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The Nurtured Heart Approach:
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This page last revised
November 19, 2006. |
| This is the second in Tina Feigal's series of articles about the Nurtured Heart Approach (NHA) created by Howard Glasser. |
As stated in the introductory article, The Nurtured Heart Approach is based on the concept that intense children are subconsciously seeking the emotional energy of the adults in their lives. If you could take a trip inside the brain of the ADHD or Oppositional Defiant child, you would see numerous fast-firing neurons producing in the child a hunger for activity, intensity, and speed. When an adult reacts to a child who is misbehaving, the usual response is filled with emotional intensity in the form of a raised voice, big gestures, and wide eyes. The adult's emotional intensity "matches" the intensity inside the child's very active brain, which satisfies the child's hunger for greater intensity from the adult. Unfortunately, this adult response inadvertently rewards the undesired behavior.
In Psychology 101 we learn from study after study that when behavior is rewarded, it is repeated. If we want to see intense children repeat desired behaviors, then we, as parents and teachers, need to reward them with intensity that will "match" the activity in their brains. The Nurtured Heart Approach teaches adults to add the necessary intensity, but the intensity is given to the positives in order to truly create the reward. As anyone who has ever parented or taught a challenging child will tell you,
The Nurtured Heart Approach offers a whole new script for the future of families and schools. I find that adults, whose children are discovering that they can get strong emotional energy for good behavior, are more content than they ever thought possible. Their children are doing the previously unimaginable, seeking energy through positive behaviors. You may be wondering whether "opportunistically" acknowledging successes while providing predictable consequences isn't a lot of work. It is. And it's the most worthwhile work a parent or teacher can do. The payoffs include easier and more satisfying adult-child relationships and most importantly, successful, whole, and happy children.
In my training and coaching sessions I teach adults how to add intensity to the positives, so that they truly download as a success in the child’s heart. The positive statements gain effectiveness when they are expressed with more intense emotion, and are delivered in a "When you…I feel…because" format. Here are some examples of language to use that add intensity to the positives.
When we take the opportunity to give heartfelt appreciation to the child multiple times each day, we strengthen the heart-to-brain message of success, rewarding the behavior we want, and increasing its frequency. This all sounds a bit technical, but when one thinks about it, we are dealing with an existing brain-body connection that is reflected in the child’s visible physiological responses of anger, rebellion, and even rage. It makes sense that the solution is for parents and teachers to mold a new physiological response.
Transforming the Difficult Child: The Nurtured Heart Approach, by Howard Glasser.
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THIS Page NHA Cause / Effects |
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