“The Explosive Child” has become an integral part of how I support students who need extra practice with skills to be able to do their best in the classroom. The quote that has really driven how I change my response to “behaviorally challenging” students is, “Behaviorally challenging kids are challenging because they’re lacking the skills to not be challenging” (pg. 9). Using this quote, I was able to adapt how I responded to the top three challenges I had with one of my students. I understood the skills he was lacking that caused him to react to situations in the way he did. This in turn helped me understand how to best support him. This relates to Vygotsky's idea on the zone of proximal development. These are skills that are too difficult for children to master on their own, but with guidance and encouragement from a person who has those skills they can quickly move to the independent stage.
When Carlos got upset by his classmates he would start yelling or just say, “Shut up!” really loudly. At first I would explain to Carlos that we need to switch our language and come to me when something was bothering him. This didn’t seem to work and it was hard for me to comprehend why he was responding with screams and inappropriate language each time he was trying to express something to his classmates. After going back to the quote, I understood the skill that he was lacking, as referenced by Ross Greene on page 9 was language processing and communication skills. He clearly had difficulty expressing concerns, needs, or thoughts in words. Rathern than saying, “It bothers me when you talk loudly because it gives me a headache” Carlos would result to “Shut up!”. I realized that asking Carlos to take a break or just change his language wouldn’t do anything to develop this skill. So instead, we have been actively working on phrases and words he can use when he is experiencing frustration to communicate his thoughts.
Second, whenever Carlos faced a challenge or got frustrated, he would respond only with his emotions. For example, if he was struggling answering a reading comprehension question, he would tighten up his fists and his face would get really red. Or, if someone teased him he would respond in the same way. My initial reaction would have been to have him take a break and relax his body but I realized that wasn’t getting at the root of the issue because he would always react in the same way. Thinking about Greene’s quote about lacking a skill, I realized that he had difficulty managing emotional response to frustration in order to think rationally. The skill he was lacking was using thought in finding solutions rather than pure emotion. Therefore, Greene’s idea of finding the lagging skill has helped me understand that I need to work on incorporating thought into decision making skills rather than focusing on the emotion.
Last, at times it seemed that Carlos “knew what buttons to push”. If I did a countdown from 5, he would be the only one continuously talking. Or, when everyone was seated, he would run around the room or get up and wander as he pleased. However, thinking about the concept of lagging skills, it became clear that Carlos would do things that seemed irritating at times when he was having trouble adapting or being flexible to the situation at hand. So rather than thinking about it as “why is he intentionally trying to irritate me” my mindset has shifted to “what skills can I teach him to improve on his flexibility and adaptability in new situations”. 
Meghna, this is exactly how you want to use Greene's work! I know this is what we discussed when we met, but I am delighted to read how you are using the idea of lagging skills to think about what Carlos needs and how to meet those needs in order to really help him. It won't be a magic fix, but this is the way to improvement. I'll be interested to hear how it's going when we visit.
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