Welcome to the Counselor's Page
Counselor: Robin Blumberg
Ms. Blumberg is at Cashell on Mondays, Wednesdays, and the first and third Thursdays each month. She works at another school on the other days.
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October 2011
Making Friends
There are many reasons why children have trouble making and keeping friends throughout their childhood, so much so that hundreds of books are written about this topic.
I will attempt to give a few ideas that might be useful to consider aiding your child with this effort. There are many variables, some you can control and numerous ones that are out of your sphere of influence that can affect how your child makes friends. Normal developments can, in fact, encompass a wide range of difficult, troublesome, and shifting behaviors, some useful and fruitful and some that detract from making friends.
For many children it may feel like making friends is easy and they feel successful. Other children may get some things basically right and see the peer world as harsh and cruel. Hierarchies dominate the life of the classroom; cliques and crowd often rule the roost. Recognizing that some of these unpleasant experiences are part of the territory at any given age will give you, a leg up. When you know what to expect and when, you are ahead of the game. When you get a sense of when to step in and when your child should work things out alone, you are in step with reality. At times you will decide to be the social secretary, the adviser, the devils advocate or the ally.
Because the popularity hierarchy is a main organizational feature of life at school, many children become sensitive to their relative status, and most are affected by the shifting sands of peer acceptance. What may help is giving your child opportunities to be the best they can be, develop many interests, and pursue a variety of out-of-school activities, so that they can shine and feel good about who they are. When they find others with similar interests at some point they learn how to be a good friend. Once they become concerned about what they can do to contribute to the happiness of their friends, they start to grow socially. Many children find that if they have a few close buddies, then the popularity issues are less in their minds forefront.
According to Harry Stack Sullivan, often called the father of American psychiatry, "chumship" is the first time a child acquires a sense of true intimacy and trust outside the family circle, and that to have such a relationship is an important aspect of growing up. He believes that a child learns things that he will later apply in the cross-sex relationships that develop during adolescence. What we can gather from this information is for parents to take their childs best friend seriously. The children learn a great deal about the give-and-take of friendship, and about how relationships can survive fights and disagreements. Teaching your child how to fight fair, how to be a good listener, how to calm themselves down, all contribute toward keeping their dearest friends.
It is wise, especially for parents of boys to encourage your sons to talk. To most boys sharing information can be a sign of weakness and to engage in any kind of intimate disclosure, from talking about feelings of unhappiness or anxiety to seeking help with, or understanding about a problem. Most boys suffer in silence. It is a good idea to spend some relaxed, parent-child hanging-out together. INDIRECT approaches are usually more fruitful to use with boys. Wash the car, unpack the groceries together, go to a baseball game together, talk about your day, and he may open up to discuss his day. Discover when it is that your child feels most in the mood to talk. Not everyone is expressive when it is most convenient for you. If you read the signals, you may realize that when hes tired and ready for bed, your child get talkative. Make yourself available at those times and be ready to listen.
Accept the fact that your child can sometimes find it easier to talk to their friends parents. With a shy and sensitive child, your childs friends may be better sources of information about their classroom life. By welcoming them into your home and being a pleasant but unobtrusive presence, you may learn a lot about what is going on during your childs day. Make your home open and inviting to your childrens parents and friends.
There are times parents are concerned that their child is hurting themselves by not participating in sports, and that they will loose social opportunities. Realize that some children do not engage in sports as they perceive that their skills inept or inadequate with others, and when they play they feel bad about themselves. Help your child find other interests and hobbies so they dont see themselves as failures. Many boys just assume they can become masters on computer games and often are not as bothered by the competitive sports endeavors as their parents are. Encourage your child to learn how to play an instrument or a different activity like swimming or Tae Kwon Do, or track and field. Expose your child to many activities and let them decide whether taking part in a sport or other competitive activity is truly important to them. Some parents become intensely invested in their childrens athletic achievements but dont realize what there children want. Listen to your child.
Finally a very helpful technique parents can use to help their children make friends is to assist them in reading social situations with greater accuracy. If your child comes home very angry and frustrated ask them open-ended questions like: "What went on today?" "And how did that start?" What do you think started the whole problem?"
Your mission is to review the bit of social business that turned nasty and break it down into discrete steps, to underscore the point that things dont "just happen" magically, but can in fact be understood as the end result of a series of interactions among two or more people.
Then you will be in a better position to give him some help working out how he might have solved the problem differently. Have your child then access from memory those strategies that may have helped in the past. If your child becomes very angry and can’t solve problems without hurting others then try rewarding them when they do see their anger triggers and can calm down and not act rashly.
Thinking the right way about the whole matter of friendship and peer acceptance is at the core of good social behavior. Help your child learn to think better and to increase his or her repertoire of good, adaptive strategies. Engage your child in conversations about alternative strategies. Once you have a clear picture of an incident that left your child feeling angry, begin by stating your position regarding her behavior and promoting a little perspective-taking: "Knocking someone down is not the right thing to do. How do you think Bob felt about that?"
Ask for many suggestions about what else could have been done and role-play some of the ideas. Often puppets can open a childs imagination. Applaud when your child gets better at calming themselves down and using the techniques they practiced with you. Try to always focus on what they did right and less on what went wrong.
Children need to learn to apologize as well. Unfortunately children remember negative encounters over the positive ones. I hear students discuss problems with friends that occurred years ago.
I suggest you use books to infuse your values and ideas to help your child navigate a pretty complex social world. Remember that children learn when their feelings get hurt and when a friend abandons them. Sometimes the most difficult situations are the ones that have the greatest learning potential. Stories can be helpful as they can be listened to with a more objective point of view of things. Explain how they get past conflicts, accidents and misunderstandings that happen all the time within any friendship pair or small group. Being a parent isnt easy. Only you know what your child is about and it is up to you to guide and advocate when you see that they need assistance. Understand that sometimes talking to a professional, be it a therapist or counselor, might be useful in finding new ideas and strategies for your childs’ specific issues. If your child is actively getting into trouble or seems depressed, find someone to help sort out some of the issues.
September 2011
Does Your Child Have Trouble Staying Focused?
I am writing this particular article early in the school year, as over the last twenty plus years, as a school and clinical therapist, I am often asked by parents and other significant adults as to whether their child might have Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). After you read this article, you may decide to look into this issue with other professionals, give me a call to discuss your concerns, or just note the information. I am not a physician; however I often refer to manuals that doctors will use to determine if a child may have some of the attributes of ADHD. You may have suspected over the last few years that your child shows or has exhibited some of the symptoms. Often we see very bright and energetic children who during their preschool years go from task to task, rarely sticking with the tasks for more than a few minutes. Some also exhibit these behaviors in multiple settings and over a long period of time. The children who do become identified by qualified examiners usually have an idea that they may be different from some of their peers. They may be aware that they have trouble focusing on just one thing at a time, or have trouble paying attention to their parents and or teacher for more than a few minutes. They realize that adults usually tell them they should think before they act, or some see that they can not sit still without holding something or moving. Still others may not have trouble sitting still but the focusing and attention to taskscan be a real problem for them as well as the need to have others help them keep track of their assignments and or belongings. Still others will also complain that they dislike and can not write in school. These children state that it is hard to compose any written work beyond a sentence or two.
What is often puzzling to the parents I have spoken, their children are very bright, seem to remember interesting facts they learn in school and on family excursions. These parents might say that when their child finds something interesting, such as a video game, that they are able to focus. Frequently these children excel in many subjects, and are funny and interesting young people. What we do hear from parents and caregivers, is that their child find their own thoughts, sights or nearby sounds to be distracting. The child may tell their parents that they have trouble concentrating on their tests or that it is hard to listen to their teacher when there are so many other things to pay attention to in the classroom. Their teacher may have commented that your child plays with things on or in their desk, looks out the window often, or seems self-distracted. Parents might hear that their child blurts out answers in class, before the questions have been completed. Some of these children have difficulty awaiting turn in group situations, causing them to have problems making and keeping friends.
Children often equate their ADHD to watching television. These children say it is like switching channels on a TV, and not being able to stay tuned to one channel. The children complain that lots of thoughts keep popping into their mind, one right after the other. That it is hard to do what they need to do in school and maintain attention throughout their homework time. These children may complain to you that they hear, “Why did you do that?” and they notice other adults or peers get angry with them.
If some of these features sound like your child, please do not be concerned but do read on. Ask yourself if these inattentive symptoms have been present before age 7 and that you have noticed them at school and in another setting. Are you hearing from their teachers that directions need to be repeated most of the time and that they make careless mistakes in their work and often do not follow through with most of the tasks assigned; that they appear as if their mind is elsewhere. You might notice that your child can not follow multiple step directions and that you have to redirect them each night to complete their homework.
Before we jump to any major conclusion at school we suggest you talk to your child's current and former teachers and other adult friends and see if they notice on a consistent basis the behavioral signs I've mentioned. The good news is that there are many things our qualified teachers can do to assist your child and help them be successful in school.
It is recommended that if your child does have ADHD, that you take steps to help them and also to rule out emotional problems that may be contributing to their inattentiveness, impulsivity and or hyperactivity. It is also wise to read up on the subject and also consider having a meeting with your physician, and bring your child's report card and other school reports. I highly encourage parents to read, Taking Charge of ADHD by Barkley; Your Hyperactive Child by Barbara Ingersoll; Larry Silver's Advice to Parents on Attention deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. I also have books that you can review on this subject. I believe that you are your child’s best advocate and reading up and asking questions to others that are schooled in this subject will enable you to make wise educational choices for your child.
It is nearly impossible to give you all the information you will need on this or other social/emotional topics, which is why I suggest you call me before school starts (between 8:15-8:45) or immediately at the end of the day to schedule an appointment to discuss any questions you might have. I will be working at Cashell on Mondays and Wednesday, alternating on Thursdays with another school. It is also a good idea to email me and I promise to get back to you within 24 hours. If there is an emergency, the school secretaries will give me the message usually within the hour. I look forward to working with your great children and your lovely community.
Robin Blumberg
Cashell Counselor