Milledgeville (GA) Police Handcuff 6-Year-Old Girl for Misbehaving at School

[d_r]

37. Assuming that I can't prevent it before it got to that point

(and frankly I would have), then:

If she can't hurt herself, I walk out and shut the door, and come back in when she has cooled off.

I say that because going head to head with a young kid having a temper tantrum is only going to exacerbate it.

If I thought she was going to hurt herself then I couldn't do that, so I would:

Talk to her in a calm, soothing voice. "It is OK, you are OK." What I want here is for her to get control of her hands and body.

I am reflecting "you are so upset" and I am I-messaging "I am afraid you will get hurt" and I am redirecting "calm down, give yourself a hug like a turtle," "shhh, you're OK sweetie give yourself a big hug," "shhh, it's ok honey, you are ok." Voice tone, calm, even, neutral, matter of fact, reassuring normal volume.

I am not taking it personally and getting my feelings involved, I am remembering that she is a young child and I am the grown up there to help her learn. I am not out of control of the situation and yelling or demanding or threatening. I am in control and I am letting her know that and that she is going to be safe.

If that doesn't work I use a calm, reassuring hold until she is able to gain control.

I get another adult to witness with me.

I am not doing this to show that I have more power. I am being reassuring and calm. I am saying that "I am afraid you will hurt yourself. You can not control your hands, I am going to help you do that now."

With my right hand I hold on to her left, talking as I go, turn her body so that I am behind cross my left arm over her body and holding her arm to her body, wrap my left leg around her body and bring her slowly down on to my lap with my left leg crossing her legs. I am pinning her legs with my left leg wrapped around hers and her arm with my arms wrapped around her. "shhh, you are OK I am not going to let you hurt yourself or anyone else shhhhh" and then I ride it out until she exhausts.

And then I talk to her and praise her for getting under control and I figure out how I'm going to prevent that from ever happening again.

I was trained to safely physically restrain a child as I worked with children in a residential mental health center. That type of training should be part of a special education curriculum and there should be someone with expertise in that in the school. One of the worst things I had to do was take a kitchen knife away from an adolescent boy - I certainly didn't need to call the police to do that for me.