#17 - Dr Ross Greene on Collaborative and Proactive Solutions (CPS) for School Can’t

Dr. Ross Greene, founder of the Collaborative and Proactive Solutions (CPS) model joins host Leisa Reichelt and guest Louise Rogers from School Can't Australia in this episode of the School Can't Experience podcast.

Dr. Greene explains the philosophy behind CPS, focusing on identifying and solving problems that cause challenging behaviours rather than just addressing the behaviours themselves. He discusses practical strategies for engaging children and young people in problem-solving, the importance of seeking information from the young person, and the importance of not imposing solutions unilaterally. 

Dr. Greene also highlights creative methods for communicating with reluctant children and the role of mutual satisfaction in finding effective solutions.

We also discuss how to involve schools in the CPS process, and potentially readjust our expectations around school attendance as we learn more.

00:00 Welcome to the School Can't Experience Podcast
00:27 Introduction to Dr. Ross Greene and CPS Model
01:13 Understanding the CPS Approach
01:58 Addressing School Refusal and Unsolved Problems
04:19 Collaborative Problem Solving with Kids
07:37 Creative Strategies for Engaging Kids
11:01 Prioritizing and Solving Multiple Problems
19:36 Involving Schools in the CPS Process
27:11 Managing Expectations and Flexibility
39:01 Resources and Final Thoughts


Recommended Resources
- Lives in the Balance (CPS Resources) - https://livesinthebalance.org/
- The Essential Conversation by Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot - http://www.saralawrencelightfoot.com/essential-conversation.html

Transcript

Leisa Reichelt: 0:05

Hello and welcome to the School Can't Experience podcast. I'm Leisa Reichelt, and this podcast is brought to you by the School Can't Australia community. Caring for a young person who is struggling to attend School Can't be a really stressful and isolating experience. But you are not alone. Thousands of parents across Australia and many more around the world face similar challenges and experiences every day. Today I'm joined by Louise Rogers from School Can't Australia, and we are very excited to share our conversation with Dr. Ross Greene. Now, Dr. Greene's work will be familiar to many of us already. Dr. Greene is the founder of the CPS or the Collaborative and Proactive Solutions model, which is an evidence-based, compassionate approach to understanding and supporting our kids. He's the author of several influential books, including The Explosive Child and Lost At School. And his philosophy has been a really important influence for School Can't Australia's perspective on how we can best support our kids and young people who are struggling to attend school. I hope you enjoy this conversation. Dr. Ross Greenee, we are absolutely delighted and very excited to have the opportunity to talk to you on our podcast today. Thank you so much for joining us.

Ross Greene: 1:12

Glad to be here.

Leisa Reichelt: 1:15

If there are any parents who are listening who aren't very familiar with CPS, and I know lots of folk out there are already quite familiar, I would love for you just to briefly explain what is CPS, how does it work and how does it differ from more traditional approaches to parenting?

Ross Greene: 1:33

Well, um, the biggest shift that's involved in the CPS model is we're not particularly focused on a kid's behavior. We're focused on the problems that are causing the behavior. Um, that's right. Concerning behaviors are caused by problems, we call them unsolved problems, and that there's the giveaway. If it's an unsolved problem, it needs to be solved. So a good example of a behavior is what we might call school refusal. And we wouldn't work on school refusal in the CPS model in the same way that we wouldn't work on hitting or kicking or spitting or screaming or swearing or whining or pouting or sulking or withdrawing. Those are behaviors that tell us that a kid is struggling or that a kid is in distress, or good calling them stress responses. We more typically call them frustration responses, but I view those as pretty interchangeable. We need to focus on the problems that are causing the behavior and solving them. When a kid is refusing to go to school, there is something that's making it hard for them to go to school. If we don't focus on that something, if all we do is try to incentivize going to school, we will never find out what's making it hard for the kid to go to school. And I would be skeptical of the long term effectiveness of simply incentivizing a kid to go to school when there is something getting in their way, that must be very important. A big theme of the CPS model is'kids do well if they can'. We could adapt that to'kids go to school if they can'. Um, if a kid isn't going to school, something must be getting in their way. So it's really easy to jump into consequences, which is traditional parenting. We'll reward you for going to school in some way. We will punish you if you don't. That's incentivizing. I think that misses the forest for the trees. We need to get at what's making it hard for the kid to go to school if we want to have reliable school attendance at some point.

Leisa Reichelt: 3:53

Right. Well, I don't think there's a single thing that you've said there that Louise or I could disagree with to be honest. In the situation then where we have parents whose children are struggling to go to school, that's the behavior that's not the problem. And I imagine there might be multiple problems contributing to going to school. What do we do? What's the next step? We're recognize that it's not that the going to school isn't the problem. How do we start to work out what those problems are?

Ross Greene: 4:21

The first thing we gotta do is recognize that we have a partner in all of this. That's the kid who's having difficulty going to school. They probably know more about what's making it hard for them to go to school than anybody. They are going to be our number one source of information on what's making it hard for them to go to school, which is why we describe collaborative and proactive solutions or CPS as an'ask the kid' model. And we want to gather information from the kid about what's making it hard for them to go to school proactively, is why another mantra of the CPS model is'don't be late'. The ideal time to deal with a kid who's having difficulty going to school is not just as the kid is having difficulty going to school, horrible timing. Uh, everybody's already escalated and predictably so. By the way, and this isn't the first time the kid has had difficulty going to school, we always say that an unsolved problem is only a surprise the first time it happens after that, it's not a surprise anymore. So nobody's shocked that this kid is having difficulty going to school. Likelihood is that it's a longstanding problem, right? And the fact that the kid is still having difficulty going to school is proof positive the problem isn't solved yet. But often it relates to'ask the kid', us adults feel that it is our job to know what's getting in the kid's way our job to know what to do about it. That often leads the most important person out of the equation, the kid. So we have problems to solve and much better to solve them collaboratively, meaning with the full involvement of the kid, proactively meaning not in the heat of the moment. That's why we call the model Collaborative and Proactive Solutions.

Leisa Reichelt: 6:03

So that'd be sitting down on the weekends and having this conversation rather than on a Monday morning.

Ross Greene: 6:09

Monday morning would be bad timing. I like making appointments with kids to have a conversation with them, and I like letting them know what we want to talk with'em about and understand better. Those are actually the exact words. Because even if you're trying to solve a problem proactively, if you're springing the topic on the kid, it still has a heat of the moment feel to it, right? I like to let kids know we really would love to understand a little bit better what's making it hard for you to go to school? Is there a time that we can find to talk about that? And then you and the kid are picking a time together and we gotta get this done. And by the way, there are some people who would say that doing that takes a lot of time. I always like to point out to them, look how much time you're spending trying to get to kid to go to school with that problem still unsolved.

Leisa Reichelt: 6:58

Absolutely. I know there would be a lot of folk who maybe didn't recognize signs early enough. and weren't able to engage a method like this early enough. And so at the point where they are trying to talk to the child about why they're struggling to go to school, the child is very reluctant or possibly unable to sit down and have this conversation. Do you have any guidance on what we do in a situation? I remember a point with my son, I'd say, could we sit down at some point and talk about school? He'd just go, no, and shut the door in my face. how do we approach that sort of situation?

Ross Greene: 7:39

Um, I wanna word it, well, there's something I'd like to understand better, so I, don't know if that would've made a difference with your son, but all we're trying to do is understand. Right. And by the way, if a kid is initially not particularly responsive to the idea of talking about it, can get creative. In the CPS model, there is such a premium on hearing the voice of the kid. We know well that there are some kids who perhaps because it's a difficult topic because they have lots of experience with adults not being particularly interested in what they have to say, or having their concerns be dismissed or disregarded. You know, we're doing this for the first time, they're not jumping for joy and saying, finally you're gonna listen to what I have to say. They are skeptical and good for them. Right. So we do have to get creative. Sometimes if the kid will sit with us, we can guess. what might be hard about going to school. And they can, they don't even have to respond in words, they can respond with fingers. Right. Some kids that I've worked with were willing to text with me, even though they were not all that enthusiastic about talking face to face. Some kids were willing to talk with me by Zoom with the cameras off, but not with the cameras on. Some kids would fill out a survey for me, reason I'm having difficulty going to school is A, there are kids who are not kind to me. B, parts of the school day are very difficult for me. C, there are assignments that are hard for me. D there are teachers that are hard for me. All they have to do is circle. So I think that we can get creative with that. Creativity is not gonna see you through every single time, but it will see you through a lot of the time. if it doesn't see us through, I might change the unsolved problem to'difficulty talking with mom or dad about difficulty going to school' and see if that's something the kid will talk with us about. Bottom line is we've gotta get the conversation going. And it might not be through the spoken word either because the kid can talk but isn't, or in the case of non-speaking kids, because they can't. we're very creative in this model, mostly because, you know, it's so easy to just say, alright, I'll decide. as the parent or as the adult, the kid's voice is critical. We're not gonna be able to, we've proven solve this problem without the kid, we're gonna have to get creative.

Leisa Reichelt: 10:17

Yeah, just reflecting on what you're saying about how sometimes you need to step it back to saying the problem isn't even about the problems to do with going to school. The problem is I can't talk to you about this

Ross Greene: 10:26

Correct.

Leisa Reichelt: 10:27

resonates a lot with me, I think, and I've found that you have to keep going back and back and back to the root cause to create something that feels safe enough to talk about and then you kind of earn the trust back really, don't you? To be able to talk about the harder

Ross Greene: 10:41

things. That's a very good point. I know that difficulty going to school may be the most pressing, urgent issue but if a kid won't talk about that, they may talk about why they don't usually eat what you've made for dinner. At least we've gotten the talking ball rolling.

Leisa Reichelt: 11:02

That kind of leads on, I think, to another interesting question, which is that a lot of the times with our kids who are struggling to go to school, it's not one problem. It's a bundle of different problems. I think we know of one parent whose child had 70 different reasons why, school was challenging for them. If we were doing one of your surveys and the child comes back and responds and says, there's a dozen different reasons why I can't go to school. What do we do? What's our next step? How do we start to unpick that?

Ross Greene: 11:32

We want to hear about all of them. We want to keep track of all of them. The fact that there are a lot of them doesn't mean that every single one of them needs to be solved for the kid to be able to go to school. Some might solve by solving others. We will, after we hear what all of those factors are, ask the kid to prioritize for us, which is getting in the way the most, which is most important. There are gonna be circumstances in which we have to address all 12. that's not necessarily the norm, but we take'em as they come. We want to hear about all of them. And by the way, that's another good strategy. We don't have to talk about them, I just want to know what they are. You don't have to tell me in words. You could write it down, text it to me. If we've got a kid who's been having difficulty going to school for a very long time and hasn't been communicating with us for a very long time, this is all not gonna happen in one fell swoop just because we adults have taken a different approach. That's what's amazing. people think that this approach means that you've brought out your magic wand, right? It's the CPS magic wand. Nope. We are still entering into this under the same circumstances that are the reason we needed it in the first place, right? And we're gonna have to understand that. The kid hasn't talked about it for a long time. Just because we're trying a different approach, doesn't mean they're gonna start singing.

Leisa Reichelt: 13:05

Yeah, I think that's. an important message, Because if we sit down and try to attempt this and it doesn't work the first time doesn't mean that the methods failed. It means we need to

Ross Greene: 13:15

No.

Leisa Reichelt: 13:15

to our creative box of ways that we can approach this.

Ross Greene: 13:18

Yeah. Well, a kid who's not talking is giving us information, right. We're paying attention to at what point did the kid start not talking? Was it when I, asked him or her or them if they would sit down with me so that I could understand something better? Was it when I told them what the topic was? Was it when I started the problem solving process? At what point did they balk that tells me, all right, we've just hit a pressure point. Now, right at that moment, we can say if the kid is still there with us, tell me what just happened. I noticed that question caused you to stop. Right. So there's bottom line is there's all kinds of nuances when it comes to having any human being, kids included, having any human being talk about something that's difficult for them or that they may be embarrassed or ashamed about, or something that's painful for them. This is any human being, just because we're trying a different approach doesn't mean they're gonna start talking right away. This is the empathic part of the model, right? A kid who's going to school, a kid who's having difficulty going to school is in distress, Whatever their demeanor is they're in distress and we need to approach them as if they're in distress. a kid who's not talking is another indicator of something. Not always clear what it is. Maybe the kid will tell me what the something is. Maybe the kid will drop a few hints. Whatever they're dropping, I've got info that's gonna help me the next time.

Leisa Reichelt: 15:05

Amazing. Okay, often talk about resilience for our kids, but maybe it's resilience for us in gently trying to have these conversations and take the information that's being put down as it happens.

Ross Greene: 15:15

The co-regulation folks may have a point good to stay on top of your own emotions. Let's face it, if you have a kid who's having difficulty going to school, you have some emotions around that as well. You are worried about your kid. You may be worried about getting into trouble. You may be embarrassed, whatever you are, if those things come through too powerfully your kid's not gonna talk to you. Because emotions are too strong and their emotions are strong, and now communication is much more difficult. So as the leader of this information gathering process, we have to steel ourselves and say, let me do my best to put my emotions around this on the shelf, my impatience around this on the shelf, because I've been dealing with this for a very long time. Can I put those on the shelf? Or do I need a neutral third party to get this going for me? If I really don't feel confident that I can put my emotions on the shelf, or, if there's so much water over the dam over this issue that I really don't think there's much chance my kid will talk to me about it. Can we find a neutral third party? And that doesn't necessarily have to be a mental health clinician. It can be a neutral third party who the kid trusts. Bottom line, we need info. Right. We need info on the road to solving this problem. We need info first. Whoever the kid is comfortable providing that info to, we'll it.

Leisa Reichelt: 16:50

Well, imagine that we have managed to start to get some info from our kids, and we have a sense of what some of the problems are and what's going on. What's our next step? We, know some of the problems. We know roughly where the priorities are. what do we do now?

Ross Greene: 17:04

Alright, as many of your listeners may not know, solving a problem collaboratively is a three step process. And once again, not just collaboratively, proactively, you really don't wanna be doing this in the heat of the moment. the first step is called the empathy step this is where we're gathering information from the kid. Why is it called the empathy step? Because it involves listening, which is the purest form of empathy and curiosity. The second step is called the Define Adult Concerns step. This is where adults are entering their concerns into consideration, basically related in this case, to why we think it's important that the kid go to school. Adult concerns usually fall into one or both of two categories. How the unsolved problems affecting the kid, how the unsolved problems affecting other people. In the case of this particular unsolved problem, most of them are probably gonna be related to how it's affecting the kid, but I can see a place where it could be affecting other people too. Then third step is the invitation step. And this is where we are collaborating on a solution. The solution has to meet two criteria. It's gotta be realistic. Both parties gotta be able to do what they're agreeing to do, and this is even more important, it's gotta be mutually satisfactory. Mutually satisfactory means the solution has to address the concerns of both parties. This problem will not be solved unless we have a solution that addresses the concerns of both parties. Now in the case of the empathy step, these are probably concerns we didn't know as much about as we needed to, which means they weren't being addressed. Solutions that we adults come to unilaterally on the basis of minimal or no information from the kid are not going to address the kid's concerns, which is why those solutions typically do not work. We don't know what the kids' concerns are. Their concerns could not possibly have been addressed if we didn't identify them. Solution also has to address the adult's concerns, you know, unilateral solutions, solutions adults impose are solutions that would address their concerns, but not the kids. This is a solution that has to be mutually satisfactory. We gotta address the concerns of both parties, but we're not gonna address the concerns of both parties unless we know what they are first.

Leisa Reichelt: 19:36

It feels as though in the school context there's almost a third collaborative partner that needs to be at play, which is the school, because a lot of the issues that kids are dealing with are to do with expectations that are imposed by school, or situations that are in place by school, where we need the school to partner with us to change the circumstances so it can make it easier to solve the problems. How should we be thinking about that? Should we be thinking about the school as being a part of this process? Or as a parent acting as an advocate with the school? Have you got some thoughts on that?

Ross Greene: 20:12

Great question. In the empathy step, and I'm still gonna go back to the three steps'cause that's what's gonna be critical. Don't know if we need the school folks there for the empathy step It's entirely possible that there's somebody at school who the kid feels most comfortable talking to. So the school may be involved right outta the gate, The Define Adult Concern step. I don't know if we need the school for that. I have a feeling the concerns of the school are gonna be fairly similar to the concerns of the adults as it relates to the kid not showing up. This is all strategy Who needs to be involved? We are almost definitely gonna need the school folks to help us out in the invitation, but I won't know how much help we're gonna need from the school folks until I hear what the kids' concerns are in the empathy step. But the fact that this is occurring on their watch at school tells me it's a near certainty we're gonna need the school folks to be involved in helping us come up with solutions that will address the concerns we've identified in those first two steps. I am thinking you are about to ask, although you might not be, I'm not a mind reader and try not to be. What if the school won't cooperate? Well, they have a student who's not showing up. They could blame the parents if they wanted to, but this is an everybody unsolved problem, and they are on the hook for meeting the kid where they're at. If they have a kid who's not showing up, they're still on the hook. They can point to the home folks all they want if that's their modus operandi. Right? Some schools recognize, no, it must be something we're doing, but we, we can't get anything out of the kid about that. So if you've got info, we'll take it. Right. And some schools are busy pointing the finger. A lot of this depends on what we hear in the empathy step. We need the school folks and they're still on the hook from meeting the kid where they're at. They have a student who's not showing up. They gotta help out. That's kind of the law

Leisa Reichelt: 22:22

Yeah,

Louise Roger: 22:23

Yeah.

Leisa Reichelt: 22:23

as though the experience many of us have is that it's much easier for them to blame the parent or blame the child than it is for them to think about how they can potentially make changes, which is not entirely true. lots of schools do try lots of things to help

Ross Greene: 22:38

But here's the interesting thing. Remember, school folks are frustrated too, because they've probably been trying stuff too. But if what everybody's been trying has been in the absence of information from the kid, Then this is what we might call the crap shoot approach to intervention, right? We don't even know what we're aiming at because we haven't received any information from the kid about what's actually getting in their way, So a lot of solutions that have gone over the dam, we might say are solutions that what we call uninformed, Uninformed solutions generally don't work because we haven't done the empathy step with the kid yet, so we don't yet know what's getting in their way. Frustration sometimes lends itself to blaming, but if we're able to come to the school folks armed with information about what's actually getting in the kids' way. I find that a lot of the blaming then ends, We're blaming the kid or the parents because Timmy is bullying our kid on the school bus. Why are we blaming anybody for that? that's a problem we need to solve, right? We're blaming the parents because Timmy is having difficulty completing the double digit division problems on the worksheet in math. Why are we blaming anybody for that? So I find that once we get that information from the kid, we're not guessing anymore. We're probably not blaming anymore. We just have some problems we need to solve. That information from the kid is critical. Otherwise, we're still guessing and often still blaming.

Leisa Reichelt: 24:15

So I'm imagining we've got a list of things that could be everything from, I can't handle wearing the school shoes that you want me to wear to school. I need, something different about uniforms. To, another really common one is I don't have somebody at school who I can trust to actually listen to me and hear me when there's something wrong. to, lunchtimes are nightmare and I can't go out and be in that unstructured, noisy, smelly time. I need to do something different at lunchtime. So there's a whole collection of different things that we've got going on. you're saying that, the parent might be the go-between, between school and child. Should the child be actively involved with talking with the school about this, or we'll just play it by ear a little bit.

Ross Greene: 24:57

Play it by ear, but if the child's able, it would be better. I'm not gonna push it if the child is not comfortable doing this, but it would be better. This is not gonna be what it looks like initially probably it would be better if the child could communicate with the school folks directly, especially if they're saying they don't feel like there's anybody for them to talk to at school. It's gonna be very hard for a parent to address all the factors without engaging the school folks. The hope is that somebody emerges from these school folks side of things to be somebody who shows that they can listen, show that they can understand, and shows, this is big, that they are as invested in getting the kids' concerns addressed they're in getting their own concerns addressed. We tend to be pretty egocentric about our concerns. That often causes us not to address the concerns of the other person. This process, it has to be mutually satisfactory. The concerns of both parties have to be addressed. Often a school folk emerges. I never know who it's be. That could start becoming the go-to person. And if the kid starts being comfortable talking to the go-to person, then we can slowly but surely as the kid lets us know that they are able start to transfer some of the talking about school to the folks who are actually in a better position to do things about school than the parent. But how long is it gonna take? All bets are off.

Leisa Reichelt: 26:34

Sometimes

Ross Greene: 26:34

it's way faster than people think it's gonna be, and sometimes it's as slow as people think it's gonna be. but just because kid/school communication isn't seamless yet, doesn't mean we can't start moving on addressing many of the kids' concerns. This is all a process. if we can start addressing some of the kids' concerns, you may not have to address all of them and some might solve by solving others. Bottom line is, at this point, we take it as it comes, and we see how we're doing.

Leisa Reichelt: 27:11

The other thing that people will be very familiar with from CPS, I think is the plan A, plan B, plan C.

Ross Greene: 27:19

well plan A is where you're solving a problem unilaterally. Probably been there and done that.

Louise Roger: 27:25

Yes.

Ross Greene: 27:25

Plan B is what we've been talking about. It's where you're solving a problem collaboratively. Plan C is where you're putting some expectations on hold, at least for now. That's big because if this kid has 17 different factors that are making it difficult for them to go to school, we're not gonna be able to address'em all at once. While we're gonna solve as many as we can, we may have to put some of them on hold for now. Right. That's interesting because us caregivers, whether it's a parent or somebody at school, we're not accustomed to putting expectations on hold. We think it means we're giving in. We think it means we're giving up. It means neither of those things. What it means is that you're prioritizing, you're recognizing you can't solve everything at once. And it took a long time for those problems to accumulate and it's gonna take a little while for us to chip our way through'em. So, some problems need to be put on hold, at least for now. If we have a kid who's engaged in the process, showing movement toward going to school because some of the top priority problems have been solved. I find that most adults are willing to put some things on hold, and here's the bottom line about Plan C. The kid isn't meeting the expectation anyway, so all we're really doing is making it official, and we're saying you don't have to meet the expectation the expectation wasn't being met in the first place. We're not giving up on the expectation, we're just prioritizing. one of my, one of my trainers was telling me a story about a school principal. I'm gonna be doing a keynote at the school, at the beginning of the school year next year. we're working with some of the schools already in the school system teaching them how to do Plan B and about Plan C and the principal of the school said, make sure you tell Ross that when he is doing the keynote, he talks a lot about Plan C. Plan C is not how most adults, it's not in their DNA. Sometimes school folks need to be given permission to ease up on some expectations while you're working on others. But here's a principal saying, please talk about Plan C when you do your keynote he knows his staff and knows that plan C is hard for a lot of people, but that's the principal giving his staff permission to put some expectations on hold because it's in the best interest of the kid. I'd call that meeting kids where they're at, and that's the definition of good teaching.

Louise Roger: 30:08

Thank you for that too though, because I think a lot of us parents find ourselves having to plan C a lot of the expectations around school attendance and, and of course, uh, for people who aren't familiar with thinking about this as underlying difficulties that we've got to solve and that we can't do it all at once. it can look from the outside, like this is somehow permissive parenting, whereas we are being strategic. In selecting the tasks and expectations that we're gonna work on. So thank you very much for giving us some context around that.

Ross Greene: 30:43

You may still be on the hook for being accused of being permissive and passive. I don't know if we can get rid of that. All we can do is explain what we're doing to people. And quite frankly what I hear from a lot of people about the CPS model is that it makes a lot of sense. This is common sense. Why would you load a kid up with expectations that you already know they can't meet? What's the point of that? So it's easy to stereotype parents as passive, permissive. That doesn't mean it's right. All you can do is explain yourself to people and hope that their minds and ears are wide open.

Leisa Reichelt: 31:16

That's beautiful.

Louise Roger: 31:18

Thank you.

Leisa Reichelt: 31:19

I was thinking, we

Louise Roger: 31:20

I.

Leisa Reichelt: 31:20

but we've framed this up a lot as like the problem is going to school and I'm sure there are a lot of people who are, kids aren't attending school, but who are still achieving an education, who might be screaming out from, you know, from their headphones listening, going, you framed the problem wrong. Like, the problem should be, how can my child learn and become educated? I just wonder if there's something that you would reflect on in that in terms of like making sure that we've actually shaped the problem the right way.

Ross Greene: 31:53

Depends what your expectation is. If it is your expectation that your kid learn at school, then difficulty going to school is a good conversation starter. It's a well worded, unsolved problem. If you find out during the empathy step that there are hurdles that are, this is not gonna happen, and I wouldn't leap to that conclusion too quickly, then we're not looking for the kid to go to school anymore, we're looking for them to learn, So it all depends on where people are in the journey. If parents still feel like school is where their kid is going to be educated and that's their expectation, then that wording is still fine, that's still an okay entry point. Right. But if they've basically decided that's not how you need to learn, we're not mandating that you go to school, but it is our expectation that you learn. Let's talk about what that looks like. You've just changed your expectation. If you've changed your expectation, you've changed the unsolved problem. And the truth is, if your new expectation is one that the kid can meet, you don't even have an unsolved problem. There's nothing to talk about anymore. But it all depends on what the parental expectation is for how their kid is going to learn, If they're still thinking the learning is going to take place in school, then that's still the unsolved problem.

Leisa Reichelt: 33:20

Interesting. In my mind, I'm trying to juggle the challenge of going into a problem without dictating my terms understanding the parental expectation and unpacking those two things. Does that make sense?

Ross Greene: 33:36

I don't know that I would say having an expectation is synonymous with dictating terms, an expectation's an expectation, dictating terms feels more to me like the parent has decided here's what the solution is. Right? I'm dictating the terms of you going to school. That's different than saying, I've noticed you've been having difficulty going to school. What's up? Now our ears are wide open. Dictating terms feels to me like we're not listening at all. We're just telling the kid the way it's gonna be. I do think that there is a pretty significant difference between having an expectation and dictating the terms. if you have an expectation and it's not being met, this is an ask the kid model. You're not dictating anything anymore. You're gathering information and you're solving those problems collaboratively.

Leisa Reichelt: 34:33

this might sound a little bit dumb, but am I solving those problems with the expectation that I will achieve my expectation? Or is part of it that I'm willing to shift on the expectation that I go into it with as well.

Ross Greene: 34:48

We will find out. But here's the interesting thing. You had to have the expectation of your kid going to school to have it be unmet. Bottom line is if your kid's going to school without issue, you don't have an unsolved problem. So you had to have the expectation that the kid go to school, and your kid had to be having difficulty meeting that expectation for this conversation to take place. Otherwise, there's no point in having the conversation. Right. You're finding out in the empathy step what's making it hard for the kid to meet the expectation. Light bulbs are going on. Generally speaking, we're telling people be prepared for surprises in the empathy step. When you discover that what you thought was getting in the kid's way is not what's getting in the kid's way. So we're going into the empathy step completely open-minded, no dictating of terms here. Right, you already had the expectation that the kid go to school, the kid's already having difficulty going. So that stuff is sort of that set the stage for the conversation. But now you are finding out what's getting in your kid's way and your kid, in the next step, is finding out what your concerns are. The problem is solved once what's getting in the way for the kid have been addressed and your concerns have been addressed. Now here's the interesting thing, in the empathy step, I've seen expectations change, people hear about what's getting in the kids' way. I've seen this happen. They're hearing things that makes them say, you know what? I think I need to modify my expectation because what I'm hearing tells me I should not have that expectation. I need to think about what my expectation is now. Right. Lemme give that some thought because I don't know if I wanna have the expectation that I had, that you were having difficulty meeting. Now that I know what I know. Right. So bottom line it's not uncommon in life for us to gather information about something we knew nothing about. And then it gives us pause and makes us say, oh my, I don't know if where I was coming, let me put it this way. Where I was coming from was not informed by what I know now. I need to give this some thought. That's not typical, but it's also not that unusual, right? What's been missing is the information. We stuck with our expectation in the absence of information. Once we have that information about what's been getting in the way for the kid, we have the right to modify our expectation. We also have the right to stick with it, right? We also have the right to drop it completely, right? I've seen adults in the midst of the empathy step go, I don't care about this anymore. Now that I know what I know, I might have to make some decisions about what my expectations are for how my kid will learn. All of this comes out of the wash in the empathy step. the reason for that is we're finally understanding what's been getting in the kid's way all along, probably for a very long time.

Leisa Reichelt: 38:00

The other thing that makes me think as well is that this process helps reveal our expectations to ourselves. I think a lot of the time we have these expectations. We don't even know we have. Because they're so built into societal expectations, and so when our kids run into a difficulty with them, it almost reveals the expectation to us, and we get the opportunity then to question it for ourselves.

Ross Greene: 38:22

Well, I think that the expectation's usually clear. Why we have it can be interesting. Right. So the whole process is, it's amazing that three simple steps can be such a, quite frankly, earth shattering process for people. But to tell you the truth, that's what happens when we listen to each other. That's what happens when we're curious. That's what happens when we find out what's really getting in a kid's way. When we put our assumptions on the side, put power on the side, and finally listen, it's a thing of beauty.

Leisa Reichelt: 39:00

Amazing. if parents are wanting more information about how to get started with CPS, where would you recommend that they start?

Ross Greene: 39:11

The Lives in the Balance website, the nonprofit that I founded Lives In The Balance has a vast, and I mean vast array of free resources to orient people to the model. Um. My book Lost at School has a very good section about home/school communication. And the person who I am referring to some in that section is someone named Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, who wrote a book called The Essential Conversation that should be required reading for every parent and educator. And it very wise book it basically says, you know what, we all have expertise on this kid. School folks have expertise that us home folks don't have. Home folks have expertise that the school folks don't have. The fact that we are in conflict with each other, even though we both want what's best for this kid, is like most conflict that occurs in this world. both unfortunate unnecessary and very counterproductive. We both want what's best for the kid. The fact that we have different perspectives should not be a deal breaker. The fact that we have disparate perspectives means that we have perspectives to reconcile based on our own unique experience of this kid. Let's try to come together on this If the kid is providing us with information about what's getting in their way, that process will be greatly facilitated because now we're not just guessing with each other and pointing at each other. We're getting information from the kid about what's actually getting in their way, which makes it clear that all the pointing at all the guessing didn't really do as much good in the first place.

Leisa Reichelt: 40:59

Yeah, and I think also just making sure that all parties are on board with that philosophy of kids do well if they can, is massive game changer as well.

Ross Greene: 41:07

no doubt.

Louise Roger: 41:09

Thank you so much for joining us today, Dr. Greenee.

Ross Greene: 41:12

My pleasure. This is what I do.

Louise Roger: 41:16

your collaborative and proactive solutions model is, is truly transformative and it's been instrumental in shaping our, our philosophy at School Can't Australia. So thank you.

Ross Greene: 41:27

my pleasure. I'm glad you've embraced it.

Leisa Reichelt: 41:29

Well, what a joy it is to talk to Dr. Greene. His work on Compassionate and Proactive Solutions has been such a game changer for many parents who are looking for more compassionate ways to work with their kids and looking for techniques that actually work and not for the first time on this podcast, that message of taking the time and effort to really build the trust, build the connection, and build that relationship between parent and child comes through so clearly. I put some links in the episode notes to the Lives in the Balance website, where as Dr. Greene says, there is an absolute mountain of free resources available to support you on your CPS journey. I've also popped a link into The Essential Conversation book that he's recommended as a essential read for all parents. If you found this podcast helpful, please do take a moment to share, subscribe, maybe even give us a rating or review. This really does help us get our podcast in front of more people who have School Can't kids, and who haven't yet found our community or the information that we share. If you have some feedback for us, or maybe you would like to share your own School Can't lived experience, which we would absolutely love, you can drop us an email to schoolcantpodcast@gmail.com. And finally, if you are a parent or carer in Australia and you are feeling distressed, please remember you can always call the Parent Helpline in your state. A link with the number to call is in the episode notes. Thank you again for listening, and we will talk again soon. Take care.