54. Supervision10 - Choices, Breaks, Support Center, Physical Intervention
Becoming Centered
Episode 54 concludes a four-episode arc, within the Unit Supervision Pathway, that presents the 10 techniques that make up the Hierarchy of Interventions. This episode focuses on how to implement these interventions in a way that goes beyond surface behavior management to supporting the development of self-regulation in children and youth. This episode particularly focuses on the Forced-Choice and related Weighted-Choice techniques. These interventions leverage a program's consequence system to help child-clients make choices that determine whether or not they receive a...
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53. Supervision9 - Change Environment and Limit Setting
Becoming Centered
Episode 53 reviews the first four tools and techniques that make up the Hierarchy of Interventions (Distraction, Engaging, Verbal Redirection, Labeling) and presents the next two steps in the Hierarchy, Changing the Environment and Limit Setting. A major emphasis is placed on using these techniques to not only manage behaviors, but also to help clients develop their abilities to self-regulate. Behavior Management is a necessary component of providing Care to troubled children and youth. All kids sometimes exhibit behavior problems. However, kids in residential treatment,...
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52. Supervision8 - The Aspect Compass and Labeling
Becoming Centered
This episode is the second in a three-episode arc that presents the Hierarchy of Interventions. This grouping of 10 interventions forms a core curriculum of counseling skills used by residential staff to encourage the development of kids' self-regulation abilities. Last episode focused on using Distraction, Engaging, and Verbal Redirection to interrupt and prevent kids from going down an off-track path toward increased emotional, cognitive, and behavioral dysregulation. This episode introduces the Aspect Compass model of the human mind. Understanding this metaphor for...
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51. Supervision7 - The Hierarchy of Interventions
Becoming Centered
This episode on the Unit Supervisor Learning Pathway moves away from a focus on managerial skills and switches to a focus on counseling skills to be taught to direct-care Child Care Counselors. It presents 10 interventions, or techniques, for Counselors to use with kids when they become off-track, dysregulated, and uncentered. Skillful use of this package of interventions starts with understanding the ways in which they can be thought of as forming a hierarchy. That includes the higher up interventions being increasingly disruptive to the group environment of the residential...
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50. Supervision6 - Leader, Superior, Boss, Mentor
Becoming Centered
This episode is the sixth on the Unit Supervisor Learning Pathway. It’s also the third of a three-episode arc that focuses on how to structure an individual supervision meeting. It also goes beyond the supervision meeting and explores the seven different roles Unit Supervisors have with their Supervisees. As a Counselor, the Supervisor is concerned with the emotional well-being of their Supervisees. As a Teacher, the Supervisor keeps a checklist of subjects (primarily policies, procedures, practicies, and training topics) that are reviewed with each Supervisee over the course of...
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49. Supervision5 - Supervisor as Teacher and Coach
Becoming Centered
This episode continues to present a model for how to structure a supervision meeting. Last episode focused on how a Unit Supervisor sometimes functions primarily as a Counselor. In that sub-role, the Supervisor is most concerned with the emotional well-being of their Supervisees. Although that can fill the entire supervision meeting, generally, after five to ten minutes the meeting agenda will usually move on to the Supervisor sub-role of functioning primarily as a Teacher. Being an effective Teacher means having an organized curriculuum that typically draws from your...
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48. Supervision4 - Structuring the Supervision Meeting
Becoming Centered
Today’s episode, which is the fourth on the Unit Supervisory Learning Pathway, focuses on a model for how to structure the typical supervision session. In the context of working on a residential treatment unit for children and youth, there are many sub-roles that define an effective relationship between a supervisor and their supervisees. A Supervisor encompasses the roles of Counselor, Teacher, Coach, Leader, Superior, Boss, and Mentor. This episode focuses on starting supervision meetings with the Supervisor focuses on the role of Counselor. In that role, the Supervisor...
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47. Supervision3 - Delegating and Organizing
Becoming Centered
This episode, the third in the Unit Supervisor Pathway, focuses on the essential managerial skills of effectively delegating tasks and projects and keeping organized. I'm hoping that you've already followed advice in previous episodes and created clearly defined Unit Coordinator roles for all the residential staff on the unit. Residential treatment is a team sport; and you need every member of your team to not only work directly with the kids, but to also help administer a quality program. However, even with clear role descriptions outlining various administrative and...
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46. Supervision2 - Giving Feedback
Becoming Centered
Episode 46 of the Becoming Centered Podcast focuses on the essential managerial and coaching skill of giving feedback to others. Individual supervision and individual coaching is, by far, the most effective way to inspire and guide the professional development of direct care child care counselors. This individual attention is much more powerful than in-service training, articles, podcasts, or other ways to train staff. The heart of coaching is being able to give feedback to supervisees in a way that effectively influences how a staff person thinks about their work, how they...
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45. Supervision1 - Unit Coordinator Roles
Becoming Centered
In residential treatment programs by far the most effective way to train direct-care staff in how to effectively care for the kids and to provide counseling is through on-the-job coaching and individual supervision. However, there's a lot of very real barriers to providing quality supervision. The nature of the work, especially at more intensive programs, means that there is a high frequency of behavior-problems on the residential unit. This drives staff toward a short-term focus on getting through the shift, or perhaps through the week, with as few safety issues as possible. ...
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The vertical axis of the Seven-Directions Meta-Compass Model, represents the core functions involved in caring for children who are literally placed in the care of a residential treatment program. The Upward direction (Relationships) involves all the activities a Residential Counselor does to care for the kids. These are things that have to happen simply because the clients are children, regardless of whatever individual treatment issues a client presents. The Downward direction (Task Responsibilities) involves all the tasks involved in caring for the kids, caring for the facility, and being an employee. The Inward (Self) direction involves caring for oneself, so that you have the energy to care for the kids.
Although there’s an overlap between Care and Treatment; the horizontal plane of the compass represents four aspects of treatment involved in being a residential counselor.
The East cardinal position represents the domain of emotions. It’s symbolized by the aspect of The Artist. The Artist is made up of those parts of the brain and psyche that only process the world and communicate in terms of emotions. That’s how those parts of the brain work.
The South cardinal position represents the domain of cognitions. It’s symbolized by the aspect of The Scout. Unlike The Artist, The Scout possesses lots of words and engages in thinking, analysis, and has a purpose of exploring the world, interpreting what it finds, and reporting back to the rest of the brain.
The West cardinal position represents the domain of behaviors (both external actions and internal physiological actions). It’s symbolized by the aspect of The Warrior. The Warrior expresses all The Artist’s feelings and all the Scout’s thoughts as external and internal behaviors.
The North cardinal position represents the domain of executive skills that are used to regulate the rest of the brain. It’s symbolized by the aspect of The Chief. The Chief is concerned with centering The Artist, The Scout, and The Warrior. The Chief regulates the tribe (the different parts of the psyche) and also is concerned with a person’s relationships with other people (the external tribe).
The podcast delves into understanding the brain's functioning, emphasizing the practice effect wherein repeated actions reinforce neural pathways. It stresses the importance of fostering calm feelings, thoughts, and behaviors in children through positive experiences and repetition.
The discussion outlines the interconnectedness of different aspects of the psyche: emotions (East), cognitions (South), behaviors (West), and executive skills (North). It highlights the role of residential staff in creating a therapeutic milieu and inspiring internal changes in children's brains to manage problem behaviors effectively.
Respectful treatment is emphasized as essential for creating a therapeutic environment, contrasting coercive approaches that may yield short-term compliance but hinder long-term transformation. The episode concludes with a preview of forthcoming tools and techniques to help children achieve emotional centeredness, laying the foundation for further cognitive and behavioral growth.
Other Key Concepts
The Practice Effect: Feelings, moods, and even thinking, work the same way in the brain as behaviors. Whatever states-of-mind are practiced become easier to achieve. Practicing becoming emotionally, cognitively, and behaviorally centered will transform a person’s brain.
The Intensity Effect: Intense feelings create lasting changes in the brain. This is why a single traumatic incident, let alone the multiple traumas that are common among kids in residential treatment, have a lasting effect on the kids’ brains (unless effective treatment occurs).
Respect Doesn’t Have to Be Earned: In a treatment environment it’s important that staff consistently treat the kids with respect. It is likely that many of the kids will not consistently treat staff respectfully. That makes being respectful to the kids a challenge that requires personal maturity and professionalism. Kids experiencing the adults consistently treating them with respect will, over time, be a key component to the clients feeling safe enough and trusting enough to try new behaviors. The Artist part of each child’s psyche has a primal fear that the world is too harsh to survive. Counselors will be most effective at treatment when they respect that fear and don’t add to it with harsh interactions.
Seeking Compliance is Behavior Management, not Treatment: Sometimes kids in residential treatment exhibit such outrageous and unsafe behaviors that managing those behaviors has to take priority over treatment. However, effective behavior management only trains kids in how to be successful within the artificial environment of an institutional setting. Treatment involves transformational change that carries over to when kids are living back in the community.