One of the things that is often talked about within early education and when working with children with developmental delays and/or behaviour challenges is the need for structure and routines. You often hear the phrases “kids need structure”, or “they just thrive off routines”. When starting a therapeutic relationship with a new family or educator, I will often ask them about their structures and daily routines. One of the main reasons we talk about the need for structure and routine is due to the way our brains are designed. As humans, we constantly seek out patterns and familiarity within our environments. Structure and routine helps reduce how much we need to think about things, which of course our brain loves! But the flipside to the love of structure and routine is the need to be adaptable and flexible to change. Too often I have seen a child or adolescent (or even some adults) who are so used to a certain routine or structure, that they haven’t developed the skills to adjust when something is different.
This lack of adaptability can be observed in many situations and across a variety of occupations. It might be only eating a particular food prepared in a specific way. It could be distress when roadblocks or traffic change the route home. It could be a disrupted bedtime due to a parent not being present, a favourite toy being washed, or a missing book that must be read before sleep. Difficulty with behavioural or emotional regulation in incidences like these might result in caregivers doing the opposite of what an individual actually requires. That is, they may provide MORE structure and FIRMER routines in order to support regulation. What this does however is reduce an individual’s ability to learn how to cope in situations that require flexibility. Restricting exposure to ‘different’ means an individual can only participate and engage when things are the same. And this is a box that may get smaller and smaller over time.
Like most things with our brain, flexible thinking and the ability to problem solve are things that need to be experienced and practised over and over, in order for them to be mastered. When we reduce the environments and occupations that an individual can be “successful” in, we are restricting their ability to develop more advanced, independent regulation skills. We don’t intend to make this restriction, and in fact we often don’t notice what is happening, as an individual may be self regulating and successfully participating in occupations within this given environment.
Thinking about this in terms of the Regulation Rocket, we would see a Rocket that can only reach a limited number of planets, and the environment they are launching from would be pretty small. What our goal should be when supporting self regulation development is not maintaining regulation at all times, but instead being able to regulate within a variety of environments, in order to access a variety of occupations. We want to build a Rocket that is able to take us many places, and launch from a variety of environments.
One of the challenges we as co-regulators need to overcome is our personal habits and beliefs. A habit I often see is where parents or educators do the things an individual needs to remain regulated, without realising that they are ‘doing for’, rather than ‘enabling to’. What I love about using the Regulation Rocket as a model for regulation development is how easy it is to see what supports are needed to extend an individual’s regulation skills. When we look at what occupations are being performed and what environmental supports are present, we often see patterns that indicate where we as co-regulators need to make changes. When we see that an individual thrives off routines and habits, we may be tempted to utilise this as a strategy for regulation. But our Rocket has multiple parts, one of which is executive functioning. If this part of the Rocket is less developed, we will see difficulties in flexible thinking and problem solving.
I once had a mother tell me about her brother, who had a limited number of meals he would cook and eat for himself. A store that he purchased one of the ingredients from stopped stocking it, so he no longer made one of the dishes. His sister tried to explain he can purchase the same ingredient elsewhere, but he had become so rigid in his routine that he refused to go somewhere else to shop. Over time, you can imagine how this rigidity had caused him to ‘lose’ meals that he could shop for, prepare and eat. Similarly, I’ve worked with individuals who have been taught a way of doing something that is no longer appropriate or functional given their age, social group or location.
It’s important for us to recognise that routine and structure can support regulation in the short term, and help an individual engage in an occupation they previously have found challenging. Routine can reduce anxiety, fear of change, and make an individual feel safe and secure. Once an individual is supported within a structured environment with a predictable routine, we then need to support their flexible thinking and problem solving skills. Adaptability is crucial for regulation and occupational engagement across a variety of settings and tasks.