Book Review – The Explosive Child
Image: The Explosive Child by Len Lantz (CC BY-NC-ND)
Synopsis: Len's Star Rating: 10 out of 10. The best book on parenting children who struggle with outbursts of anger.
BY LEN LANTZ, MD / 4.3.2020; No. 11
Disclaimer: Yes, I am a physician, but I’m not your doctor and this article does not create a doctor-patient relationship. This article is for educational purposes and should not be seen as medical advice. You should consult with your physician before you rely on this information. This post also contains affiliate links. Please click this LINK for the full disclaimer.
Star Rating – 10 out of 10
Rating guide: 1 = horrible, 5 = average and 10 = wow
Author
Ross Greene
About the author
Dr. Ross Greene is a clinical psychologist and author of several books describing the use of his model, Collaborative & Proactive Solutions (CPS), in different settings. He is also the founding director of the non-profit Lives in the Balance, which supports the dissemination of the CPS model.
General description
The Explosive Child: A New Approach For Understanding And Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically Inflexible Children is a book designed to help parents who have children who are chronically irritable, inflexible and prone to outbursts of anger. In his book, Dr. Greene explains why traditional parenting strategies, such as reward and punishment, do not work for these kids and what to do instead. He outlines parenting strategies that result in permanently solving recurrent parenting problems and teaching children self-regulation skills. Dr. Greene sees emotional regulation as a skill to be learned rather than viewing anger outbursts as a character flaw of the child or failure of the parents.
Dr. Greene originally called his approach Collaborative Problem Solving, and later changed the name to Collaborative & Proactive Solutions (CPS). He explains the CPS concepts and approaches in ways that parents can understand and use. The approach begins with empathy and understanding and works to equip parents to help their children cope with their emotions and solve problems without becoming overwhelmed by those problems and exploding in anger.
Unique and most important aspects
This is one of my favorite parenting books because one of the top concerns that parents bring up to me is the anger outbursts of their kids. I used to think that Dr. Ross Greene’s The Explosive Child was a clever re-write of Dr. John Gottman’s Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child, but after reading this book many times, I concluded that this book stands on its own. Dr. Greene explains how to deal with the explosive anger of children effectively and durably, and he boils down the approach to its bare elements.
Dr. Greene approaches the problem of explosive anger from the perspective of a neuropsychologist – someone who is keenly aware of brain development and functioning – and explains that children explode in anger because they become overwhelmed due to the situation or their capacity to withstand the situation. People who have a hard time grasping and/or applying the concepts of this book might benefit from the help, encouragement and assurance of a therapist skilled in CPS.
Important concepts from this book:
The Assessment of Lagging Skills and Unsolved Problems (ALSUP) aids the understanding and development of effective parenting strategies
Outlines the 3 different plans for dealing with your child’s unsolved problems:
Plan A – solves problems unilaterally (via the adult’s will)
Plan B (the preferred plan) – solves problems collaboratively
Differentiates Proactive Plan B from Emergency Plan B
Plan C – sets aside the problem for the moment
Best quotes
“Challenging behavior occurs when the demands being placed upon a child outstrip the skills he has to respond adaptively to those demands.”
“When your child has the skills to respond adaptively to demands and expectations, he does. If your child had the skills to handle disagreements and changes in plan and adults setting limits and demands being placed on him without falling apart, he’d be handling these challenges adaptively. Because he doesn’t have those skills, he isn’t. But let there be no doubt: he’d prefer to be handling those challenges adaptively because doing well is preferable. And because – and this is, without question, the most important theme of this entire book – kids do well if they can.”
Who would enjoy this book?
Parents who want a few strategies (rather than dozens of unrelated tips) to help their explosive child would likely enjoy The Explosive Child.
Who would not enjoy this book?
People who are punishment-oriented and blame children for their outbursts would not enjoy this book. Parents who feel that their authority is undermined when they try new things or give their children an opportunity to problem solve would not likely enjoy this book.
Conclusion
The Explosive Child is an excellent book for parents looking for a few basic approaches for dealing with their child who has frequent anger outbursts. The approaches in this book can be a complete game-changer for parents once they learn and use the approaches consistently.
