Tips on how to form a good working relationship with SEMH students

Hello everyone! Hope you're all doing good.

As the above title states, I thought I'd share some useful tips on how to form a good working relationship with SEMH students. This is especially handy for anyone who is looking into going into this industry. Not to mention that the benefits that come out of this feel immensely rewarding too!

However, I must warn you that the process of forming a good relationship with SEMH students can come with a fair share of emotional obstacles along the way... As I have experienced...

DO:

• Be polite by saying "morning" to them - Even if you see the students walking around who you barely know, it's always good to greet them warmly first thing in school. Especially how it can really secretly brighten up their mood, as they may not be warmly spoken to in that manner at home.

• Try to start a friendly conversation with them - Again, if you come across a student you barely interact with, at least pluck up the courage to begin a friendly conversation with them, such as: "How are you doing today X?" Although a majority of the students (especially the ones I didn't interact with much) will tell you to go away at times, at least they will eventually see in time that you are trying to make an effort to get to know them a bit more.

• Be firm with boundaries & behaviour - I know this will be nerve-racking, but you need to be very consistent with verbally telling students about the inappropriate behaviour they are displaying, as well as to firmly inform them of the consequences should they choose to continue with their inappropriate behaviour. Believe me, they will be thanking you inside their heads later, as SEMH kids crave on a sense of security.

DON'T:

• Keep on changing their routine during their school day - If there is 1 thing that SEMH kids HATE the most, it's definitely change. Every structured routine in their school day must be kept the same where possible, as sudden last second changes can REALLY cause SEMH kids to have some serious dysregulations! Trust me, witnessing a SEMH pupil dysregulated is not the prettiest thing to experience.

• Expect or make them do paperwork for the whole lesson - I know this may sound weird to some people, as you'd typically expect any pupil to get on with doing paperwork for an entire lesson, but with SEMH pupils, that is a different story, and this can cause them to feel tired & overwhelmed, as being in a classroom for too long can stress them out due to carrying an excessive amount of energy then other kids from non SEMH school settings. 

• Make them feel ashamed of their needs - Just because your purpose is to discipline SEMH pupils when they display inappropriate behaviour, doesn't give you the excuse to blame their needs for who they are as a person. The only thing this will do, is cause SEMH kids to have their confidence crushed, as they cannot change who they are inside.

I hope these tips will come into use for anyone who is looking into working in a SEMH environment. Especially having first-hand experience & knowledge. 

*I began this post on the 7/7, but didn't finish it until the 14/7*

The psychology behind I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here!

Happy Friday all! I cannot believe we're now in December already?! This only means I can begin the official countdown to Christmas, my birthday & 2024. (They all come at once for me within just 7 days😂 )

Putting that obvious, but irrelevant information aside, I want to do a kind of blog post which I haven't done for as long as I could remember the last time I did so. (As the 3 first words in the above title state)

And because it's also that time of year again, where a certain iconic TV programme invades ITVX (as it's now known as these days) for 4 weeks, I felt like discussing the psychology that lies behind it. Just to pre-warn you all, I will be sharing my thoughts in this post as well.

I'm sure most people can say that I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here is one of the most entertaining programmes to come around every year, as 12 celebrities participate in scary & silly challenges. All of which is set in a remote jungle located in Australia. And the 2 hosts are none other than the Geordie duo, Ant & Dec.

But I ask myself this rhetorical question: "What makes this TV programme so entertaining & popular?" Could it depend on what celebrities go into the jungle? Could it depend on which celebrities do what challenge? Could it be that Ant & Dec are the main hosts? Could it even be the the fans' gossip/opinions on social media? The possibilities are endless.

In my own personal opinion, I would say all of the above. Purely because this TV programme has been running the same way since 2002. (Including when the show had to relocate to Wales for 2 years running due to COVID-19 restrictions)

Whenever I watch a celebrity take on a thrilling challenge on public television, it makes my mind think: "Wow! They are so brave at doing that!" And yes, even the celebrities who do these challenges on IACGMOOH like to think they are hard as nails, just for the purpose of the rest of the public to think that way as well. However, the harsh reality is, that it's easy for any celebrity to forget that they are a human being at the end of the day.

To further extend on that point, they get into this habit of people pleasing by thinking they can do anything, as they chose to go on a popular TV programme to undertake a series of crazy challenges. This is also where they develop this mindset of behaving as if they were Superman or Superwoman, (for all you feminists out there) and that giving up is simply not an option. But if any celebrity ended up having to shout: "I'm a celebrity, get me out of here!" When they feel like they cannot cope with a challenge due to feeling too scared, they just end up feeling guilty afterwards. Again, this is their Superman or Superwoman mindset talking to them by telling them that they should've done better.

I can only imagine the celebrities' thoughts if they were to bother reading the fans' comments all over social media about them...

All in all, IACGMOOH is always, and will always set out to people please. Whether it's aimed at the celebrities taking part or just the public watching at home. Especially if the programme itself is still encouraging social stigma across all media.

Growth Mindset VS Fixed Mindset

Happy Sunday all! I hope you've all had a great week, wherever you are in the world. I've mainly been busy prioritizing my self-care throughout this week by not spending too much time on the internet, as spending too much time on the internet does genuinely kill my productiveness.

Anyway, as the title states, I shall be explaining what is a growth & a fixed mindset, as well as explaining the differences between them both. This was another one of those psychology studies which I have learned about back in my 1st year of my Public Services course at college, but had never gotten round to sharing it onto here. The fascinating aspect about this study, is that it can be used to analyse other people's minds. This can mostly be effective for when you are watching studying answer some questions in a classroom. The same method can also apply for when your mind is being studied by somebody else.

What is a growth mindset?

A growth mindset is where you are always looking for ways to learn & grow. This is very commonly used when it comes to making a mistake. For example, when you see somebody being asked to work out a question on chemistry, and they get it wrong, they would want to know where they went wrong in order learn from that mistake.

What is a fixed mindset?

A fixed mindset is where you like to think you are perfect all of time by not making any mistakes. In fact, you try to avoid making mistakes all together for the sake of looking like a genius all of the time. For example, when you see somebody in a classroom copying somebody else's answers in chemistry, because they are too headstrong about making mistakes if they were to provide their own answers. The trouble is that person won't be able to learn how they got their answer in chemistry, as there are no mistakes to help them learn.

Here is the attached picture that shows the characteristics of the 2 contrasting mindsets. Although I may do a separate post on here fir another time, which involves discussing each of them in more detail.

*I began this post on the 29/10/23, but didn't finish it until the 31/10/23*

2 ways to become everyone's favourite person

Evening everyone! I hope you've all had a good week doing whatever you're all doing.

This morning, I decided to have a scrolling session on Psychology Today to see any recent articles that had caught my eye. And as the above title states, this was the most interesting one I had come across, so I thought about distributing what I had read onto here for you guys to see for yourselves as well.

As of at this time of day, I'm too tired to be making this into a long post by using my own words, so I'll write out my overview & attach my source at the end. This is also because this article is too accurate for me to write out by using my own words. Or in other words, I cannot word what I had read in this article differently.

Overview: This article will go into detail about the behaviours of people who have an intention to be everybody's favourite person. In terms of detail, the article will discuss the characteristics of how an individual will be like towards other people, in a bid to make other people like the individual.

Source link: https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/social-instincts/202305/2-ways-to-become-everyones-favorite-person

The psychology of addictive smartphone behaviour

Yes, welcome back to yet another small, but insightful research project of mine! I say small, as this is something which I've only been doing research on for a short period of time. I did ensure to scroll down slowly though, so I could take in every single word of what I was reading to help my head process everything.

What I've chosen to publish for this post, is an inspiration from a picture I had come across on one of my psychology groups on Facebook, and I said to myself that I'll get round to making a post on my blogging website about it at some point. I thought this today would be my ideal time for me to do it! Although I had the picture, I needed to find a piece of research that would link well with the picture. I had typed in "psychology & smartphones" in the Google search bar, which took me to this article that came up 1st in the results page: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2020.573473/full Here's my evaluation:

*This was the picture I had come across on one of my psychology groups on Facebook*

Overview: It is without any doubt that people like to spend their boredom time on their smartphones. I for 1, can even happily hold my hands up to this as well. We like to use our smartphones for the purpose of connecting with other people around us. That being said, most of our modern social life in this day & age revolves around communicating/connecting with people on social media. While social media can be a good purpose for connecting with other people, it can also become too addictive by constantly having to feel the need to check it all of the time. If you're curious to know more about this, see: The psychology behind social media It's not just social media that can cause smartphone addiction though, using a smartphone to continuously replace basic tasks can even put an enormous strain on our mental health. (Mine included) When I say basic tasks, I'm referring to checking the time, checking emails & doing work on it. It would be definitely safe to say that smartphones are taking over mental health, and that is not good at all.

Evidence: On the subject of communicating to one another, a smartphone may seem like a perfect use to do so, as you could have friends who could be going through a difficult time, and they would love somebody to communicate to them. Unfortunately, they could be too far away to communicate to a friend in person, which is why smartphones can provide the most affective use to communicate with people, regardless of whereabouts they are in the world. Highlighting social media for a few seconds, it can be a good way for anybody looking into the creative industry by creating their own content. Moreover, creating popular content on social media can help you to earn money.

Now for the downsides. It has been proven that teenagers' mental health have typically been effected the most by smartphone addiction, as they feel the need to crave their use of social media for the benefit of socially connecting with others. This can also include craving to seek support from their social media followers in a bid to make them feel valued. Although a smartphone my not seem like much to begin with, but the more that people, especially teenagers, mindlessly play about on their smartphone, the more they are at risk from dysfunctional systems. This is just something else besides poor mental health. 

If excessive smartphone use eventually gets to the point of becoming too addictive, then it causes aggressive behaviour to come out of oneself due to their addictive use of a smartphone interfering with their life in general. Endless use of a smartphone could very well be easily done if repeating its excessive use too often. Doing so can make your mind go numb by not even thinking about doing it. This is where the depression comes into play, as your mind will get bored of doing the same thing every time, but feel like there is no escaping the addiction at the same time.

Conclusion: All smartphone addictions have a different story to tell. Meaning, they are not all the same. In theory, it really all depends on what way people behave addictively on their smartphones. Regardless of what smartphone addictive behaviour, they can all have poor mindset consequences at the end.

Understanding Narcissism

Before I even begin, I just want to clarify by saying that this research topic I had mentioned in my previous post was actually found on WebMD. (Not on Psychology Today) *I apologize there*😂

Anyway, I can't exactly remember what I was doing where I came across this article that was published on a website called WebMD. But what I do remember, is I instantly became curious to have a thorough read through the article which contains information about what narcissism is all about.

Before reading through the article, I was already aware of what narcissism is, but at the same time, I wanted to plunge my mind deeper into the subject for the intention to develop a better & wide understanding of the reasons of how narcissism is unknowingly formatted into oneself. Here's what I have gathered...

Discussion/Review:

Narcissism is what is classified as a self-involvement that creates a dark personality trait to a person. Its overall intention is to fill their ego by purposely ignoring the needs of anyone around them. It was at this point during my reading of the article where I read that narcissism may not be a permanent trait to some people who just choose to behave like narcissists. This may well be dependant on how their mental health is coping, by again, choosing to behave this way as their way of trying to block out everything going on around them. Although, you may seem to think they enjoy behaving this way on the outside, but a look into their mental health state must be considered to be able to understand more about their reason for their choice of narcissist behaviour. 

As I then found out, narcissism has a spectrum. People who are going through a temporarily period of narcissism are classified on the lower part of the overall spectrum. 

In terms of the higher end of the spectrum, you have people who have to live with narcissism attached to them day-in, day-out due to a disorder. And that disorder is named as: 'Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD)' There are 2 different types of narcissism that link to the personality disorder just mentioned. The 2 things the types share in common is the fact that different childhood experiences play a role of being officially diagnosed with NPD. Another common thing in the 2 types is the different ways people will behave in relationships. I suppose that does makes sense, given how different childhood experiences are first formatted to shape a person's upbringing.

Going back to narcissism in general, it is important to factor in all of its characteristics before just saying how it is just by looking at it on the outside. You will notice right away with any narcissist behaviour that a person will make themselves look important compared to other people around them by purposely paying zero attention to how these other people will react around them. This could be followed by that person constantly wanting to be admired for every single thing. Even though, there could be hardly anything for that person to be admired for - Just for the sake of not wanting to look like a disappointment. As a warning to any person who criticises a narcissist person, they will just hit you back hard (emotionally) with rudeness & abuse by thinking they are not receiving the support you are giving them. This has to be done by showing compassion & understanding. What I mean, is by not comparing yourself to other people. No judgement, just be there to show support to.

Conclusion: I would say the one thing that really spoke out to me while reading this article, was that narcissism goes way deeper than just its name. Meaning, there are so many psychological factors of how narcissism is made up of by discovering the roots of the trait.

As always, if anyone is interested to see where I got my research from, the source link is here: https://www.webmd.com/mental-health/narcissism-symptoms-signs        

The psychology behind conditioning

We're currently 15 days into 2022, and it's been so far so good for me at the moment. I say that, because I haven't been feeling anxious about anything during that time. Hence, I'm in a good enough headspace to be doing lots of blogging.

So... as the above title says, I'll be talking about how the term 'conditioning' works. This is another thing which I've been studying about in my college course over the last couple of months. I find it really interesting, due to the fascinating psychological effects it can have on people and even animals!

   What is conditioning?

Conditioning is, you work out a way to train a human being or an animal, to do something to make them respond in the way you want them to. 

The way how classic conditioning is demonstrated, is by using Ivan Pavlov's dog food and bell training example:

He trained his dog to respond the the sound of a bell, then he put a bowl of food infront of the dog, so he can make it produce saliva. (This is potentially known as unconditioned stimulus) Eventually, Pavlov will have trained the dog enough times to be able to automatically respond to the bell and show hunger, by salivering at the expectation of food. (Potentially known as conditioned stimulus)

That is where the chemistry comes into play. Pavlov has practically trained the dog to get hungry every time it hears the bell ring, even if there is no food! 

This similar kind of conditioning can may also be used on humans.

   

What goes through the minds of those during conditioning?

When one is currently under the spell of conditioning, they would think to themselves first time: "What is going on here?" Due to them being oblivious to what is happening to them. After many many practises of the conditioning spell later... One will eventually understand the routine, and will therefore think: "Oh, I know exactly what will happen now when I do this, so I must react to it immediately" 

To put this in more basic terms, your mind has adapted expectation skills.

In contrast to all the above, conditioning also defines as you being born to do something. An example of this, would be to always have a positive attitude in life. My conditioning falls under, as being the best person I can be. 

I reckon that just about wraps up that topic now.

Thank you for reading through, please feel free to let me know your thoughts and I should be back again sometime soon.

Enjoy the remainder of your weekend!😊