Life Space Crisis Intervention and PBIS
What is Life Space Crisis Intervention?
Life Space Crisis Intervention (LSCI) is a verbal strategy for intervention with students in crisis (negative reactions to stressful events). The process of LSCI uses the students' reactions to stressful events to change their behavior, enhance their self-esteem, reduce anxiety, and to expand understanding and insight to their behavior and feelings as well as others'. The goal of the adult working with these students in crisis, is to understand the conflict from the students' point of view so they can help the student learn to make positive choices during these times of conflict.
The Conflict Cycle
Life Space Crisis Intervention (LSCI) is a verbal strategy for intervention with students in crisis (negative reactions to stressful events). The process of LSCI uses the students' reactions to stressful events to change their behavior, enhance their self-esteem, reduce anxiety, and to expand understanding and insight to their behavior and feelings as well as others'. The goal of the adult working with these students in crisis, is to understand the conflict from the students' point of view so they can help the student learn to make positive choices during these times of conflict.
The Conflict Cycle
"One way of looking at crisis is to see it as the product of a student's stress, kept alive by the reactions of others." - Nicholas Long, Life Space Crisis Intervention
The Conflict Cycle looks at a student's crisis by analyzing the student's feelings, their behavior, and the reactions of others. Typically, the Conflict Cycle follows this pattern:
1. A stressful incident occurs (i.e., frustration, failure) which triggers a troubled student’s irrational beliefs such as "I'm a failure" or "Adults are unfair."
2. The stressful incident triggers feelings and anxieties.
3. These feelings and anxieties lead to inappropriate, defensive, behavior.
4. Inappropriate, defensive behaviors (yelling, threatening, sarcasm, refusing to speak) attract attention adults and/or peers around them.
5. Adults and/or peers not only pick up the student’s feelings, but also they frequently mirror the behaviors (yell back, etc.) This negative adult and/or peer reaction increases the student’s stress escalating the conflict into a self-defeating power struggle.
6. The Conflict Cycle has begun and could spiral into a full crisis.
Example of the Conflict Cycle:
Cycle 1 EVENT: At the start of P.E. the teacher decides to let the class vote on a game to play. The majority of the class votes on soccer. --> STRESS: Grace does not like soccer and does not feel she is good at it. A lot of the kids in class really like soccer and get competitive. --> FEELINGS & ANXIETIES: Grace fears she will let her team down and they will not like her anymore. --> BEHAVIOR: After a comment from a teammate, Grace yells “I don’t care! I hate this game!” and runs back to her classroom in tears. --> OTHERS' REACTIONS: Classmates look at Grace after she yells but then go back to playing. Grace’s tells her teacher she does not want to go back because her team keeps yelling at her because she isn’t good at soccer and they all hate her. Grace watches the rest of the class but does not participate.
Cycle 2 INCIDENT: Grace receives an 85% on a rather difficult math test. --> STRESS: Grace is normally a straight A student and puts a lot of pressure on herself to maintain perfect Grades. --> FEELINGS & ANXIETIES: Grace is very bothered when she feels like she does not completely understand something inside and out. When she receives her test with an 85% she feels like she has failed and is “stupid”. --> BEHAVIOR: Grace begins to cry and when I quietly go over to her desk to try to go over the incorrect questions with her, she loudly says, “You never taught me this! You never teach me anything and now I failed!” She then storms out of the room and sits outside the classroom.--> OTHERS' REACTIONS: Although the students look up, they go back to their independent work pretty quickly. When the teacher goes outside to talk with Grace she tells her that she is sorry she feels like she was not taught the material on the test but she would really like to go over what she feels like she does not know. The teacher then offers for her to redo those problems on the test for extra credit. She agrees but is embarrassed to go back to the classroom after her outburst fearing her classmates will not like her because of it.
Cycle 3 INCIDENT EXPANDS: During music class, the students begin a unit on playing the recorder. As soon as the students receive their instruments they begin to blow noisily on them. The music teacher wanted to let them get this temptation out of their systems allows the noise for a few minutes.--> STRESS: Grace’s autism causes high sensitively to noise. The music teacher did not realize this. --> FEELINGS & ANXIETIES: The noise becomes too much for Grace. --> BEHAVIOR: Grace yells, “Shut up!” to her class and runs out. --> OTHERS' REACTIONS: Grace’s music teacher, confused, tells Grace's teacher what happened and returns to class. -->
CRISIS: After Grace left the music class, she was so overwhelmed by the noise and embarrassment that she was unable to calm herself down and her mother had to come pick her up. She misses the next few days of school.
How to Stop the Conflict Cycle - The Six Stages of LSCI
1. Drain Off - De-escalate the crisis
Goal: Show the student you support and understand their stress. Try to get the student to talk about the incident to drain off emotional intensity in order to prepare to focus on the event.
2. Timeline - Students in crisis need to talk
Goal: Encourage the student to about their perception of the event and the surrounding circumstances so you can get an understanding of their point of view.
3. Central Issues -Select the appropriate Reclaiming Intervention strategy
Goal: Gain understanding of the student's perception of the incident, feelings, and anxieties. Once you feel you have this understanding, choose the appropriate Reclaiming Intervention.
4. Insight - The goal of the Reclaiming Intervention
Goal: Use interviewing skills to help the student recognize and change self-defeating behavior patterns.
5. New Skills -Plan for success
Goal: Teach the new skills needed for behavior change.
6. Transfer of Training - Prepare the student to reenter the on-going activity and setting
Goal: Help the student anticipate how to manage reentry into the classroom and activity.
Reclaiming Intervention Strategies:
Red Flag: Identify the Source of Stress
Student's Perception: "Everyone is against me and no one understands or cares."
Goal: Identify what the source of the problem really is. If the student letting stress from another situation or setting carry over into this problem?Help the student recognize that they are displacing their feelings on others resulting in alienation. Instead of taking feelings out on those who do not seem to understand, teach them to seek out a staff member to talk about their real problem instead of creating new ones.
Reality Rub: Organize Perceptions of Reality
Student's Perception: "I am being treated unfairly."
Goal: Students in need of Reality Rub Reclaiming interventions tend to have blocked perceptions of reality due to intense feelings. The goal is to help the student organize their thinking so they are able to see a more accurate perception of what really happened. Helping the student organize what happened chronologically helps them to see that maybe there is another way to look at the situation and how their actions might have contributed to making the situation worse.
Symptom Estrangement: Confront Unacceptable Behavior
Student's Perception: "I do what I want even if it hurts others," or "I have to take care of me and I have a reputation to maintain."
Goal: Confront unacceptable behavior by making the student uncomfortable with his rationalizations of gaining pleasure from causing others pain.
Massaging Numb Values: Build Values to Strengthen Self-Control
Student's Perception: "Even when I'm upset and know I need to gain control, I still cannot stop myself."
Goal: With students who act out and then are overwhelmed after by guilt, emphasize the student's positive qualities to strengthen self control. This will build the student's self-confidence and remind them next time they are about to act out that they are a valued person with positive qualities and they do not need to act out to express themselves.
New Tools: Teach New Social Skills
Student's Perception: "I want to do the right thing, but it always comes out wrong."
Goal: When students seek approval from adults and/or peers but lack appropriate social behaviors to do so, teach them new social skills that will result in a positive, desired response from others.
Manipulation of Body Boundaries: Expose Exploitation
Student's Perception: "It's important to have a friend, even if that friend gets me into trouble."
Goal: Students who are set up by others or who are manipulated through a false friendship, need help to see that another student is manipulating events in a way that is working against their best interest. Help them to see that a friend is someone who helps you solve problems and feel good - not get you into trouble.
Life Space Crisis Intervention and PBIS
LSCI and PBIS are two techniques that can easily go hand-in-hand. Any of the above interventions can fit easily into any Behavior Intervention Plan. Once an FBA is completed and the function of the behavior has been uncovered, the team can select the appropriate Reclaiming Intervention to help the student reach their BIP goals!
The Conflict Cycle looks at a student's crisis by analyzing the student's feelings, their behavior, and the reactions of others. Typically, the Conflict Cycle follows this pattern:
1. A stressful incident occurs (i.e., frustration, failure) which triggers a troubled student’s irrational beliefs such as "I'm a failure" or "Adults are unfair."
2. The stressful incident triggers feelings and anxieties.
3. These feelings and anxieties lead to inappropriate, defensive, behavior.
4. Inappropriate, defensive behaviors (yelling, threatening, sarcasm, refusing to speak) attract attention adults and/or peers around them.
5. Adults and/or peers not only pick up the student’s feelings, but also they frequently mirror the behaviors (yell back, etc.) This negative adult and/or peer reaction increases the student’s stress escalating the conflict into a self-defeating power struggle.
6. The Conflict Cycle has begun and could spiral into a full crisis.
Example of the Conflict Cycle:
Cycle 1 EVENT: At the start of P.E. the teacher decides to let the class vote on a game to play. The majority of the class votes on soccer. --> STRESS: Grace does not like soccer and does not feel she is good at it. A lot of the kids in class really like soccer and get competitive. --> FEELINGS & ANXIETIES: Grace fears she will let her team down and they will not like her anymore. --> BEHAVIOR: After a comment from a teammate, Grace yells “I don’t care! I hate this game!” and runs back to her classroom in tears. --> OTHERS' REACTIONS: Classmates look at Grace after she yells but then go back to playing. Grace’s tells her teacher she does not want to go back because her team keeps yelling at her because she isn’t good at soccer and they all hate her. Grace watches the rest of the class but does not participate.
Cycle 2 INCIDENT: Grace receives an 85% on a rather difficult math test. --> STRESS: Grace is normally a straight A student and puts a lot of pressure on herself to maintain perfect Grades. --> FEELINGS & ANXIETIES: Grace is very bothered when she feels like she does not completely understand something inside and out. When she receives her test with an 85% she feels like she has failed and is “stupid”. --> BEHAVIOR: Grace begins to cry and when I quietly go over to her desk to try to go over the incorrect questions with her, she loudly says, “You never taught me this! You never teach me anything and now I failed!” She then storms out of the room and sits outside the classroom.--> OTHERS' REACTIONS: Although the students look up, they go back to their independent work pretty quickly. When the teacher goes outside to talk with Grace she tells her that she is sorry she feels like she was not taught the material on the test but she would really like to go over what she feels like she does not know. The teacher then offers for her to redo those problems on the test for extra credit. She agrees but is embarrassed to go back to the classroom after her outburst fearing her classmates will not like her because of it.
Cycle 3 INCIDENT EXPANDS: During music class, the students begin a unit on playing the recorder. As soon as the students receive their instruments they begin to blow noisily on them. The music teacher wanted to let them get this temptation out of their systems allows the noise for a few minutes.--> STRESS: Grace’s autism causes high sensitively to noise. The music teacher did not realize this. --> FEELINGS & ANXIETIES: The noise becomes too much for Grace. --> BEHAVIOR: Grace yells, “Shut up!” to her class and runs out. --> OTHERS' REACTIONS: Grace’s music teacher, confused, tells Grace's teacher what happened and returns to class. -->
CRISIS: After Grace left the music class, she was so overwhelmed by the noise and embarrassment that she was unable to calm herself down and her mother had to come pick her up. She misses the next few days of school.
How to Stop the Conflict Cycle - The Six Stages of LSCI
1. Drain Off - De-escalate the crisis
Goal: Show the student you support and understand their stress. Try to get the student to talk about the incident to drain off emotional intensity in order to prepare to focus on the event.
2. Timeline - Students in crisis need to talk
Goal: Encourage the student to about their perception of the event and the surrounding circumstances so you can get an understanding of their point of view.
3. Central Issues -Select the appropriate Reclaiming Intervention strategy
Goal: Gain understanding of the student's perception of the incident, feelings, and anxieties. Once you feel you have this understanding, choose the appropriate Reclaiming Intervention.
4. Insight - The goal of the Reclaiming Intervention
Goal: Use interviewing skills to help the student recognize and change self-defeating behavior patterns.
5. New Skills -Plan for success
Goal: Teach the new skills needed for behavior change.
6. Transfer of Training - Prepare the student to reenter the on-going activity and setting
Goal: Help the student anticipate how to manage reentry into the classroom and activity.
Reclaiming Intervention Strategies:
Red Flag: Identify the Source of Stress
Student's Perception: "Everyone is against me and no one understands or cares."
Goal: Identify what the source of the problem really is. If the student letting stress from another situation or setting carry over into this problem?Help the student recognize that they are displacing their feelings on others resulting in alienation. Instead of taking feelings out on those who do not seem to understand, teach them to seek out a staff member to talk about their real problem instead of creating new ones.
Reality Rub: Organize Perceptions of Reality
Student's Perception: "I am being treated unfairly."
Goal: Students in need of Reality Rub Reclaiming interventions tend to have blocked perceptions of reality due to intense feelings. The goal is to help the student organize their thinking so they are able to see a more accurate perception of what really happened. Helping the student organize what happened chronologically helps them to see that maybe there is another way to look at the situation and how their actions might have contributed to making the situation worse.
Symptom Estrangement: Confront Unacceptable Behavior
Student's Perception: "I do what I want even if it hurts others," or "I have to take care of me and I have a reputation to maintain."
Goal: Confront unacceptable behavior by making the student uncomfortable with his rationalizations of gaining pleasure from causing others pain.
Massaging Numb Values: Build Values to Strengthen Self-Control
Student's Perception: "Even when I'm upset and know I need to gain control, I still cannot stop myself."
Goal: With students who act out and then are overwhelmed after by guilt, emphasize the student's positive qualities to strengthen self control. This will build the student's self-confidence and remind them next time they are about to act out that they are a valued person with positive qualities and they do not need to act out to express themselves.
New Tools: Teach New Social Skills
Student's Perception: "I want to do the right thing, but it always comes out wrong."
Goal: When students seek approval from adults and/or peers but lack appropriate social behaviors to do so, teach them new social skills that will result in a positive, desired response from others.
Manipulation of Body Boundaries: Expose Exploitation
Student's Perception: "It's important to have a friend, even if that friend gets me into trouble."
Goal: Students who are set up by others or who are manipulated through a false friendship, need help to see that another student is manipulating events in a way that is working against their best interest. Help them to see that a friend is someone who helps you solve problems and feel good - not get you into trouble.
Life Space Crisis Intervention and PBIS
LSCI and PBIS are two techniques that can easily go hand-in-hand. Any of the above interventions can fit easily into any Behavior Intervention Plan. Once an FBA is completed and the function of the behavior has been uncovered, the team can select the appropriate Reclaiming Intervention to help the student reach their BIP goals!