Nurtured Heart Approach

The nurtured heart approach has various techniques to engage kids to have better behavior. It’s toughted as an approach for troubled kids. I’ve worked in an after school program many years ago that used this approach. From my perspective, there are some kids who do well with this approach and others who don’t benefit from this.

I want to first establish that the after school program had two problems. It was in conjunction with a token society– where tickets were given for very good behavior. And second, the program director chose one part of the full approach of the nurtured heart approach and only emphasized that aspect. Every problem that came up had the resolution of “simple recognition.” There’s more to this approach than that and this approach is open for other aspects, but as long as it works with the child.

Simple recognition is that an adult who participates in this approach recognizes a child when they follow a rule. The example that I was given at work was to recognize that the child is wearing a red shirt– there is no praise or blame, it’s just recognition.

The approach is meant to motivate kids to do well because they are being recognized for doing well. Consistency is a emphasized. And if a child is acting up, give the child a highly directed request.

From my experience, it would work well in a classroom or with a very attentive parent. Kids who don’t have severe issues love the attention and relish in it. We were using it in a program with several staff who were not fully trained in the approach. We were all given a CD to listen to on our own time. The wikipedia page has about as much information as that CD. With several adults using the approach, there was inconsistency.

One of the items brought up in the CD was that kids like adults as their favorite toy because they can press buttons and watch the reaction. This has definitely stuck with me as I’ve continued to work with children and teens.

There were kids who weren’t going to change with “simple recognition.” There were kids who were depressed who didn’t want the attention. There were other kids who were just not interested in participating in the program. To some kids, attention means that they are doing wrong, which is what the program is supposed to address. However, a few hours a week at an after school program before going back to an environment that doesn’t support the approach doesn’t work in the after school program’s favor.

With the program also going with the token society made the approach attached to a system that didn’t work well anyway. Again, kids who didn’t want the attention and who did not want to participate were not any more involved in the program if the approach wasn’t used. Those type of kids would likely benefit from a program that uses a sort of organized mentoring program to the younger kids. The kids with depression like one-on-one attention and sometimes if an adult sits and lets them explain a cool idea that they like.

I didn’t like the “simple recognition” technique for kids who were actively disregarding rules and acting in an unsafe manner. There’s obviously no way to tell a kid that they’re doing fantastic while they’re running with scissors and won’t stop.

It seems like this approach would be easier in the framework of a larger program. Yes, recognizing kids who are following the rules and doing well is great. Most kids probably need more of that. This approach doesn’t fully address underlying issues or anything more than a behavior. And it has to a behavior that’s done well. This approach says that it’s great for kids who are oppositional. Part of the problem with oppositional children is that their parents are inconsistent and often get in the way of their wellness. This seems like a disaster waiting to happen for the families struggling with consistency. The nurtured heart approach works well within some circumstances but there are some obvious problems with the approach.