Breaking Boundaries Support Solutions Inc.

✨ The key to behavioural change is to meet our children in their nervous system states. ⤵️

❇️ As educators, parents, and service professionals, we need to encourage physiological safety over behavioural compliance, because when children are able to achieve a calm, regulated state, they can think clearly, problem solve and create stronger memories of what they are learning. 🧠

Our own childhood experiences can greatly impact the way that we parent.

✨ What beliefs did your parents or teachers have about you that you carried through childhood, adolescence, even into adulthood? How would your life have been different if you weren't burdened by their expectations?

Often times, when left unexamined, our parenting styles can be drawn from instincts that aren't productive for raising independent, confident, resilient children in the world. 🌍

As an example, a parent I coach came to me because she was going through a hard time with her son and needed guidance. By observing their interaction, it became clear that she would laser focus in on what her son "shouldn't" do. By focusing in on only the challenging behaviors, or only noticing what's "wrong", she wasn't modeling what he should do. This is called Negative tracking.

This of course doesn't mean we should ignore the challenging behaviors and pretend they're not happening. What we could do instead, is get to a higher ratio of focusing on positive behaviors, and you will begin to see more of what you want. Aim for a ratio of 3:1, appreciation to criticism.

🌈 The words we speak become the house we live in, for better or worse. Expectation becomes reality. Be kind, and speak to your children as if they are the most magical, wonderful humans, for what they believe is what they will become.

For more, please read the Scaffold Effect by Harold S. Koplewicz, M.D., j

✨🥳 Hooray!! It's time for a new type of group for our children. A place to learn, connect, wonder and create. We’re here to bring together the Neurodiversity community, and create opportunities for children with developmental differences to thrive. Our community of learners is an inclusive, supportive, passionate, spirited place to be.

NeuroThrives is an online community designed for children on the Autism spectrum to learn social skills, grow friendships and meet peers in a safe, secure environment. While having fun, we will work on social-language skills, sensory integration, fine motor skills, gross motor skills and more. Come hang out with us! Our first online meetip will be on May 22nd. Join us on Meetup!

Meet the host

✨🖐🏼Hello, I'm Kira Keulemans, Neuroeducational Therapist | Behavior and Emotions specialist and avid proponent of whole-child wellness. Broad areas of focus include: managing meltdowns, boosting self-regulatory capacity, improving attention and focus, and developing social and emotional skills. Ultimately, fostering healthy Executive Functioning and ensuring that you to feel calm, confident and in your parenting flow.

💫 Help your child thrive in an overstimulating world. ⤵️

💭 Think for a moment about how you you were awokened as a child? 🤔 With a LOUD, jarring voice yelling down the hall or perhaps a soft, gentle voice whispered "Good Morning". Think about how different these interactions feel to your nervous system... Someone towering over, versus sitting next to. A bright light flicked on, or a soft hand on your back, or a tickle underneath your foot.

🌡️ humans, we're constantly interpreting safety signals that move us toward or away from a regulated and calm state. Tone, pace and prospdy of voice are a few of the BIG ways that we can communicate safety. 🥰 Coregulation is a big word that comes down to a simple process, we don't need to always carve out special moments to connect, they can look just like an ordinary moment, where we slow down the pace and expand the moment enough to invite wonder, joy and connection. ✨

🧠 More on this and other effective brainaligned ways of regulating in tomorrow's post. A few of the most effective include one or more of the following: breathe, movement, sensation, rhythm/ pattern. 🤸🏼‍♀️🌊🥁

"When a child is doing something she's passionately interested in, she grows like a tree - in all directions. This is how children learn, how children grow. They send down a taproot, like a tree in dry soil. The tree may be stunted, but it sends out these roots, and suddenly one of these taproots goes down and strikes a source of water. And the whole tree grows." - John Holt

Are mornings a challenge in your home, if so this is the post for you.

Reflect back to your own childhood for a minute, how were you awakened in the morning? With a LOUD, jarring and abrupt voice, yelling from down the hall? Or perhaps a kind, soft and gentle whisper in your ear. These are all emotional cues that either support or dysregulate our nervous system.

Be mindful of the non-verbal cues, e.g towering over vs sitting next to. Notice your pace, can you allow space to slow the moment and invite a minute of connection? Notice the tone of your voice, all of these signals either wire us for the days success or dysregulate and add to the list of stressors we're already faced with.

Learning evolves as the brain and body find safety and regulation. As humans, we learn from the "bottom up". Our sensory systems lay the foundation for learning.

When children are able to achieve a calm, regulated state, they can think clearly, problem solve and create stronger memories of what they are learning.

Instead of enforcing behavioural compliance, we could embrace physiological safety intead. Connection > Compliance. We need to meet our children in their nervous system states.

The most effective brainaligned ways include Co-Regulation using one or more of the following methods: breathe, movement, sensation, rhythm/ pattern. More on these focused attention practices in tomorrow's post, including practical modelled examples .

For more, please read the work of Lori DeSautels.

Learn to manage strong emotions and set limits with love 💖

When we view behaviours from the lens of safety-seeking and physiological safety, we find that soothing the child through our gentle interactions (emotional co-regulation) is the answer, not issuing consequences or extinguishing unwanted behaviours. Co-regulation is a constant process that requires patience and thousands of repetitions with a trusted caregiver. Progress over perfection every time! Our interactions are filled with moments of rupture and repair.

When we understand that emotional co-regulation (helping the child’s emotional journey causing the behavioural challenge) is the new paradigm - we begin to have compassion for ourselves and others along the way. Beneath the behaviour is a child trying to communicate a need. ✨💫

Tips for setting limits with love:

🌪 Clear is kind, Unclear is unkind. Boundary pushing is how children learn to navigate and make sense of the world around them. Connect using emotional language. Communicate the limit clearly, and then Connect again. Show that you "see them". Wow, that was BIG. I hear you, I'm with you.

💖 Remember, Self-Reg is a skill only fully learned in adulthood. Children need help getting from chaos to calm.

💫 Embody physiological safety using tone/prosody of voice. Body language, posture etc.

🦎 Examine stressors across several domains

Be gentle with yourself along the way!

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When we view behaviors from the lens of safety-seeking and physiological safety, we find that soothing the child through our gentle interactions (emotional co-regulation) is the answer, not issuing consequences or extinguishing unwanted behaviors. Co-regulation is a constant process that requires patience and thousands of repetitions with a trusted caregiver. Progress over perfection every time! Our interactions are filled with moments of rupture and repair. When we understand that emotional co-regulation (helping the child’s emotional journey causing the behavioral challenge) is the new paradigm - we begin to have compassion for ourselves and others along the way. Beneath the behavior is a child trying to communicate a need. ✨💫 Tips for setting limits with love: 🌪 Clear is kind, unclear is unkind. Boundary pushing is how children learn to navigate and make sense of the world around them. Connect using emotional language. Communicate the limit clearly, and then Connect again. Show that you "see them". Wow, that was BIG. I hear you, I'm with you. 💖 Remember, Self-Reg is a skill only fully learned in adulthood. Children need help getting from chaos to calm. 💫 Embody physiological safety using tone / prosody of voice. Body language, posture etc. 🦎 Examine stressors across several domains Be gentle with yourself along the way!

🧠🔑 Contrary to what has been thought for decades, Self-Control is not the key to changing challenging behaviour. It is a crucial piece of the puzzle, but it is actually Self-Regulation—the ability to manage and recover from stress— that lies at the heart of changing a childs developmental trajectory. 📈 Instead of trying to teach children better Self-Control, we should instead focus on identifying and reducing stress load. During heightened times of stress, the parts of the brain that allow us to successfully exercise Self-Control are diminished.🌡💫 Dr Stuart Shanker has been instrumental in this work, and I especially love his insights into the 5 domains of Self-Reg.

Do you know what the 5 domains are? What are a few of your favourite ways to manage stress behaviour? Comment down below ⬇️