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Interpersonal Systems and Problem Behavior
Teachers can get stuck when they strictly adhere to individual-oriented approaches, approaches that have value most of the time but in certain cases do not work. Even the best-designed behavioral intervention and a curriculum tailored to a student’s interests can fail to curb a persistent problem behavior. An interpersonal systems approach is meant for just such times—when teachers feel stuck, when methods focusing on the individual student do not work, and when all the usual methods have failed.
With an interpersonal systems approach, instead of viewing problems as being located inside individuals, problems are viewed as reflections of a dysfunctional interpersonal system in the classroom. That is, when using an interpersonal systems approach, you look at a student as if you are looking into a mirror reflecting back something wrong with the classroom system. Doing so not only leads to exploring alternative methods designed to confront the problem behavior indirectly, it also prevents a student from being stigmatized as the bad student, class clown, or whatever.
Background
Surprisingly, there is virtually no research and only one book (by Alex Molnar and Barbara Lindquist) on using an interpersonal systems approach to address persistent problem behaviors in classrooms. Furthermore, the most comprehensive handbook on behavior and classroom management (edited by Carolyn Evertson and Carol Weinstein) makes no mention of an interpersonal systems approach to addressing problem behaviors in classrooms.
The approach itself is an outgrowth of family systems theory and a movement in counseling and clinical psychology during the mid- to late twentieth century. Critical of the then dominant focus on individuals and their pathology, several scholar-clinicians (e.g., Murray Bowen, Jay Haley, Don Jackson, Salvador Minuchin) developed family systems theory to refocus attention on dysfunctional patterns of interaction among family members. They found that doing so provided a better way to understand and treat chronic and serious problem behavior within families.
Classrooms too can develop dysfunctional patterns of interaction, and so the interpersonal systems approach for classrooms is a logical extension of family systems theory. As in the case of family therapy, using an interpersonal systems approach for persistent problem behaviors in classrooms leads to focusing on three things in particular, namely (1) reframing the problem behavior, (2) changing a pattern of interacting so as to change the system, and (3) developing better boundaries.
Reframing the Problem Behavior
When we take a systems approach, we realize that we are part of the dysfunctional system needing changing. That includes the way we define problems. In particular, the negative ways we define problems can contribute to maintaining the problem. Furthermore, often the problems themselves can be reframed to take into account positive aspects of the problematic situation, thereby helping considerably.
Take, for example, the case of Dennis, a first-grader who before entering first grade had been labeled by everyone in entirely negative ways (as being violent and impulsive, as having ADHD and language delays). Prior to first grade, Dennis had an aide assigned to him, and he and his aide essentially spent all their time together, so that Dennis was never integrated into the kindergarten classroom community. For Dennis, the kindergarten classroom was dysfunctional for not helping him acquire social skills and for preventing him from becoming a contributing member of the classroom community.
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