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We did not invent the idea that option-finding matters. It has been studied for decades, in children and in adults, and the findings are consistent enough to build a program on.
Researchers interviewing young people about tough decisions they had actually faced found they “often saw only one either-or choice rather than a series of options.”
Beyth-Marom & Fischhoff → Adolescent Decision Making · U.S. Dept. of Health & Human ServicesA program teaching children aged 4–12 to generate a variety of solutions and weigh their consequences showed significantly improved interpersonal behavior at one-year follow-up, and greater emotional control at two years.
I Can Problem Solve → Rated program · National Institute of JusticeAcross more than 400 real organizational decisions, failure was four times more likely when the decision-maker embraced the first idea instead of searching for alternatives. Adults do not grow out of this.
Paul C. Nutt → 400+ decisions studied · Ohio State UniversityA meta-analysis of 213 school programs teaching social, emotional and problem-solving skills found improved behavior and attitudes, plus an 11-percentile-point gain in academic achievement.
Durlak et al. → Child Development, 2011 · Meta-analysis of 213 programsThese are findings from independent research into decision-making and problem-solving, not measured outcomes of The Situation Room. We are a new program, and we will not borrow somebody else’s results to describe our own. What this research supports is the choice of skill to build a program around; the rest we intend to earn.
A child weighing two bad choices is not deciding. They are picking the less bad of the first two things that came to mind. The judgement is fine; the raw material is missing.
So a session starts where the problem starts: mapping what is actually available, and refusing to stop at the obvious two or three.
Skip the first box and the other two have nothing to work on.
The obvious thing, or nothing. Hit back, or say nothing. Send the message, or stay silent. Two doors, one of them bad and the other one worse, and a decision that was never really a decision.
A real situation goes up. Then the cohort maps it out loud, on a board, past the obvious answers, until the quiet options are on the list next to the loud ones.
Then they test what each one would actually cause, and practice the one they picked. The mapping is the part that makes the rest possible.
See how a session runs →Cohorts are 5–10 children, weekly sessions across a 4-week cycle, in Redmond & Bothell, WA. Tell us your child's age and we'll be in touch when the next cohort in their track opens.