Reframing ‘Bad’ Behavior to Help Students Succeed

In a preschool classroom I observed, a young boy who had been having a challenging few weeks quietly walked over to the behavior chart at dismissal time. His name had landed in the green section that day. He grabbed his mother’s hand and pointed to it, face lit up with pride. “Look, Mommy,” he said. On days when the chart showed otherwise, though, he often broke into tears the moment he saw her—no words, just shame.

That moment stuck with me. Not because of the chart itself, but because of what it revealed: how early children start to link their behavior to their self-worth.

The Harm in Oversimplifying Behavior

For many students receiving special education services, behavior becomes the dominant lens through which they are evaluated, managed, and labeled. Instead of being known for their curiosity, creativity, or resilience, students are often categorized by their ability or inability to remain still, quiet, and compliant. This is especially harmful for neurodivergent students and those who have experienced trauma.

According to a report from Advocates for Children, students with disabilities—who are about 20 percent of the student population—received 44.8 percent of long-term suspensions and 39.1 percent of principals’ suspensions in 2019–20. These outcomes often have less to do with the student’s capacity to learn and more to do with how schools respond to expressions of stress, frustration, or overwhelm.

Behavior systems that reward compliance and penalize dysregulation often send an unspoken message: “You’re valuable when you behave the way we expect.” But what happens when a student can’t meet those expectations due to sensory overload, emotional dysregulation, or communication differences? They learn, over time, to internalize failure. “I had a hard moment” becomes “I’m a bad kid.” And that self-narrative is hard to unlearn.

We need to ask ourselves: What are we unintentionally teaching students when we use labels like “good” or “bad” to describe behavior? How do we move beyond surface-level behavior management to support emotional regulation, self-awareness, and healing? And how can we create systems that affirm students’ humanity, even in their hardest moments?

Replace Public Charts with Private Self-Regulation Tools

Though some schools have moved away from using behavior charts, many still rely on them as a primary behavior management tool. One important step toward a more supportive approach is replacing public behavior charts with emotionally responsive tools that encourage self-reflection rather than mere compliance. In classrooms that use individual reflection journals or private check-in systems, students have the opportunity to name what felt hard, what helped, and what they want to try next time.

This method aligns with the Zones of Regulation framework, which teaches children how to recognize their emotional states and select strategies to support themselves. The goal is not to ignore behavior, but to help children understand the underlying emotions and needs that drive it.

Shift Praise to Reinforce Self-Efficacy and Growth

Language matters. Simply removing behavior charts is not enough. If we are not watchful of the words we use to describe students’ experiences, our efforts can become unfruitful. Rather than praising obedience, we can reinforce growth and emotional recovery. Instead of saying, “You were good today,” we can say, “You looked overwhelmed and took a break—that’s self-awareness.” Or, “You were frustrated and still found a way to get through the rest of your day.”

This kind of feedback builds what psychologist Albert Bandura calls “self-efficacy,” the belief that you can handle difficult things. When students feel capable of recovering from dysregulation, they develop trust in themselves, rather than fear of disappointing adults.

Write Emotionally Intelligent IEP Goals

It’s also important to examine the way behavior goals are written in individualized education programs (IEPs). Too often, goals focus on reducing outbursts or decreasing specific behaviors, as if control were the ultimate objective. But when IEPs instead aim to strengthen a student’s emotional vocabulary, teach co-regulation strategies, or identify signs of distress before escalation, we shift from compliance to capacity-building. 

This mirrors the Collaborative & Proactive Solutions model, which emphasizes identifying the root causes of challenging behavior and working with students to solve them. In doing so, we equip students with tools they can carry into adulthood, not just expectations they must meet in the moment.

Reframe How We Communicate with Families

Family partnership is essential in this work. Often, caregivers are unintentionally pulled into performance-based narratives that revolve around whether a child was “good” or “bad” at school. Educators can help reframe this by modeling reflective, emotionally attuned language in their communication with families. 

Instead of sending home generic behavior logs, we can share what strategies helped the student regulate that day or how they bounced back from a hard moment. When families begin to use that same language, asking, “What helped you get through it?” instead of “What did you do this time?” we create a consistent, supportive framework across home and school.

Create Classrooms That Reflect Emotional Safety

Even classroom visuals and shared language can reinforce the belief that students are more than their behavior. When students see posters that say, “All feelings are welcome here” or “You can always restart your day,” we send a clear message: Dysregulation is not the end of the story. You are still welcome. You are still worthy. You are still growing.

The Bigger Picture: Supporting the Whole Child

None of this means eliminating boundaries or accountability. But if we truly want to support the social and emotional growth of students with disabilities, we have to align our systems with what we know about trauma, neurodiversity, and development. Overvaluing compliance creates the illusion of success while masking a lack of real skill-building. And too often, it tells children that their worth is conditional.

Our students are always listening. They hear how we speak to them, how we narrate their behavior, and how we respond when they fall apart. They’re not just learning academics, they’re learning whether they are safe to be fully human in front of us. If we want students to see themselves as resilient, capable, and worthy of support, we have to model what that looks like, even in the middle of meltdowns, missteps, and messy moments.

We don’t need more behavior systems. We need systems that truly understand behavior as communication and that meet it with curiosity, care, and consistency. Because every child deserves more than a color chart. They deserve to feel seen, supported, and believed in.