Recording incidents

GinaS

Hello,

I'm not sure if I'm supposed to post questions but there's something I've been thinking about for a while and I'd appreciate your thoughts!

How do you feel when someone asks you to start recording your son's/daughter's incidents of "challenging behaviour" at home?

My job is to understand why people behave in a certain way but unfortunately, sometimes, I find it quite hard to capture and get a clear picture of behaviours at home. This is when I ask parents to record any incidents they have at home. I give a particular form (based on ABC model, Antecedent, Behaviour, Consequence) and ask them to complete it once an incident has occurred. I do understand that if your son/daughter has just been aggressive towards others or has been self-injuring, the last thing you want is to put this in paper.

However, this is an invaluable tool for our assessment and I'm struggling to help people understand how important this is. I appreciate though, how hectic a typical household might be and completing this form might be time consuming.

I was wondering if anyone would like to share their experience of recording incidents at home. Was there anything particular that you didn't like about it? Anything that you found helpful and made it easier for you?

Thank you all
Gina

Mary-anne

As a foster carer we have to do lots of recording, but I find it is helpful. Its good to look back to see if there are any patterns of contributing factors to behaviour. It can also be a good thing to look through with your child, talking about both the positive and negatives. I have a bigger challenge getting this information recorded at school.It also helps you reflect on how well a situation was managed. It is however time consuming. I find having a notes app on my phone is useful for recording bullet points instantly then I can write about it later.

GinaS

Thank you for sharing this!
This is exactly why we ask people to record incidents; we analyse them and see if there is a pattern of behaviour, triggers, what the person gets, etc.

A note app for a phone is an excellent idea!! I will definitely try to work on it and maybe design a short template/doc that people can access from their phone! Many thanks!

Mary-anne

We find the 'notespark' app useful as it can be synced with other devices, so husband can update as well (not that I'm an expert or have good knowledge on apps)

GinaS

thank you Mary-anne, I will definitely check it out!

JimJams

I suppose i record it all in my head, I know if I introduce something new to my child , like a multivitamin for example to expect his behaviour to change whilst he gets used to it. Its the same when birthdays, events etc come around his behaviour always changes and he becomes much more anxious and hyper active. I would like to start a journal but do not have much time to do this, I can usually pin point however what has triggered an out burst etc.

GinaS

I do understand that it's time consuming to keep a journal or make a note. However, it's great if you are able to pin point triggers without even recording. Thanks for sharing that!