Behavior Charting

Charting can be a powerful method of facilitating social, emotional, and moral development in children. Many people misperceive charting as limited to rigid reward schedules in behavior modification. However, the technique can be used to facilitate self-awareness and taking responsibility for one's own actions. When coupled with a sensitive review of the chart between parent and child, it can also promote communication and closeness. When children have problems in emotional development, charting can help them learn principles of emotional cause-and-effect. Charting can also help children understand why parents or teachers are concerned about their behavior. Rather than the abstract concepts that adults usually talk about, the chart requires everyone to be more specific. Thus, charts make abstract concepts of behavior more concrete and observable.

Charting must be accompanied by daily parent-child reviews of the child's behavior and its consequences. The reviews create opportunities for parents to share their own principles with their child. The repetition and restating of the principles, and the application of principles to daily incidents, are often necessary. 

In the beginning of the charting process, children are often preoccupied with the numerical results of the chart, and with the concrete rewards they can earn. Over time, if parents pursue opportunities for discussion, children learn the link between abstract principles and concrete behavioral incidents. If parents do not take the opportunities to engage their child in such discussions, the charting process remains on the concrete level.

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Copyright © 1999 Tom Holman, Ph.D. All rights reserved.