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Discussion Points
Responsive Teaching intervention sessions focus on the strategies and activities that parents can implement during daily interactions. Thus, the activities that take place during RT sessions should help parents:
  • understand how the pivotal behavior that has been targeted as the intervention objective will both improve the child’s developmental learning and help parents attain the outcome they want for their child;
  • learn to understand and use RT strategies that will foster their child’s use of pivotal behaviors;
  • integrate RT strategies into their child’s daily, routine activities.

More than 130 Discussion Points have been developed for this curriculum. These discuss in simple language the theories of development that are the basis for this curriculum. They explain why certain behaviors are “pivotal” to children’s learning and development and how RT strategies encourage children to use these behaviors.

Discussion Points have been designed so that parents will be able to complete each intervention session having a few clearly defined ideas to think about that support the RT strategies that they have been asked to use with their children. Discussion Points formalize what good professionals typically do. They provide a focused and cohesive structure for providing child development information to parents. Each Discussion Point emphasizes a key idea that underscores the importance of a pivotal behavior to children’s developmental progress and reinforces the importance of using RT strategies to address children’s developmental needs.

Cognition

C-100SOCIAL PLAY
C-101Social play with parents is critical for promoting children’s developmental growth.
C-102Cognitive learning is a two-person process.
C-103Cognitive learning occurs whenever children are active and alert.
C-104By themselves, children can only learn information they discover accidentally.
C-105Parents scaffold children’s involvement in social play.
C-106Parents enhance children’s play by providing new information related to their current activities.
C-107Parents’ responses to children’s social play activities help children learn the social consequences of their actions.

C-200INITIATION
C-201Child-initiated behavior is the hallmark of active learning.
C-202The play behaviors children initiate on their own are generally reflective of their current thinking, understanding, and reasoning.
C-203All children initiate developmentally meaningful behaviors.
C-204The idea that children learn through their routine, self-initiated activities contrasts with many developmental and therapeutic activities.
C-205The types of toys that are available and the ways that adults ask children to use them can affect children’s use of active learning strategies.
C-206Children are likely to respond to information, guidance, or direction related to activities they initiate.
C-207Children are likely to attend longer when adult interactions focus on actions or activities that the children themselves have initiated.

C-300EXPLORATION
C-301Exploration is the basis for discovery learning.
C-302Knowing and understanding are multidimensional–multimodal tasks.
C-303As children’s cognitions change, they rediscover new possibilities.
C-304Similar concepts can be learned through a variety of experiences.
C-305Exploration is child initiated, not a guided tour.
C-306Curiosity is a critical tool for learning.
C-307Play provides children opportunities to explore.

C-400PROBLEM SOLVING
C-401Problem solving: persisting in the face of challenge.
C-402Problem solving means learning what does not work as well as what does work.
C-403Situations become problems when they obstruct children from doing what they want.
C-404Obstructions: The bigger they are, the faster they quit.
C-405Collaborate in children’s problem solving by following their reasoning.
C-406Interact with children to generate solutions.
C-407Become children’s partner, not the solution for their problems.

C-500PRACTICE
C-501Practice provides children the opportunity to master and determine the uses of behaviors.
C-502To acquire new developmental behaviors or ways of thinking, children must give up old behaviors and ways of thinking.
C-503Repetition and practice are the most common features of children’s play.
C-504Children with developmental problems do not practice or repeat deficient behaviors.
C-505Children cannot be stopped from practicing or repeating the developmental behaviors they naturally want to do.
C-506Children do not spontaneously practice and rehearse behaviors that they learn through direct instruction.

Communication

CM-100JOINT ACTIVITY
CM-101Children’s social interactions are their first conversations.
CM-102Children with language delays are often delayed in nonverbal communication.
CM-103Communication is an advanced level of social interaction: Children must be actively involved in joint activity to learn how to communicate.
CM-104Joint activities occur when children and adults (a) interact equally and (b) have a common focus of attention.
CM-105Joint activities do not always need to involve toys; parents can be children’s most effective toy.
CM-106Joint activity is a persistent lifestyle—not just occasional participation in games or activities.
CM-107The longer children remain engaged in joint activities with people, the more sophisticated their communication will become.
CM-108Children must learn to give in order to get.

CM-200JOINT ATTENTION
CM-201Children learn the meaning of language by using context and nonverbal clues to decipher the relationship to the feelings, observations, objects, or actions these words refer to.
CM-202Children make eye contact with parents when parents persist in making eye contact with them.
CM-203Children attend to their parents when parents are attentive to their children.
CM-204Children learn to follow their parents’ focus of attention when parents use multiple cues to direct their attention.
CM-205Children learn to direct their parents’ attention by controlling their parents’ behavior.
CM-206It takes time for children to learn to develop joint attention.

CM-300VOCALIZATION
CM-301Children learn to produce sounds by practicing their vocalizations.
CM-302Children must make sounds before they will speak.
CM-303Quiet babies make quiet adults, who make quieter children.
CM-304Children may be quiet when they have motor impairments that impede their ability to make sounds.
CM-305Vocalization (vocal play) leads to more conventional sound production.
CM-306Children develop oral–motor skills most effectively in social communicative contexts, not in rote, repetitive drills.

CM–400INTENTIONAL COMMUNICATION
CM-401Intentional communication occurs when children get others to understand their feelings, needs, and observations.
CM-402The first step toward becoming an intentional communicator is understanding that gestures and vocalizations can be used to express feelings and needs.
CM-403Children become intentional communicators to the degree that their early nonverbal behaviors have effects on others.
CM-404Children’s early communications do not have to be understood, only responded to.
CM-405Children’s first words describe their actions, experiences, and nonverbal communications.
CM-406Children learn words and language rapidly as they discover how these help them communicate more effectively.

CM-500CONVERSATION
CM-501Children who have language but rarely use it in conversations need to have frequent interactions to learn to converse.
CM-502Children converse longer and more frequently when adults respond to their intentions rather than correct their speech or language.
CM-503Children are more likely to have conversations in situations that are enjoyable, interesting, and related to what they know.
CM-504Communicating for needs is not sufficient to build a habit of conversation.
CM-505Every interaction is an opportunity to practice and learn how to have conversations.
CM-506Children will become conversational when others speak to them in ways they can speak rather than in ways they can only understand.
CM-507Children practice language by talking to themselves; joining children’s self-talk is a good way to help them learn.
CM-508Asking children to imitate and then testing them with questions can interfere with their becoming conversational.

Socio-Emotional

SE-100TRUST
SE-101Attachment refers to children’s trust and dependency on their mothers, fathers, and other primary caregivers.
SE-102Children’s attachment is manifested by their seeking out and trusting their parents and other primary caregivers.
SE-103Children’s attachment relationships with their parents or primary caregivers predict their social–emotional functioning later in life.
SE-104Disrupted attachment relationships will affect children’s social–emotional behavior.
SE-105Fathers and other primary caregivers play a critical role in the formation of children’s ability to trust.
SE-106Children’s attachment relationships with adults depend upon how much adults engage in warm and responsive interactions with them.
SE-107Children who are attached to highly responsive adults learn to function independently in later childhood.
SE-108Children’s attachment behaviors progress through predictable developmental stages.
SE-109Parents promote children’s independence by comforting them at times of separation distress.
SE-110Attachment is prerequisite to effective discipline.

SE-200EMPATHY
SE-201Effective social relationships occur when children become capable of sharing emotional states with others.
SE-202Children learn how to react emotionally from their parents or caregivers.
SE-203Eyes, facial displays, and body gestures are windows to children’s feelings and emotions.
SE-204Intersubjectivity: setting the stage for children’s emotional reactions.
SE-205The more sensitive adults are to children’s affective cues, the more reactive children become to adults’ emotions.
SE-206Depressed mothers have depressed babies; animated mothers have animated babies.

SE-300COOPERATION
SE-301Children learn to be cooperative when they are successful at complying with requests made by their parents or others.
SE-302Failure to cooperate: one of the major forms of misbehavior.
SE-303Children will comply with their parents’ requests when parents ask them to do things that are within their current range of ability.
SE-304Children are more likely to comply with their parents’ requests when parents ask them to do things which are related to children’s immediate interests.
SE-305Children will comply more often to their parents’ requests when parents reduce the number of requests they ask their children to do.
SE-306Children are more likely to comply with their parents’ requests when adults engage in frequent, reciprocal interactions with them.
SE-307Parents can gain children’s cooperation by giving them frequent opportunities to make choices.
SE-308Transitions are often difficult for children to cooperate with.
SE-309Parents can reduce the stress of children’s transitions.

SE-400SELF REGULATION
SE-401Self-regulation—learning to cope with emotions.
SE-402Children develop their coping skills with time.
SE-403Children’s behavioral style or temperament plays a major role in the ease with which they learn to self-regulate.
SE-404Tantruming—children’s reaction to stress or frustration.
SE-405Children do not tantrum just to get their way.
SE-406Comfort and acceptance help children learn to soothe themselves.
SE-407Parental anger aggravates children’s frustration.
SE-408Parents are most successful at managing their children’s behavior when they expect them to react according to their temperament or behavioral style.
SE-409Give children room to react.

SE-500FEELINGS OF CONFIDENCE
SE-501Children’s ability does not determine how they feel about themselves.
SE-502Even at early ages, children form internal models of who they are.
SE-503Children feel good about themselves when adults express pleasure or take delight in what the children do.
SE-504Success breeds self-confidence; failure breeds lack of confidence.
SE-505Children fail when they are unable to do what they are asked to do.
SE-506Long-term learning is more dependent on how children feel about themselves than on the specific skills and behaviors that are taught to them.
SE-507Children who feel self-confident confront challenges and assert themselves in cognitive and social tasks.

SE-600FEELINGS OF CONTROL
SE-601Children have a basic need to control their environment.
SE-602Children learn to control by controlling others.
SE-603Children have no choice if parents always tell them what to do.
SE-604How young children make choices.
SE-605Activities that children choose are just as important as those that parents choose.
SE-606Learned helplessness—not feeling able to control.
SE-607Children with high feelings of control confront challenges.
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Mission
Responsive Teaching National Outreach is dedicated to disseminating information to parents and professionals about the use of Parent-Mediated, developmental and social-emotional interventions for all children with developmental problems and risks who are between birth to six years of age.

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