September 14, 2026
A child refuses to follow directions. Another becomes upset during a classroom change. One child talks back while another becomes quiet and pulls away. Adults see the behavior, but what they see may not tell the whole story. This question is what led educator and child advocate Ellise Boyd-Johnson, M.A.Ed., to write her new book, Cultural Context Discipline™. A Framework for Understanding Children’s Behavior Through Age, Culture, Environment, Personality, and Human Needs.
“Every behavior has a context. Every child has a story,” said Ellise Boyd-Johnson. “Understanding those stories is the first step toward meaningful discipline, stronger relationships, and lasting growth.”
After more than three decades of working with children and families, Ellise Boyd-Johnson began asking why children who seem similar can respond very differently to the same situation. One child may adjust easily to a change while another becomes emotional. One may use words during a disagreement while another may respond physically. These experiences caused her to look beyond the action itself and ask what might be happening in the child’s life.
The idea became personal through her years in early childhood education. Ellise Boyd-Johnson began working with young children in 1994 and continued to learn through classrooms, childcare programs, family conversations, staff coaching, and everyday experiences with children. She found that a strategy that helped one child did not always help another. A consequence that worked in one situation could make another situation worse.
“I wanted techniques. I wanted interventions. I wanted solutions,” Ellise Boyd-Johnson writes. “Sometimes those theories provided answers. Sometimes they did not.”
Those experiences did not lead Ellise Boyd-Johnson to reject the work that came before her. Instead, they led her to believe adults needed to consider more of the child and the situation when making behavior decisions. Her book presents Cultural Context Discipline™ as a way to bring that wider view into everyday discipline.
The book also speaks to the changes children experience in the world around them. Ellise Boyd-Johnson began her career in a different time, and she writes about how childhood has changed over the years. Children today grow up with different experiences, relationships, pressures, technology, communities, and family circumstances than many adults experienced when they were young.
“Because of you, I became more open to new ways of understanding behavior, relationships, learning, and development,” Ellise Boyd-Johnson writes in a personal message to her children.
Her message is not that children should avoid responsibility. It is that adults should take time to understand what happened before deciding what the child needs. Understanding helps adults tell the difference between a child who needs more time to develop a skill, a child dealing with an unmet need, and a child who needs clear guidance and accountability.
Cultural Context Discipline™ encourages adults to move from quick assumptions toward thoughtful questions. It asks them to consider the child’s experiences, relationships, development, family, surroundings, and individual characteristics before concluding.
The book is written for parents, educators, childcare professionals, school leaders, family support workers, counselors, consultants, and others who care for and work with children. It helps adults make better decisions while keeping children’s dignity, growth, and responsibility in view.
Ellise Boyd-Johnson’s guiding belief is simple.
“Children deserve understanding before judgment.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ellise Boyd-Johnson, M.A.Ed., is an educator, child advocate, entrepreneur, and founder of Cultural Context Discipline™. She has more than 30 years of experience in early childhood education and child development. She is the Founder and Executive Director of Anointed Childcare Academy and Anointed Child Development Center.
She is also the founder of Anointed Youth Development, a parenting education agency contracted by the Department of Children and Family Services to provide parenting education and support services to adolescent mothers in foster care.
Through her work with children, families, educators, and young parents, Ellise Boyd-Johnson continues to promote dignity, accountability, family partnership, and better understanding of children’s behavior.
Cultural Context Discipline™ is the first edition published in 2026 and is available under ISBN 979-8-9966852-0-2.
For media inquiries, interviews, speaking opportunities, or additional information, please get in touch with Ellise Boyd-Johnson at:
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