1KHO 720: Kids Do Well If They Can | Dr. Ross Greene, The Kids Who Aren't Okay

Summary

The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast
Episode: 1KHO 720: Kids Do Well If They Can | Dr. Ross Greene, The Kids Who Aren't Okay
Host: Ginny Yurich (1000 Hours Outside)
Guest: Dr. Ross W. Greene
Release Date: February 24, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode features renowned child psychologist and bestselling author Dr. Ross W. Greene, known for “The Explosive Child,” “Lost at School,” and his latest, “The Kids Who Aren’t Okay.” Host Ginny Yurich and Dr. Greene dig deep into the foundational belief that “kids do well if they can,” urging a reexamination of how schools and parents address challenging behaviors. The discussion covers ineffective school discipline, the importance of proactive problem-solving, developing empathy, and practical approaches for parents and educators who want to support children’s mental health and development—especially those struggling to meet expectations in conventional settings.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Dr. Greene’s Background & Approach

• [00:37] Dr. Greene shares how he came to focus on children with behavioral challenges and the evolution of his “Collaborative & Proactive Solutions” (CPS) model.
  • “For whatever reason, given that I was not particularly behaviorally challenging, that's the population that I gravitated to very early on…”
  • He emphasizes his transdiagnostic approach: “It applies to any psychiatric disorder in which kids are exhibiting concerning behavior that is of concern to us adults.”
• Notable Resource: LivesintheBalance.org, full of free, practical tools for families and educators.

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2. The Problem with Conventional School Discipline

• [04:43] The same small group of students receive most of the punitive discipline, disproving the efficacy of traditional approaches.
  • “The kids who are on the receiving end of those interventions the most are the ones who are benefiting from them the least.” — Dr. Greene [04:46]
• Kids do well if they can—not because of the fear of consequences but because they’re able to meet expectations.

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3. Why Consequences Don’t Work

• [07:59] “Consequences are behavior modification strategies… The concerning behavior is simply a kid's frustration response… If all we're doing is modifying the frustration response, then we're not doing anything about what the kid is frustrated about.” — Dr. Greene
• Problem behaviors arise from unmet expectations. Standard discipline misses the root cause.

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4. The Empathy Step & Listening Over Power

• [13:12] Empathy is foundational: “In this model, we are asking kids what's making it hard for them to meet an expectation. It's not up to the adult to divine… The kid is your partner in this model.” — Dr. Greene
• Memorable Moment: “Listening is the purest form of empathy. And in this model, we are listening to kids so that we adults can understand what's making it hard for them to meet a particular expectation—that is huge.” [14:28]
• Non-compliance is informative—it points directly to where a child can’t meet an expectation.

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5. Proactive, Collaborative Problem-Solving (Plan B)

• [17:28, 24:58] Most problem behaviors are predictable and can be tackled proactively, not reactively.
• Dr. Greene outlines three “Plans”:
  • Plan A: Conventional, compliance-focused, adult-imposed solutions (consequences).
  • Plan B: Collaborative problem-solving (the CPS model) that involves empathy, understanding, and inviting the child into the solution.
  • Plan C: Temporarily setting aside low-priority expectations.
• “If you identify the unsolved problems proactively, they become highly predictable. And if they're highly predictable, they can be solved proactively…” — Ginny [17:28]
• Plan B Explained:
  • Step 1: Empathy (gather the child’s perspective)
  • Step 2: Define the adult's concern
  • Step 3: Invitation (collaborative solution-generation)

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6. The Time Investment Myth

• [27:40] Solving problems at the source actually saves time.
  • “Problems that are unsolved continue causing concerning behavior, which take an enormous amount of time; solving problems collaboratively never takes that much time.” — Dr. Greene
• Dr. Greene on priorities: "I'll take problem solving over soccer, because soccer is not ruining your family, but conflict can ruin your family." [29:01]

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7. Understanding “Lucky” vs. “Unlucky” Kids

• [32:52] The difference doesn’t lie in motivation but in how frustration is expressed—withdrawal vs. explosive behaviors.
  • “Lucky frustration responses... are things like whining, pouting, sulking, withdrawing, crying. Unlucky: screaming, swearing, hitting, spitting, kicking, biting…” — Dr. Greene
  • The unlucky kids receive the harshest discipline but all frustration responses signal the same unmet needs and unsolved problems.
  • “I just don’t believe in slicing the pie by a kid's concerning behavior. That's going to work out to the disadvantage of a lot of kids.” — Dr. Greene [34:07]

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8. The Capitalism & Testing Trap

• [38:25] Capitalist interests drive much of school policy (textbooks, training, high-stakes testing, "restraint industry"), often at the expense of humanity and evidence-based practice.
  • “Companies love to sell stuff to schools. That a lot of what is sold is not evidence-based… the industry that I am casting a spotlight on is what we call the restraint industrial complex.” — Dr. Greene [39:43]
• Schools invest heavily in late-stage responses instead of early intervention and prevention.

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9. Differentiation & Meeting Kids Where They’re At

• [42:41-44:00] It’s hard work to meet every student where they are, but not doing so is even harder and less effective.
  • “Every kid is going to be different. If you have a kid who is different in one way, you want to make sure that they're addressing that at school in another way. A good school is judged by the degree to which it is responding well to the developmental variability that's walking in the door.” — Dr. Greene

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10. Tools, Resources & Practical Advice

• [54:15] Ginny highlights Dr. Greene’s “Assessment of Skills and Unsolved Problems” (ASAP), a concise tool to help parents and teachers identify the underlying skills kids may lack and the specific situations they struggle with.
  • There are less than 20 key skills to consider, such as the ability to consider multiple solutions or manage time.
  • “The reason we list skills in the top section of the ACIP is because we want caregivers to recognize that it is skills or the lack of them that are driving a kid's poor frustration response, not motivation. That's huge.” — Dr. Greene [57:22]
• Empathy grows when adults realize struggle is often due to skill deficits, not willful misbehavior.

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11. Medication and Mental Health

• [50:19] Medication should be a deliberate, cautious decision.
  • “It's too easy to pull out a prescription pad. Second, there are some kids who benefit enormously from psychotropic medication. Both can be true… We need to know what each medicine does and whether it’s worth the potential side effects.” — Dr. Greene

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12. Societal Context & What Schools/Parents Can Do

• [62:25] While educators can’t control all outside influences (social media, trauma, college pressure), they can focus on being proactive and collaborative with kids to strengthen mental health.
  • “If you do what you can do, which is getting to the root of these problems, getting out ahead, not being late, you will enhance the mental health of children, your students, your own children. And so it's just a book of things that you can do and the impact that you can make.” — Ginny

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Notable Quotes

• “Kids do well if they can. This kid would actually like to meet your expectation. Something's getting in the way. There's absolutely no harm in finding out what that something is.” — Dr. Ross W. Greene [22:46]
• “Listening is the purest form of empathy… Listening brings people together. Power causes conflict.” — Dr. Greene [14:28]
• “Non-compliance is informative. Non-compliance concerning behavior lets you know that there's an expectation that a kid is having difficulty meeting.” — Dr. Greene [15:38]
• “Solving problems collaboratively never takes that much time. A lot of these kids… have big piles of unsolved problems. Primarily because the problems never got identified and never got solved.” — Dr. Greene [27:40]
• “Meeting every student where they are at is hard work, but not meeting every student where they're at is way harder.” — Ginny [42:41]
• “It is skills (or the lack of them) that are driving a kid's poor frustration response, not motivation.” — Dr. Greene [57:22]
• “Most kids are still doing okay… but if we keep doing things the way we still are, more kids will not be doing okay and we'll continue losing the ones who already aren't.” — Dr. Greene [49:03]
• “If you don't ask the kid, you're always going to be in the guessing game. And us adults are wrong. A lot.” — Dr. Greene [22:46]

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Memorable Moments

• Ginny’s realization about how few skills are on the core list and how that clarified her empathy [54:51]
• Dr. Greene’s story of being recognized with the American Legion Citizenship Award for conflict resolution as a child [62:31]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [00:37] Introduction to Dr. Greene and his background
• [04:43] Why school discipline practices fail
• [07:59] Understanding behavior as frustration response
• [13:12] The role of empathy and listening in CPS
• [17:28] Predictability of behavioral problems and proactive solutions
• [24:58] Explanation of Plan A, B, and C
• [27:40] Time investment and solving vs. not solving problems
• [32:52] “Lucky” vs “Unlucky” frustration responses
• [38:25] The role of capitalism in education (testing, “restraint industrial complex”)
• [42:41] The challenge and necessity of meeting students where they are
• [54:15] The ASAP and its use
• [57:22] Empathy and understanding skill deficits
• [62:25] Focusing on what’s within our control for mental health

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Resources Mentioned

• Dr. Greene’s books: “The Kids Who Aren’t Okay,” “The Explosive Child,” “Lost at School”
• Website: LivesintheBalance.org (free resources, problem-solving cheat sheets, maps of state discipline policies)
• ASAP/ACIP: “Assessment of Skills and Unsolved Problems”
• Plan B cheat sheets and guides for implementation

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Final Takeaway

Change is possible, and it begins with a mindset shift: Kids are not giving us a hard time—they are having a hard time. When adults focus on empathy, collaborating with children, and proactively solving the real problems beneath the behaviors, outcomes improve for all—kids, parents, teachers, and communities alike.

Transcript

[Podcast Host (Sponsor Reader)]

This episode is brought to you by Peloton Break through the busiest time of year with the brand new Peloton Cross Training Tread plus, powered by Peloton iq. With real time guidance and endless ways to move, you can personalize your workouts and train with confidence, helping you reach your goals in less time. Let yourself run, lift, sculpt, push and go. Explore the new peloton cross training Tread [e-mail] Welcome to the 1000 Hours Outside podcast.

[Jenny Urch]

My name is Jenny Urch. I'm the founder of 1000 Hours Outside and I have just read some excellent books and the author, Dr. Ross W. Green is here. Welcome, Ross.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Thanks for having me.

[Jenny Urch]

So the books I read, and I know you have more books in this, but I read the Kids who Aren't okay, which is coming out in 2026. So if you're hearing this, you can go get it now. And it is about the urgent case of reimagining, support, belonging and hope in schools. What a photo on the front of a child who is just so frustrated and you feel, you feel it like you know that feeling if you sat in, in those desks. And you know, for some kids, obviously it's, it's harder than for others. And I also read your book, which has come out in so many different editions, called the Explosive Child A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting. Easily Frustrated, Chronically Inflexible Children. I would say that the two of them go really well together. And I know you have other books as well. And also the website that I went to is called livesinthebalance.org and this is a free, phenomenal website. It's one of the best websites I have ever seen. It was organized so well. There was so many helpful things. Like I printed off these cheat sheets and they're like one pagers and they're designed well. And it was just, you know, people's websites often are an afterthought these days. I was like, my goodness, there's a lot of help there. So would you give us just a quick bit of your backstory? You are really an advocate for children.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

I like to think so. I've sure have been working with them for a long time. And for whatever reason, given that I was not particularly behaviorally challenging, that's the population that I gravitated to very early on, starting with kids with adhd, moving on to those. And I'm not very diagnostically oriented, but this is how we communicate these days. Moving on to those who were diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder and those are the kids who are punching holes in the wall and are defiant, refusing to do what they're told and non compliant as they are called to any population of kids that is prone toward concerning behavior. And you know what, that's why I refer to my model collaborative and productive solutions as being transdiagnostic. Because quite frankly, it applies to any psychiatric disorder in which kids are exhibiting concerning behavior that is of concern to us adults. So that cuts across quite the swath of diagnoses. But more importantly of kids.

[Jenny Urch]

You said something in this book, the kids who aren't okay. And it's also echoed in the explosive child that I had never considered. So I know, I think, I don't know if other people have this, but I have sort of my go to conversation topics that tend to, they're kind of open ended. So, you know, for people I know that read, we'll talk about what they're reading. I, I often ask what are you most looking forward to right now? But when I'm with kids, and I don't know if this is a good idea or a bad idea, but when I'm with kids like 9 years old, I find that they're really expressive. And we'll talk about who gets in trouble in their class. So I'll ask, you know, it's a conversation topic that they immediately will tell me, you know, oh, it's Bobby or oh, it's, you know, it's, I, I mean, I think almost exclusively it's always been boys. Oh, who's, who gets in trouble. And they'll say, you know, that kid is the one that gets in trouble over and over again. And I had never considered this, but what you said was it is that it is like the same kids who are getting in trouble over and over and over again. And you said they have more consequences than some people will experience in a lifetime. I have so many notes here, I just, I want to read it verbatim because I just thought, okay, a couple things, Sorry, I gotta find it. I was like, I have never thought about this in my life. Ross, you talk about how kids do well if they can, not because of the school discipline program, but you talk about how it's the 10 to 15 kids in every school who are on the receiving end of most of the punitive exclusionary disciplinary practice practices doled out in that building. Like if it would have worked by now, it would have worked.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

And that's the proof that it's not working.

[Sponsor Voice]

Exactly.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

And that's the proof that the lenses we've been wearing. And the practices that we've been using aren't working either. And we need to face up to that. A lot of us adults just keep doing the same thing because it is supported by our belief systems. That explains why we're still hitting kids with a two foot piece of plywood in school in 17 different states still. Yes, that's called corporal punishment. Many people weren't aware that it was even still being used. But there are believers in corporal punishment. There are believers in detentions and suspensions and expulsions and any other type of consequences. The proof is before us. The kids who are on the receiving end of those interventions the most are the ones who are benefiting from them the least. It's not like it's eventually going to work. These are kids who've been on the receiving end of those interventions for a very long time. It's not working. This kid would very much like to be doing well because kids do well if they can. And all of those consequences are not what this kid needs.

[Jenny Urch]

The wording is really, really thought provoking because you wrote kids do well if they can, meaning if a kid could do well, they would do well because doing well is preferable. So when you think about the kids that are doing well and you talk about how school is really set up for those kids, but if we set up school for the ones that were that were exhibiting concerning behaviors that would help everyone. You talk about how these consequences, the sort of least of which, but it's also very concerning, is taking away recess, which is still happening quite a bit. But these consequences, they're affecting the classroom as a whole. So you say the consequences aren't working for anyone. The kids who aren't okay aren't the only ones who suffer in this scenario. The ones who are okay perpetually watch adults intervene in ways that are ineffective and counterproductive, continue to feel unsafe and continue to have their learning disrupted. These consequences aren't working for anyone. And you say the vast majority of kids with concerning behaviors I've worked with over the years have already endured more adult imposed and natural consequences than most of us will experience in our lifetime. If all those consequences were going to work, they would have worked a long time ago. So this is kind of a shocking thing, right? Because this is the norm. It's. If you grew up in school, I was a teacher for a while. It's like, well, what happens? A kid gets, they lose their recess, they sit out in the hallway, you know, then it progresses. They get suspended, they get expelled. It is sort of this progressive thing. And it really is pretty much always the same kids. So for someone who like me, I mean, I never really read anything like this and I hadn't considered it. And. And for someone who's kind of shocked to be and is like, well, yeah, I mean, it's not working. Can you talk about why?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Well, first of all, it's a major accomplishment to help people who fervently believe in consequences recognize that they're not working. That's an accomplishment all by itself. Right? Because sometimes we're not paying attention to that. We think the consequences are working for the kids who don't get them right. Now, as we've just said, those kids aren't doing well because of adult imposed consequences or even the threat of them. They're doing well because they can. Why are those consequences not working? Because consequences are behavior modification strategies. As you read, the concerning behavior is simply a kid's frustration response, simply a distress response. That's what concerning behavior is. If all we're doing is modifying the frustration response, then we're not doing anything about what the kid is frustrated about in the first place. What's the kid frustrated about in the first place? Why are they exhibiting a frustration response? Because they're having difficulty meeting a particular expectation.

[Jenny Urch]

Sure.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Hard stop. Now, in my line of work, as you read, we call those unmet expectations unsolved problems. We also call them problems that have yet to be solved. We also call them problems that are waiting to be solved. Most of them are old, meaning expectations the kid has been having difficulty meeting for a very long time. How come those problems aren't solved yet? Because, number one, we haven't even identified them yet. Number two, if we haven't identified them, we haven't solved them. And number three, what we've been busy doing all these years is modifying the behaviors that are being caused by those problems. Consequences don't solve problems, they only modify behavior. So one of the things that's laid out in my books, including the kids who aren't okay, is a technology for solving problems with kids that involves them in the problem solving process. So they have voice, so they have agency, so we can find out what's really making it hard for them to meet a particular expectation and so they can be integrally involved in the solution. I'm probably jumping the gun here on some of your questions, but why don't consequences work? Because they weren't designed to solve problems, and we haven't been focused on problems. We've been focused on the behaviors that are Being caused by them.

[Jenny Urch]

I mean, the line that kids do well if they can not because of the school discipline program is such a huge one because I mean, I was kind of like a teacher's pet type kid. And it's like I wasn't motivated so that I didn't get in trouble. I mean, such an interesting statement. I just think that these books are so valuable for. Especially for someone like I was a part of that whole system and never have been exposed to this. And you talk about how that's that happens. The teachers are exposed to one thing. They go to teacher training. It's not very long anyway. And you, you know, you have one student teacher experience and you're not really exposed to that many different ideas. And so this is critically important. You know, I also think we're in the situation and it's gotten worse. Kids are thrown into a situation that's like anti their biology. So of course they're frustrated. I would be frustrated too. Like I don't want to sit and listen to some lecture. I don't want to, you know, be told what to do all the time and have very little recess. You talked about how that one of the strategies we can get into this more but people can also read about it. It's like in the book and there's like a couple, a couple step problem process here. But talking about what are they having difficulty with. And so you say difficulty as a verb. And so these are some of the examples. Difficulty waking up. I was like, same, you know, like all the things that you. That you put in here as the example. I was like, well, any human is, you know, some are going to have more difficulty than others. But I was like, these are relatable. They're also reasonable. Difficulty completing an algebra worksheet. Who wants to do that? Difficulty emptying the dishwasher. Nobody wants to do that. We've got five kids. Nobody wants to empty the dishwasher. Difficulty getting start on. Getting started on homework. Difficulty ending the Xbox game to come in for dinner. I mean, as humans, we all have. I have difficulty putting down my novel. If I really like it, I don't want to go do anything else. Difficulty putting away the laundry. These are all so reasonable. It's so reasonable. And so you talk a lot then about empathy and how we have to really start there. So can you talk about just as an overview like where. I don't think we're very empathetic to children. I mean, I think if we were, we would structure the school. They vastly different. I don't think that we would give homework. I don't think that we would allow as much screen time, like if we were truly empathetic to their life experience. So can you talk about then that also goes in line with starting to kind of get to the root of why is this happening? Why are these concerning behaviors happening?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Got it. So these expectations that you were naming, number one, it's reasonable that we adults have those expectations. It's also reasonable that some kids might not be all that interested in meeting them, but some kids are interested in meeting them. And some kids meet them even if it's hard for them because somehow they're able to plow through and meet them. Then there's the kids I've been working with for 35 years that are, first of all, they may be, well, interested in meeting the expectation. So it's not necessarily because they don't want to. Although there's a lot of expectations we put on kids that, you know, they don't see the point and it's not all that stimulating. But a lot of kids meet those expectations anyways. I work with the ones who are having difficulty meeting them still first, don't find it enticing or might, but are having difficulty meeting them for one reason or another. Where does the empathy piece come in? In this model, we are asking kids what's making it hard for them to meet an expectation. It's not up to the adult to divine what's making it hard for the kid to meet the expectation. It's not up to the adult to divine what the solution is. The kid is your partner in this model. And I'm always reminding people that in the finding out process, I suppose we could call it the discovery process. We adults often hear things that are completely different than what we thought was getting in the way for the kid. Huge. Why do I call that the empathy step? Because listening is the purest form of empathy. And in this model, we are listening to kids so that we adults can understand what's making it hard for them to meet a particular expectation that is huge. Kids then know we are listening instead of consequencing. Consequencing is power. Listening is the beginning of collaborating. Collaborating brings people together. Power causes conflict. So whether the kid wants to meet the expectation or not, if they're not, we got some finding out to do. And empathy is a huge part of the finding out process. Here's something I've been saying a lot lately. Non compliance. Good. Now, people who don't know my work often, you know, Go. What now? He's completely out of his mind. No, non compliance is good. Non compliance concerning behavior lets you know that there's an expectation that a kid is having difficulty meeting. Now, whether you're a parent or an educator or a mental health professional or whatever, don't you want to know that? But what have we been doing with non compliance all these years? We've been squashing it. We've been extinguishing it in the name, in parlance of behaviorists, which is how I was originally trained. No, you don't want to extinguish non compliance because non compliance is also informative. Non compliance is informative if you first of all have the right lenses on. What is this non compliance telling me? Right. If you've got on the lenses of the kid isn't motivated, or the kid is testing limits, or the kid is coercing me into capitulating to their wishes, or the kid is manipulating me, or the kid is seeking attention through their concerning behavior. You are going down the wrong path if you're saying to yourself the non compliance, the concerning behavior is telling me something. I don't quite know what yet. Let me get curious and let me ask the kid. You are heading in the right direction

[Jenny Urch]

because you talk about how that a lot of these problems can be solved proactively. You say if you identify the unsolved problems proactively, they become highly predictable. And if they're highly predictable, they can be solved proactively rather than in the heat of the moment. Many caregivers believe a kid's concerning behaviors are unpredictable and occur out of the blue. But with most kids, their concerning behaviors are reliably set off by the same 5 or 6 or 10 or 12 problems every day or every week. In other words, unsolved problems are predictable. They don't really pop up. So they can be solved proactively.

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[Jenny Urch]

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[Jenny Urch]

What are some reasons why, if we could go through a couple of these options, a couple of these examples that you brought up, what would be some reasons why a kid, you know, people be like, oh, they're lazy, they're unmotivated, they're disobeying, they won't focus. So the things of like, I mean, obviously it's like, well, why don't they want to sit for three hours and not have recess? I'm like, nobody would want to do that. But, but these smaller ones that you talk about, which is like, okay, emptying the dishwasher, turning off the Xbox, difficulty, waking up difficulty, completing or completing their worksheet, or even getting started on their homework, which to me, these are all kind of reasonable things. What would be if, you know, if you listen and you are trying to get to the bottom of that, what would be some other alternatives besides this is a bad kid?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Oh, my goodness. Well, first of all, we're going to ask the kid what's making it hard for them to turn off the Xbox, Come in for dinner. I don't like to tell people what they're going to hear because I always hear something different. But I can tell you some of the things I most commonly hear about why a kid's having difficulty turning off the Xbox to come in for dinner. They're in the middle of a game and they don't want to lose their level. Or we've never really agreed on how much time the kid gets to spend playing on the Xbox. Or they don't really like what we make for dinner or all they get at dinner is yelled at. I don't know what I'm going to hear. I know though that the person who's going to help us understand that is the kid. Now here's what's interesting. People sometimes ask me what makes you think the kid knows? And my pat response is 35 years of asking. If you don't ask the kid, you're always going to be in the guessing game. And us adults are wrong. A lot. A lot of those characterizations you mentioned earlier are wrong. Kids do well if they can. This kid would actually like to meet your expectation. Something's getting in the way. There's absolutely no harm in finding out what that something is. Why might a kid be having difficulty completing the num. The double digit division problems on the worksheet in math? They don't understand the directions. Yeah, they've got single digit division problems down pat, but the double digit ones throw them for a loop. Why would they be motivated to do the single digit ones but not do the not be motivated to do the double digit ones? It makes no sense. Something's getting in the way. Ask the kid, find out what's getting in the way. Then solve the problem together. But first, first you've got to start focusing on problems rather than the behaviors that are being solved by them. Then you've got to start solving those problems rather than modifying the behaviors that are being caused by them.

[Jenny Urch]

Yeah. What a different model. You talk about time. So the newest book is called the Kids who aren't okay. And you have this. There's so many great resources on your website. So many. I'll make sure. I'll put the link because you talk about this as plan B. This is what we're trying to do here. Plan B is the empathy step. Define the adult concerns invitation step. I mean it's color coded. This is incredible. This is incredible. Ross. Then you also have and plan B,

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

by the way, just for the sake of your listeners, Plan B is where you're solving a problem collaboratively. And yes, it's a three step process.

[Jenny Urch]

Yeah. Because there's three options. There's you. So you read the books, you learn that there's three options. One is the original way, which is sort of a compliance type way, using consequences.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

You.

[Jenny Urch]

And clearly you say it's not working. And if anybody uses their common sense, they will be like, yes, the same kid got in trouble for my entire school career and nothing ever worked. So plan, that's plan A. Plan B is this, which is empathy and getting to the root cause of what's going on. Like you said, there's usually five or six or 10 or 12 triggers. It doesn't come out of the blue, can we solve those problems proactively? And then plan C is setting this aside for, you know, setting that particular thing aside for now, come back to it later, you know, work on some other things that are more important or more pressing. And then plan C is sort of to come back. So you're going to learn a lot about plan B in these books. And also, you know, they've got incredible things on the website.

[Sponsor Voice]

But you pro.

[Jenny Urch]

You also have this drilling cheat sheet. So you, you talk about drilling, not grilling. You really want to understand where the kid is coming from. And you wrote this. Adults are often astonished by what they learn when they start inquiring about a kid's concern. And then this. The number one complaint. The number one. You've been doing this for 35 years. The number one complaint I get from kids is that their parents don't listen. And the number one complaint I get from parents is that their kids won't talk to them. So let's talk about time from a family standpoint. Families are very busy, so you have to set aside time for this. This takes some time. And you say, actually in the long run, it's going to save you time because you're not spinning your wheels. In a classroom, I could see how someone would say, oh my goodness, I've got 28 students. But same thing, you talk about how the rigmarole of doing what's not working actually takes more time in the long run. So can you encourage a listener? Whether they're dealing with this in their own family or they're dealing with this in a school setting, the unsolved problems always take more time than solved problems.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Problems that are unsolved continue causing concerning behavior, which take an enormous amount of time, solving problems collaboratively never takes that much time. A lot of these kids, especially the ones who are struggling the most, have big piles of unsolved problems. Like I said, most of them are old These are expectations that these kids have been having difficulty meeting for a years, few, very long time. Primarily because the problems never got identified and never got solved. The reason we don't have time is because of all those unsolved problems, problems that have never been solved that we keep chasing after day after day after day without solving anything. Because consequences are not problem solving strategies. So when it comes to time, the schools that implement this model, the parents that implement this model recognize that it saves them time. So we don't worry too much about the time issue. We were more and more about the commitment issue. If we're working with a parent or an educator who's saying I don't have time to do this, then we are paraphrasing. You're saying you don't have time to solve problems with your child or your student.

[Jenny Urch]

Right?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

All right. I don't know what y' all are busy doing. You know what? I'll take problem solving over those violin lessons. I'll take problem solving over soccer because soccer is not ruining your family, but conflict can ruin your family. I'll take problem solving over putting expectations on a kid that we already know they can't meet. That's just going to cause concerning behavior again. Right? I would be the first to acknowledge the school day was designed around parents. You could design your day any way you want, but you got to have time to solve problems with your kids that busy, something ain't right. Schools. I'd be the first to agree. The school schedule was not organized around problem solving. It was organized around academics. In many schools, we have to reconfigure their schedule so that classroom teachers have time to solve problems with their kids. Because what we've been busy doing is sending problems to other people, mostly in the office, for them to do something about it. But the office can't solve difficulty. Completing the double digit division problems on the worksheet and math, the classroom teacher can. So we'd all be a whole lot better off if we were instead of having this long line outside the assistant principal's office. Committing to solving problems with our students and creating time for our classroom teachers to solve problems with their kids. And in the book I go into great detail about how we can create that time as we are in the process of saving

[Jenny Urch]

would be so good for everyone. They would come out with so many skills. Because you never know. You never know then if in 10 years, 10 years time, or 20 years of time, you're going to be the parent that has a child that has concerning behaviors and Maybe you learn those skills from your fourth GR teacher.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Wouldn't that be great?

[Jenny Urch]

Wouldn't that be great? You say that the changes we recommend. So the book is called the Kids who Aren't okay, the Urgent Case for Reimagining Support, Belonging and Hope in Schools. This other one that I read is

[Sponsor Voice]

called the Explosive Child.

[Jenny Urch]

You also have one called. Is it called Lost at School?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Lost at School, yeah.

[Jenny Urch]

Okay, so a lot of. A lot of tools here, A lot of resources. And then your website, which has incredible resources and is so well done. So, so well done. You just hang this on your wall. You know, if you're a teacher that you hang these cheat sheets on the wall. If you're a parent, you put them on your fridge. They're phenomenal. They're color coded. They have examples on them. They're laid out so well. You write, the changes we recommend benefit vulnerable students the most, but they will also benefit all students along with their educators and parents. So this is going to help everyone. You say it is seductive to believe that most of what's going on in school is working if most of the students are doing well. Most school and classrooms are structured around the kids who aren't struggling. But what would we do differently if we structured things in the opposite direction? But teachers have not been exposed to these ideas usually. So talking about empathy, you kind of start there. The empathy step gives your child a voice. Then they don't have to scream or exhibit any other concerning behaviors to be heard. And just in case you had any doubts, it is good for children to be heard. So can you talk about. We're kind of. I want to back up just one step because you use the phrase lucky versus unlucky kids. I would love for you to. To talk about that because some we gloss over maybe the kid who's crying or the kid who's whining or the kid who is withdrawing. And then some kids are biting and kicking and screaming. And so maybe we're. We're focusing that way, but in either direction, these kids are struggling.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

I use lucky and unlucky to describe different types of frustration responses. Lucky frustration responses, and this is my own terminology because I'm not very diagnostically oriented. Lucky frustration responses, though, are things like whining, pouting, sulking, withdrawing, crying, unlucky. Frustration responses are things like screaming, swearing, hitting, spitting, kicking, biting, throwing, destroying, running. They all communicate the same thing, that there's an expectation that a kid is having difficulty meeting. So a frustration response is a frustration response, but it's the kids who have unlucky frustration responses who are typically on the receiving end of the most punitive, exclusionary disciplinary practices our society has to offer, even though when it comes to what their behavior is communicating, their frustration response is communicating the exact same thing. So it's the unlucky ones who are on the receiving end of our worst. If there's a disadvantage to being a kid with a lucky frustration response, it's that you might get overlooked.

[Jenny Urch]

Yeah, sure, you're ignored.

[Sponsor Voice]

Right.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

But what I'm trying to get us out of the business of doing is slicing the pie by the nature of a kid's frustration response. For me, a frustration response is a frustration response I'm not worried about. And I get it. The unlucky frustration responses can be scary and dangerous and disruptive to a classroom. But those frustration responses are going to continue so long as what we're focused on are the frustration response responses. We've got to move upstream to the problems that are causing those frustration responses. I just don't believe in slicing the pie by a kid's concerning behavior. That's going to work out to the disadvantage of a lot of kids and has through time immemorial.

[Jenny Urch]

I mean, I could see if you're in a. In a classroom setting and you got a kid that withdraws, it's like, oh, okay, you know, it doesn't grab your attention. So to your point, those ones are getting ignored or, you know, sometimes brushed over. It could happen, I guess, but a child who is biting will never be ignored. And so to your point, like lucky and unlucky, you know, it goes, I guess, both ways in terms of the responses. But these are all frustration responses. I guess a couple things. It was really good for me to be aware of that. It's good to know that crying and sulking or pouting, instead of just being like, oh, they're annoying, they're whining. That's a frustration response. It's good to know. I mean, I think that a lot of adults may not know. That was kind of news to me. Like, these are, these are two ends of the spectrum, but really they're coming from the same root thing. And then also you can easily see how one might get pushed aside while one is, like you said, punitively affected for their whole childhood. Basically, you say, you know, people say, well, all they want is attention. And you say, but we all want attention. So it doesn't really distinguish your child from anyone else. A lot of kind of myths I guess, you dispel in this book. You know, talk about things that are like a non starter. So a lot to learn.

[Sponsor Voice]

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[Jenny Urch]

No guesswork.

[Sponsor Voice]

IXL covers math, language arts, science and social studies from Pre K through 12th grade and it's built to help families keep momentum going even through winter, so confidence can grow heading into spring. Make an impact on your child's learning. Get IXL now and 1000 Hours Outside listeners can get an exclusive 20 off IXL membership when they sign up today at ixl.com 1000hours. Visit ixl.com 1000hours to get the most effective learning program out there and at the best price. The new year always makes me want to reset our spaces. Not perfectly, but intentionally. I want our home to support our routines again instead of working against them. And that's where Wayfair has been such a help. Wayfair really is a one stop shop for everything your home needs, from bedding and bath basics to storage to those little decor touches that make a space feel finished. Whether you're refreshing kids rooms, organizing your kitchen for easier weeknight dinners, or rethinking a work from home setup, it's all there. One of my favorite updates this season has actually been for our podcast studio. We get so many books sent from guests and they were stacking up everywhere. We ordered new shelving from Wayfair and it completely changed the space. Clean line, simple style, and finally a place for all those books to live. It looks great, it's functional and honestly it just makes the room feel calmer and more put together. That's what I love about Wayfair. The selection is huge, the styles are easy to browse, and you can find pieces that work for your home in your budget without overthinking it. Get organized, refreshed and back on track this year for way less head to Wayfair.com right now to shop all things home. That's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R.com Wayfair every style, every home.

[Jenny Urch]

Can you talk about the capitalism piece? So one of the things that you

[Sponsor Voice]

talked about

[Jenny Urch]

was that when the high stakes testing started, you wrote, many educators began to comment that high stakes testing took all the humanity out of their jobs. There are many realms in which capitalism has been the cart leading the horse of American education. With high state, high stakes testing very much in the mix as well. I, I guess people might not know this there. I, because I was in the, you know I taught for a kind of a short period of my life but I was exposed to the textbook buying process and it was like a huge money maker. You know they're sending in these slick, you know these are really slick, like similar to pharmaceutical reps. You know, they're always like really good looking. They're always dressed to the nines. They got free stuff for you. You know, like the rest of the whole thing is just like, you know, you're just trying to like stay above water and make sure like no one's nose is running and like you're just kind of like in this crazy rigmarole of, of trying to get kids through the classroom day and income these reps and you're like these are like a different class of people.

[Sponsor Voice]

Because you're right.

[Jenny Urch]

There is big money in training educators to do different types of things. So what do people need to know?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

People need to know that companies love to sell stuff to schools. Schools are a big customer. We're talking lots of money here. That a lot of what is sold to school is not evidence based. In the case of kids with concerning behavior. The industry that I am casting a spotlight on the most is what we call the restraint industrial complex. The good folks who are and educators are buying. Schools are buying. I was just on the school with a, on a zoom call with a special ed director and we were talking about how much money she spends teaching get buying training for her teachers to learn how to de escalate and restrain kids. That's why we call it the restraint industry. Big money. The biggest of the companies generates $100 million a year owned by a private equity company. And what they do is teach educators how to restrain and de escalate kids. If that's what we're buying, we're going to be late every time because restraint and de escalating and even seclusion rooms, or isolation rooms, as they're sometimes called, occur at the end of a very long sequence that begins, once again, with an expectation a student is having difficulty meeting. But that's not what we're focused on, unfortunately. And what we're buying focuses on what happens at the end of that sequence. What I want people to be buying in the form of, I guess, a $20 book. Instead of spending hundreds of millions of dollars every year teaching people what to do when it's already late, let's develop a technology for being early. See, as I said in the the kids who aren't okay, being late is not a given. We're set up to be late. We don't have to be set up to be late. We could be set up to be early. But as you saw in that chapter, it's chapter three in that book, all of the things we do in schools that are late. Late is not a given. Restraint and seclusion is not a given. De. Escalating is not a given. The problem is it's a setup. We've been set up to be late. We could just as easily be set up to be early.

[Jenny Urch]

It's really good phraseology. It's really good phraseology. I'd never heard it before. We need to stop being late. Being late is not your best strategy. And when you spend years responding to problems, you can overlook the fact that you could be preventing them. So you talk about all of those things, even the rooms that they send kids to. Like, this is at the end. This is at the end.

[Sponsor Voice]

You're too late.

[Jenny Urch]

You're too late. So can we be early? Can we get on the front end of it? You wrote. And I was like, even this. I was like, oh, you can just hear. Even in myself. I was like, oh, is it too hard? You wrote good teaching. Good teaching. What is good teaching? It is meeting every student where they are at. I mean, like. And everyone will be like, well, there's 27 of them and one of me. How can you possibly meet every student where they are at? And you wrote, meeting every student where they are at is hard work, but not meeting every student where they're at is way harder. There's a lot in here to think about, I guess. You know, I've been out of the school system since 2008, so I'm not quite sure where things are at for teachers. I do think things are probably way harder because of screens and testing. It was hard then. I would imagine it's harder now. But these are things I'd never heard.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

I'm sorry about that. Teachers differentiate instruction all the time.

[Sponsor Voice]

Yeah.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Teachers personalize learning all the time. So these are not foreign concepts for most educators. There's a lot of developmental variability walking in that door. One of the things, in fact, that's what's guaranteed to be walking in the door, developmental variability. Which is a fancy way of saying every kid's going to be different in some way or another. Every kid is going to be different. If you have a kid who is different in one way, you want to make sure that they're addressing that at school in another way, you want to make sure school is addressing that. Right. High stakes testing didn't make that easy because we. High stakes testing is where I said we got to get every kid over the bar. Same bar by the end of the school year. Right. That flopped. Right. Complete and total flop. Bad idea right out of the gate. Also driven, as we were talking about earlier, by capitalism rather than what's best practice for kids and educators. Every kid is their own reference point because of developmental variability. And what that means in the context of problem solving is not only meeting every kid where they're at, but it means that we're going to be disproportionately solving problems with kids. We've all heard that disproportionality is bad, punitive disproportionality is bad, but I got a good kind of disproportionality. Some kids are going to need us to solve more problems within them than others just because of developmental variability. Right. And why is there developmental variability? Dozens of reasons that all that developmental variability is walking in the door. I didn't spend any time on those dozens of reasons. All that developmental variability is walking in the door. All I'm saying is we've got to be responsive to it. I think a good school is judged by the degree to which it is responding well to the developmental variability that's walking in the door. And here's what I can promise you. If we are seeing concerning behavior, if we are seeing a frustration response, then we got a kid who's developmentally variable and we're not meeting that kid where they're at. Yeah, that's the equation.

[Jenny Urch]

You had a map on your website. I was like, oh, my goodness, there's so much incredible information. It was a map that showed basically, I guess, I don't know how you would phrase it, but, like, it was like where the most punitive schools were. It was a map of the United States. And it was like Red or lighter red or not. It was like color coded. So you could see that there in some ways are some overarching norms, not necessarily good norms, but like that are happening even geographically throughout the country. So I guess if you're in a red state, you really need the book.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

The map is on the website. It's. We don't refer to red states based on, on politics in other spheres, but the red states, they're just colored red

[Jenny Urch]

and then it's like lighter red. Yeah. The key is that, yeah, it was not red or blue.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Red was meant to be bright and alarming. Not the way we talk about red states in politics. But we have states that love to hit kids in schools. We have kids that restrain and seclude way more than other states do. There's some states that I wouldn't want to be a kid in that's on the Lives in the Balance website. Because a big part of what Lives in the Balance does is advocacy work. We are in touch with legislators in every state to try to affect legislation that affects how kids are treated. And we want people to know the states in which things are really bad. You can find schools in every state where things are pretty bad, but some states generically are worse than others and they tend to be in the southern United States.

[Jenny Urch]

And that. Interesting. That was interesting. It was interesting to see the map. I think people just got to pop up. We got to pop over to the website because there's just a lot there to kind of peruse. Livesinthebalance.org you wrote this. This is actually pretty. Well, it's all pretty interesting. So I mean, that's a dumb thing to say. I thought, you know, we talk so much about the mental health crisis and the youth mental health crisis and the numbers that are up, like suicide and depression and anxiety, but actually most kids are still doing okay. Was I gotta. Nobody ever really says that. I guess, you know, you say, well, most kids are still doing okay. More kids than ever aren't doing very well at all. When we see dramatically more kids exhibiting anxiety, depression concerning behavior, suicidality, and school absenteeism, it tells us that we need to take a hard look at the ecosystems in which they exist and start asking some questions. And like we talked about now several times, can we, can we focus the system on the vulnerable kids, knowing that that will help all of the kids as a whole. But the sentence most kids are still doing okay, I guess you don't, you don't actually really hear that. You only kind of hear the numbers of the. Concerning Things. But you say more and more kids are not doing very well at all trend wise. Do you see that continuing?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

I think that if we don't change things, I see that continuing. If we just stick with business as usual and we don't take st talk of the fact that we've got a bit of a new normal here. You know, I'm not. My style is not click oriented. My style is not headline oriented. I'd rather be honest. I'd rather say what's true. And most kids are still doing okay. That's not necessarily going to be headline worthy these days because what's headline worthy these days is the stuff that's alarming. Well, there's plenty to be alarmed about. Those sky high rates of the things you just mentioned, plenty to be worried about. But that doesn't mean every kid is not doing okay. Most still are. And I'm sorry that I'm one of the very few people who is saying that, but that's honesty. But the bottom line is if we keep doing things the way we still are, more kids will not be doing okay and we'll continue losing the ones who already aren't.

[Jenny Urch]

Yeah, it's good to know. Good to be aware of. You talk about medication. Deciding whether to medicate one's child should be difficult. It's a good statement. Teachers and classmates are often really interesting and I've not read this either or thought about it. Teachers and classmates are often the primary beneficiaries of pharmacologic. Yeah, pharmacotherapy. Is that another word too?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Pharmacotherapy? Yeah.

[Jenny Urch]

Okay. I've not actually heard pharmacotherapy or pharmacologic. Because kids with concerning behaviors may be medicated during school hours, but many medications wear off by late afternoon or early evening. Just in time, you know, for when the kid reaches home. And then they've got homework to do and you know, and there's other factors there. Can you talk about. I know it's a really big piece, but I, I think it's a really big piece. I mean it's, it's a really big part of what's going on in our world is medicating children, deciding whether to medicate when children should be difficult. What are your thoughts on that?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

I have a few thoughts on that. That's from the explosive child. First of all, it's too easy to pull out a prescription pad. Second, there are some kids who benefit enormously from psychotropic medication. Both can be true. So we don't want to take the stance of all Medication is bad. We also have to appreciate the fact that probably in this country more than any other, we're over medicating kids because it's easy to pull out the prescription pad. So this should be a intentional, deliberate process in which we're evaluating whether part of this kid's presentation is something medication would address well, and the side effect profiles of different medications. So I actually view this as one of the easier parts of working with kids who have concerning behaviors. We have to know what medicines do well and what medicines don't do well. And there's a lot of things medicines don't do well and some things medicines do do well. In the psychotropic medication department, we need to know what psychosocial treatment does well in case it does something better than medication does. And we need to know what each medicine does and whether it's worth the potential side effects. So for me, it's a fairly straightforward algorithm. There are kids that I've worked with over the last 35 years for whom medication was an indispensable part of helping them do better. And there are kids I work with over the last 35 years who, when I started working with them, were on 8, 9, 10 different medications. I don't know any kid who needs 8, 9, 10 different psychotropic medications. That's going way overboard a lot to think about here.

[Jenny Urch]

And you talk about how just these things take some time. They take some time. You got to solve the problems. You say if you're extremely busy. So this would go for a parent or an educator. If you're extremely busy and are accustomed to solving problems in the spur of the moment, there's a good chance you're leaving your kid floundering in your wake. And he's probably not doing very well back there. We could demand that he adapt to you, but since flexibility and adaptability are not his strengths things, the more realistic option, though it may not be easy, is for you to adapt to him. Once he learned some skills and you are able to solve some chronic problems together, maybe he'll be able to reciprocate back to the unresolved problems. Always take more time than solve problems. Doing something that isn't working always takes more time than doing something that will work. Can we just as we're wrapping it up, you had. It was actually shorter than I was expecting, but something that teachers and parents could use is this. Did you say ASLAP also asap ace.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

It's now the assessment of skills and unsolved problems we took lagging out. Okay.

[Sponsor Voice]

All right.

[Jenny Urch]

I was like, I thought there was an L in there, but there's.

[Sponsor Voice]

Okay.

[Jenny Urch]

Asap. So you're gonna. And I. I could see how, as a parent or an educator, you might be overwhelmed by this. Like, oh, you know, what are their unsolved skills? But similar to all the other things on your website, this is very concise. And you go through this list of skills that a child might be having difficulty with, and, you know, they're. They're maybe getting frustrated, meeting certain expectations, but there's really only. I mean, there's less than 20 things on here.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

We think it's a. There's two sections on the ASIP.

[Jenny Urch]

Yep. This is on your website, people. Your amazing website, people can find it.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

The first section is this. Are the skills that make it hard for some kids to respond adaptively to problems and frustrations.

[Jenny Urch]

Okay, can I give an example of one? So I actually thought this was. I guess here's what I'm trying to say. When you think about your kids and you're like, maybe this is overwhelming, like, to be proactive, to not be late, and you might think, oh, there's so many problems. We're having so many problems. But when you actually go to the asap, which is on your website, you can just pull it right up. You're like, oh, there's really not that many things here. Right. And. And there. They could be bigger things, but there's not, like, an endless list. I thought there would be a list of, like, 200 things, but there's not. It's less than 20 things. So one of them, which was interesting because you. You talked about it in your books, was considering a range of solutions to problems. So you wrote that.

[Sponsor Voice]

Okay, that.

[Jenny Urch]

This is really interesting wording. Many children, I never would have considered this because I think actually I'm pretty good at coming up with different ideas. Like, for example, I edit my podcast, and it's kind of laborious, and it takes a long time. So, like, a couple months ago, I realized I can kind of do it while I'm doing a puzzle, and I really like doing puzzles. So I'm like, I saw. I feel like I solved my problems a lot. You know, I mean, that's like a stupid, simple example. I never would have considered that other people, and kids especially, might have a difficulty solving their own problems. Problems, she wrote. Many children have great difficulty considering a range of potential solutions that could have been applied to a particular problem. Some can't think of any solutions at all. Many also have difficulty anticipating how each. Each Potential solution would pan out. Some are so impulsive that even if they could think of more than one solution, they've already done the first thing that popped into their heads. The bad news is that the first solution is often the worst one, the one that required the least amount of reflection and thought. Which probably explains why some kids are notorious for putting their worst foot forward. Moreover, there are many kids who can't think of any solutions at all. So the problem remains unsolved and the concerning behaviors being caused by that problem persist. That's one example of the about 20 things that are on the skills list that a child might not be able to consider. They might have difficulty considering a range of solutions to problems. So I guess I'm trying to say two things. One, it wasn't as overwhelming of a

[Sponsor Voice]

list as I thought.

[Jenny Urch]

And two, it was very eye opening. What was on there?

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Well, that's the goal. The reason we list skills in the top section of the ACIP is because we want caregivers to recognize that it is skills or the lack of them that are driving a kid's poor frustration response, not motivation. That's huge.

[Jenny Urch]

It's huge. It helps with empathy. I'm sorry, I'm interrupting. I just was so eye opening. To me, it helps empathy because you're like, okay, if you don't know that a kid might have a hard time figuring out a range of solutions to problems, if you don't even know that's a thing, then you can be more empathetic. Or if you don't know that it's a thing that they're, you know, that they are have a problem with the skill of inter interoception, which is the ability to know what's going on inside of their body, or if they are having trouble with the skill of handling ambiguity or uncertainty. And they're young. So I mean, I. All of us have a hard time handling ambiguity and uncertainty, and some kids might, but more so be struggling with that skill. So it just like, I don't know, it gives you a lot of empathy and understanding.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

It's huge. It's huge. I've had many caregivers get tears in their eyes when they. When I was helping them through the process of identifying the skills their kid was struggling with, and all of a sudden it became very clear to them that this was not about motivation, this was not about poor parenting, which is what a lot of mental health professionals have been telling parents about their kids with concerning behaviors. That's how I was trained to believe until I noticed That a lot of the parents I was working with who had an ill behaved kid also had well behaved kids in their home. So apparently this is not about poor parenting, but the skills help us get the right lenses on. My kid is struggling with skills, not motivation. It's that second section on the ACIP which is where we are identifying every single expectation a kid is having difficulty reliably meeting. Those are our unsolved problems. That is what really helps parents and educators get organized because they've never identified those unsolved problems before because they've been too busy counting and checking and modifying the behaviors that are being caused by that problem, those problems. So what the ACIP as we call it does is it helps us move upstream so we don't always find ourselves downstream dealing with a kid's concerning behavior.

[Jenny Urch]

Yet again, the resources are incredible. Incredible. What if a child has a problem with the skill of the sense of time? They might have difficulty and the wording uses. If they have difficulty with the skill of. I might be totally botching all of this. But you know, you talk about the word difficulty. They have a difficulty meeting certain expectations. But like one of the things, one of the skills is, is having a good sense of time. Like I feel like I've got a pretty good sense of time. Like how much time has passed, how much time am I going to need for that task? But if they have a difficulty with that, then that's going to mess with everything.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

I mean there's, that's why your five minute warning isn't working very well. You've got five minutes to get off the Xbox. The kid does not comprehend that. And some, some people might be rolling their eyes right now. But if you have a kid who has a poor sense of time, you're not rolling your eyes right now. Now anyways, hopefully you're saying, oh my goodness, I didn't realize that.

[Jenny Urch]

Yeah, it's so good. The new book is called the Kids who Aren't okay. The Urgent Case for Reimagining Support, Belonging and Hope in Schools. You check out the website, it's got fantastic resources. I printed out the plan B cheat sheet. I printed out the drilling cheat sheet which is going to help you have deeper and more understanding conversations with your children and with other people. Work on your listening skills. I actually, in saying that I have a good sense of time. We're running out of time. So that was ironic. But I wanted to end with this sentence and this was in the kids who aren't okay. You say you can't do much about. And you go through this long list of things you can't do much about social media. Now a parent maybe can do a little bit more, but you can't do much about social media. Cyber bullying, the student's family at home, social isolation and loneliness, ostracization, trauma, helicopter parenting. So this is kind of talking to the educators, but is this general sense that there's a lot of things that you can't do much about. You can't do anything about the college admissions process. You know, you can't do anything about the youth sports complex that's just become so invasive. Like you can't do anything about the, the pressures that kids are on. There's a lot of things you can't do anything about. But you say if you do what you can do, which is getting to the root of these problems, getting out ahead, not being late, you will enhance the mental health of children, of your students, of your own children. And so it's just a book of, of things that you can do and of, of impact that you can make are very interesting things I never considered. We always end our show with the same question. What's a favorite memory from your childhood?

[Sponsor Voice]

That was outside.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Oh, outside. Came out of the blue.

[Jenny Urch]

And you've got one minute.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

You know, at North Miami Elementary School, I was outside playing softball, I guess, with my classmates. And I looked behind me and I saw that my sixth grade teacher, Mr. Stearns, was sitting outside watching us. He was not part of the baseball game. And a ball got hit into left center field. I guess I was the center field fielder and a classmate of mine was the left fielder. And a got between us, passed us and the left fielder who had a temper, he shall remain nameless. But I remember his name started screaming at me for letting the ball scoot by right. And I said some things to my classmate that were very calming. And Mr. Stearns must have noticed because Mr. Stearns is the reason I got the American Legion Citizenship Award for the sixth grade that year. And I have a funny feeling it was while he was watching that sequence in that softball game that he decided, I want to promote this.

[Jenny Urch]

Wow. That kind of comes full circle, the fact that you remember that kid's name and it was in the sixth grade. It's like everybody knows the kids that always get in trouble, you know, the kids that are struggling with their frustration responses. But what a different reframe. This is one of the most comprehensive and most useful resources I've ever seen and I've introduced, I have interviewed 650 people and read, you know, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of books. And I just found this to be incredibly valuable. As well as the website livesinthebalance.org the books, the explosive child in its sixth edition and brand new, the Kids who Aren't okay. The Urgent Case for Reimagining Support, Belonging, and hope in schools. Dr. Green, thank you for being here.

[Dr. Ross W. Greene]

Thank you so much for having me. This was one of the most fun interviews I've ever done.

[Sponsor Voice]

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