Supporting Young Children with Challenging Behaviors

This article will help parents help their child learn to manage strong emotions and reactions as they become aware of themselves as separate individuals from their parents and the other important people in their world.

How you react when a child lashes out has an effect on whether he will continue to respond to distress in the same way, or learn better ways to handle feelings so they don’t become overwhelming. This explains how adults should respond when children lash out.

This page provides links to behavior intervention resources, including guides, tools, issue briefs, videos & webinars, and general resources.

This is information on a resource available through the IL Early Intervention Clearinghouse. This book presents in-depth background information and strategies to help pre-service and practicing teachers understand, prevent, and address the behavior problems found so often in today’s primary schools and child care centers.

This topical guide will introduce you to important books, videos, and information resources.

The Challenging Behaviors Tool Kit will provides strategies and resources to address challenging behaviors and help provide support during difficult situations.

In this podcast episode, Dr. Angela Searcy shares the importance of considering context when thinking about challenging behavior. Dr. Searcy also shares how the “Push Past It” Approach from her book can be helpful for educators and professionals as a tool to be intentional when addressing challenging behaviors.

This document is the Routine Based Support Guide which was developed to assist teachers in problem-solving a plan to support young children who are having challenging behavior.

This article shows how early childhood educators can use strategies such as teaching empathy, discussing conflict, and developing expectations to support all young children and reduce their challenging behavior.

This article explains that parents and teachers can help children learn to cope with their feelings of anger and to express them appropriately.

This page provides information, videos, and links to an interactive training curriculum that provides current and future early childhood professionals with tools and strategies for guiding preschool children’s behavior in positive ways.

This article, geared towards parents, goes over what typical behavior looks like, helps parents recognize true aggression, and lists strategies to help your toddler with aggression.

This article presents 12 suggestions that may help parents provide children with the guidance they need.

Controlling anger and impulse is perhaps the most difficult task of emotional literacy. This article explains how teachers can play a significant role in helping children learn to control their anger and impulses and to handle disappointment in appropriate ways.

This digest explores what is known about the components of children’s anger, factors contributing to understanding and managing anger, and the ways teachers can guide children’s expressions of anger.

This article provides information regarding behavior and how to help manage children’s behavior at home.

This 5-minute video podcast gives a couple of ideas and tips to help transitions run smoothly for both you and the children in your classroom.

This article aims to provide an understanding that all behavior is a form of communication that has meaning and every behavior can be described by its form and function.

This 30-minute video presents that all behaviors communicate messages. Children need teachers who model and encourage respectful interactions.