Interpreting Behavioral Relapses
By Mary Beth Hewitt
This article is reprinted with the permission of Mary Beth Hewitt. It is reprinted from CHOICES, volume 2, page 19. See the bottom of this page for more information.
9/02/01
It’s time for the Committee on Special Education meeting and/or grade level meeting where decisions will be made about placements for next year. Suddenly, your star pupil, the one who has made so much progress this year, starts backsliding. What is going on? Why are old inappropriate behaviors or poor work habits resurfacing now, just before you’re ready to recommend a less restrictive program? After all, isn’t this what he’s/she’s been working toward all year?
I vividly remember a discussion I had with a student near the end of the school year. Evie had been in our self-contained program for emotionally handicapped students for three years. All she ever talked about was how much she wanted to go back to her home school. Her junior year, she made significant behavioral and academic progress and that goal was well within her reach. She was fully aware that the staff members were going to recommend that she return to her home school for her senior year.
About a month before the meeting, Evie started “backsliding". Her surly attitude returned; she stopped doing her homework; she became argumentative and seemed almost driven to start problems with her peers. The staff members were growing concerned. Maybe we had made a mistake and Evie wasn’t ready to return.
While I was speaking to her one day, I expressed our concern and confusion as to the recent turn of events. “Evie, I’m confused. "It’s almost like you’re trying to sabotage your return to your home school” I said. “Miss Hewitt,” she said softly, “all my life I’ve been good at being bad. Now I’ve been good for a while and I’m afraid that I won’t be able to keep it up. I’m afraid I’ll be bad at being good. I know the bad Evie, but I really don’t know the good Evie.”
Suddenly, her behavior made perfect sense. Evie had made significant changes in the way she behaved, and those changes had required enormous effort on her part. In anticipation of reaching her long awaited goal, return to home school district, she was scared that she would not be able to maintain her progress. Faced with this uncertainty, she was returning to her habitual behavior patterns. As her old behaviors resurfaced, she viewed them as evidence that she wouldn’t be successful and was just giving up.
As I thought about it, this type of response to change and progress is not an unusual phenomenon. In fact, it is a fairly normal response. Whenever an individual makes a serious attempt to change a habitual behavior (overeating, smoking, behaving a different way, etc.), it requires enormous effort to establish new patterns. Although they are pleased with the changes, the new behavior is uncomfortable and requires constant vigilance. There comes a point at which the individual has to decide if he/she is going to continue to make the effort or return to more comfortable, established patterns. As the stress of an impending change increases, habitual behaviors may return. These old behaviors are comfortable and the individual often thinks, “Who am I trying to kid? I’ll never be able to maintain it so I might as well give up!”
When faced with a student who is “backsliding”, many
times just interpreting the behavior like I did with Evie is enough to
turn the tide. Once students have some understanding of why they
are returning to their old ways (and until you talk, they
are often just confused as you are!), you’ll be able to work through
their fears. As for Evie, once we had decoded her behavior, we helped
her work through her fears. She did return to her home school and
successfully completed her senior year!
**If you like
the tips of Mary Beth Hewitt, you can purchase one or both volumes of CHOICES
(with about 25-30 of her articles in each) by going to the web site www.edutech.org./choices/choicesf.htm.
, calling 315/332-7255, or faxing
315/332-2117.
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