Students Who Drive You Crazy

Succeeding With Resistant, Unmotivated, and Otherwise Difficult Young People
Second Edition
Jeffrey A. Kottler - California State University, Fullerton, USA
Ellen Kottler - California State University, Fullerton, USA
Students Who Drive You Crazy
August 2008 | 168 pages | Corwin
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eBook
ISBN: 9781452295206
Available from January 0001
Paperback
ISBN: 9781412965293
Available from January 0001

Description

"An absolutely necessary read for educators. The commonsense model assesses and outlines how to respond to challenging students, parents, and colleagues. This work is making a difference in my school."
—Bonnie Tryon, Principal
Golding Elementary School, Cobleskill, NY

Take a proactive approach with your most challenging students!

This second edition of a bestseller gives teachers a model to assess, understand, and respond to challenging students. The book also provides strategies for handling relationships with difficult parents and colleagues.

This fully updated survival guide offers additional strategies to help teachers manage difficult students, including those who break rules and those who are withdrawn, plus new tables and charts and questions for reflection. With real-life scenarios from interviews with teachers, counselors, and school administrators, this volume provides:

  • More tips for developing active listening skills that improve communication with students and their parents
  • Suggestions for creating caring communities in the classroom
  • A new section on dealing with aggressive and violent behavior
  • Information on understanding parent behavior and suggestions for building positive connections with parents and families
  • Research from the related disciplines of nursing, social work, psychology, counseling, and family therapy

Use this authoritative handbook to establish healthy, positive relationships with students and maintain a supportive learning environment in the classroom.

Contents

Preface

Preface

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

About the Authors

1. Why Do Some Students Drive You Crazy?

  • At a Loss About What to Do
  • Eye of the Beholder
  • So, Who Gets to You?

2. Which Students Challenge You Most?

  • Students From Hell
  • Profiles of Students Who Are Difficult
  • Placing Actions in Context

3. Understanding Students' Challenging Behavior

  • They Are Doing the Best They Can
  • Additional Functions of Conflict
  • When Biology Has Its Say
  • Creating Difficult Students
  • Multiple Viewpoints

4. What Students Do to Make You Crazy

  • Separating Students and Behavior
  • Protecting Yourself
  • Pushing Our Buttons
  • How Failure Helps
  • Engaging the Challenging Student
  • Recognizing Your Limitations
  • Don't Take the Conflict Personally
  • It Comes With the Territory

5. Changing Your Own Behavior

  • Detachment Without Withdrawal
  • Talking to Yourself
  • Processing Disappointments Internally
  • Stop Complaining
  • Keeping Your Sense of Humor
  • Recognizing Accomplishments and Strengths
  • Reframing Problems
  • Being Flexible
  • Seeking Support
  • Help Yourself First

6. Strategies for Changing Students' Behavior

  • Some Rules of Engagement
  • Develop a Sense of Community
  • Use Counseling Skills
  • Collaborate With Others
  • Brief Interventions
  • Develop Alternate Perspectives

7. Parents and Colleagues Who Drive You Crazy

  • The Least of Our Problems
  • Teachers Who Don't Understand
  • Administrators Who Handcuff Us
  • Parents Who Fight Us
  • What About You?
  • Those Who Abuse You

8. Preventing Future Problems

  • Proactive Versus Reactive Strategies
  • Paying Attention to Feedback
  • Teacher Strategies That Maintain Momentum
  • Conflict Resolution
  • In Summary

References and Suggested Readings

References and Suggested Readings

Index

Index

Description

"An absolutely necessary read for educators. The commonsense model assesses and outlines how to respond to challenging students, parents, and colleagues. This work is making a difference in my school."
—Bonnie Tryon, Principal
Golding Elementary School, Cobleskill, NY

Take a proactive approach with your most challenging students!

This second edition of a bestseller gives teachers a model to assess, understand, and respond to challenging students. The book also provides strategies for handling relationships with difficult parents and colleagues.

This fully updated survival guide offers additional strategies to help teachers manage difficult students, including those who break rules and those who are withdrawn, plus new tables and charts and questions for reflection. With real-life scenarios from interviews with teachers, counselors, and school administrators, this volume provides:

  • More tips for developing active listening skills that improve communication with students and their parents
  • Suggestions for creating caring communities in the classroom
  • A new section on dealing with aggressive and violent behavior
  • Information on understanding parent behavior and suggestions for building positive connections with parents and families
  • Research from the related disciplines of nursing, social work, psychology, counseling, and family therapy

Use this authoritative handbook to establish healthy, positive relationships with students and maintain a supportive learning environment in the classroom.

Contents

Preface

Preface

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

About the Authors

1. Why Do Some Students Drive You Crazy?

  • At a Loss About What to Do
  • Eye of the Beholder
  • So, Who Gets to You?

2. Which Students Challenge You Most?

  • Students From Hell
  • Profiles of Students Who Are Difficult
  • Placing Actions in Context

3. Understanding Students' Challenging Behavior

  • They Are Doing the Best They Can
  • Additional Functions of Conflict
  • When Biology Has Its Say
  • Creating Difficult Students
  • Multiple Viewpoints

4. What Students Do to Make You Crazy

  • Separating Students and Behavior
  • Protecting Yourself
  • Pushing Our Buttons
  • How Failure Helps
  • Engaging the Challenging Student
  • Recognizing Your Limitations
  • Don't Take the Conflict Personally
  • It Comes With the Territory

5. Changing Your Own Behavior

  • Detachment Without Withdrawal
  • Talking to Yourself
  • Processing Disappointments Internally
  • Stop Complaining
  • Keeping Your Sense of Humor
  • Recognizing Accomplishments and Strengths
  • Reframing Problems
  • Being Flexible
  • Seeking Support
  • Help Yourself First

6. Strategies for Changing Students' Behavior

  • Some Rules of Engagement
  • Develop a Sense of Community
  • Use Counseling Skills
  • Collaborate With Others
  • Brief Interventions
  • Develop Alternate Perspectives

7. Parents and Colleagues Who Drive You Crazy

  • The Least of Our Problems
  • Teachers Who Don't Understand
  • Administrators Who Handcuff Us
  • Parents Who Fight Us
  • What About You?
  • Those Who Abuse You

8. Preventing Future Problems

  • Proactive Versus Reactive Strategies
  • Paying Attention to Feedback
  • Teacher Strategies That Maintain Momentum
  • Conflict Resolution
  • In Summary

References and Suggested Readings

References and Suggested Readings

Index

Index

SAGE Publishing Logo

Students Who Drive You Crazy

Succeeding With Resistant, Unmotivated, and Otherwise Difficult Young People


August 2008 | 168 pages | Corwin

Format Published Date ISBN Price
Paperback 01/02/2026 9781412965293 $37.95
Hardcover 01/02/2026 9781412965286 $79.95
Lifetime 01/02/2026 9781452295206 $35.00

"An absolutely necessary read for educators. The commonsense model assesses and outlines how to respond to challenging students, parents, and colleagues. This work is making a difference in my school."
—Bonnie Tryon, Principal
Golding Elementary School, Cobleskill, NY

Take a proactive approach with your most challenging students!

This second edition of a bestseller gives teachers a model to assess, understand, and respond to challenging students. The book also provides strategies for handling relationships with difficult parents and colleagues.

This fully updated survival guide offers additional strategies to help teachers manage difficult students, including those who break rules and those who are withdrawn, plus new tables and charts and questions for reflection. With real-life scenarios from interviews with teachers, counselors, and school administrators, this volume provides:

  • More tips for developing active listening skills that improve communication with students and their parents
  • Suggestions for creating caring communities in the classroom
  • A new section on dealing with aggressive and violent behavior
  • Information on understanding parent behavior and suggestions for building positive connections with parents and families
  • Research from the related disciplines of nursing, social work, psychology, counseling, and family therapy

Use this authoritative handbook to establish healthy, positive relationships with students and maintain a supportive learning environment in the classroom.


Table Of Contents:

  • Preface
  • Acknowledgments
  • About the Authors
  • 1. Why Do Some Students Drive You Crazy?
  • At a Loss About What to Do
  • Eye of the Beholder
  • So, Who Gets to You?
  • 2. Which Students Challenge You Most?
  • Students From Hell
  • Profiles of Students Who Are Difficult
  • Placing Actions in Context
  • 3. Understanding Students' Challenging Behavior
  • They Are Doing the Best They Can
  • Additional Functions of Conflict
  • When Biology Has Its Say
  • Creating Difficult Students
  • Multiple Viewpoints
  • 4. What Students Do to Make You Crazy
  • Separating Students and Behavior
  • Protecting Yourself
  • Pushing Our Buttons
  • How Failure Helps
  • Engaging the Challenging Student
  • Recognizing Your Limitations
  • Don't Take the Conflict Personally
  • It Comes With the Territory
  • 5. Changing Your Own Behavior
  • Detachment Without Withdrawal
  • Talking to Yourself
  • Processing Disappointments Internally
  • Stop Complaining
  • Keeping Your Sense of Humor
  • Recognizing Accomplishments and Strengths
  • Reframing Problems
  • Being Flexible
  • Seeking Support
  • Help Yourself First
  • 6. Strategies for Changing Students' Behavior
  • Some Rules of Engagement
  • Develop a Sense of Community
  • Use Counseling Skills
  • Collaborate With Others
  • Brief Interventions
  • Develop Alternate Perspectives
  • 7. Parents and Colleagues Who Drive You Crazy
  • The Least of Our Problems
  • Teachers Who Don't Understand
  • Administrators Who Handcuff Us
  • Parents Who Fight Us
  • What About You?
  • Those Who Abuse You
  • 8. Preventing Future Problems
  • Proactive Versus Reactive Strategies
  • Paying Attention to Feedback
  • Teacher Strategies That Maintain Momentum
  • Conflict Resolution
  • In Summary
  • References and Suggested Readings
  • Index

Recent Product Reviews:

"With its person-in-environment analysis and intervention model, this book is a good resource in the library of a school social worker. It allows for balanced and nuanced consideration of behavior and provides a framework for ethical and culturally competent practice."
David Roden, School Social Worker, School Social Work Journal, March 2011, Vol. 35, No. 2
"An absolutely necessary read for educators. The commonsense model assesses and outlines how to respond to challenging students, parents, and colleagues. This work is making a difference in my school."
Bonnie Tryon, Principal, Golding Elementary School, Cobleskill, NY
"This book offers strategies, understanding, and hope for practicing educators who find themselves struggling with particular students on a daily basis and who want to reach out to students to help them reach their educational goals."
Danielle Torres, Assistant Professor of School Counseling, Lewis & Clark College
"The book is a compact overview of the equivalent of an entire college course, blending student psychology, classroom management, and introduction to counseling."
Katy Olweiler, Middle School Counselor, Lakeside School, Seattle, WA

Recommendations