Crisis Managment

The training was disappointing.

It could have been great. I would not have learned much that was new, but it would have been good.

As a teacher myself I found myself automatically re-writting the curriculum.

The problem with the curriculum was that it was a two-day curriculum, smashed into one day, taught be good social workers who understand it, but have not been teaching it long. We needed to be focused on the fact that we were not learning how to be good foster parents, or on how to deal with a kid who did not do their chores. We were dealing with that specific situation in which a child is getting aggitated and yells, "I'm not doing my chores and you can't make me!"

Maybe the child is just spoiling for a fight. Maybe he has some excess energy and wants to yell. Maybe they are working up to a real rage and about to become dangerous.

So the first thing on the curriculum should have been: what is the difference between a child who is complaining about chores and a child who is escalating whose refusal to do chores is simply a part of that escalation?

Sigh.

I filled out an evaluation for the social workers at the end of the seven hour day, but I will write a long email too. Don't worry...I can be nice about it.

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By the way, for those of you who have switched to the Beta version of Blogger, can you switch without having to do much for a while? Or do you have to immediately start learning a whole list of new things?