What looks like defiance is usually a lack of skillfulness, not willfulness.

Challenging behavior appears when a moment's demands exceed the skills a boy has to meet them.

The missing skills are executive functions: inhibitory control, working memory, and cognitive flexibility.

Help him by identifying his lagging skills, meet him where he's at, and teach him the skills over time.

Life with a challenging boy is, well, challenging.

You tell your son to get dressed for school, and 10 minutes later, you find him still in his pajamas, watching YouTube. You ask if he’s finished with homework, and he swears he is (even when he's sure to be caught in the lie). You look for his jacket and discover that he’s lost it. The second one he’s lost this year! The smallest frustrations (he doesn't want what's for dinner, he plays badly in a video game) lead to epic meltdowns.

From the outside, it feels irresponsible, oppositional, and disrespectful. Looked at from the inside, however, a different picture emerges.

Over 30 years of working with challenging boys and their families, I have yet to meet a boy who didn't want to do well in school, to get along with his siblings and peers, and, more than anything, to feel that his parents love him and are proud of him.

So what is going on here?

The Hidden Complexity of “Simple Demands”

Think of everything that your son must do to follow even a small direction like "Time to start your homework."

Here are just a few of the things it requires of him:

Stop what he's currently doing

Process and understand what’s being asked of him

Manage his emotions, body, and impulses

Shift his attention to his homework

We experience that as one simple ask, but it is actually a multi-step demand.

Psychologist Ross Greene points out that what feels like willfulness is actually a lack of skillfulness. Challenging behavior occurs when the........

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