Human Service’s Case Plan
3. Side Effects of Physical Punishment
4. Discipline and Behavior Management
5. Shared Parenting and Alliance Building: Benefits to the Children, Foster Parents and Parents of the Children in Foster Care
6. The Importance of Birth Parents to Children in Foster Care
7. Family Strengths for Parenting the Sexually Abused Child
8. The Impact of Sexual Abuse Upon Children in Care
9. Strategies for Parents to Implement in the Home to Help the Child Who is Acting Out Sexually
10. Family Structuring to Minimize Misinterpretation

Next week, it’s our turn to bring dinner for the class. For the ten classes, there were two couples to sign up each week to bring dinner, drinks and dessert for the class. Next week, its our turn. The other half that signed up with us was the single lady that quit the class, so we’re on our own. Any thoughts on dinner ideas? I didn’t think about the date when we signed up, but of course we picked the WEEK OF THANKSGIVING! Yuck.

So far, people have brought the following:
Week #1 – Chili, cornbread, cookies
Week #2 – Jimmy Johns bread, homemade meatballs and sauce, cheese, chips, cookies
Week #3 – Homemade enchiladas, beans, rice, cookies
Week #4 – Fried chicken, potatoes and gravy, green beans, cookies
Week #5 – Homemade Asian food (noodles, pork, chicken), salad, cookies

Week #6 – Prepared by ME – the person who doesn’t like to cook

HELP.