Professional Development for Educators

Transcription

1 Professional Development for Educators Goal of the Course T&L 900 School Violence and School Climate Course Syllabus The University of North Dakota and MacNeil Environmental are proud to offer this new online course. School Violence, School Climate is based on the latest research and taught by Dr. Mary Helen Pelton, a national scholar, former school administrator, and consultant on school safety. The goal of this course is to acquire sufficient quality knowledge and skills to provide leadership in creating a safe and supportive school environment for students and staff members. Vision Statement Safety at school is not only an expectation but also the right of every student who attends school in the United States of America. Students can't learn if they feel physically, psychologically, or emotionally unsafe at school. The goal of every educator is to create a positive, warm school environment where no violence of any kind is tolerated. The following aphorisms are related to the vision statement above: Students learn best in a psychologically and physically safe and warm environment. Students have a right to be free from physical harassment. Students have a right to be free from verbal harassment. Students have the right to be free from all kinds of systematic and random oppression from adults and peers in their school environment. A positive school social climate is associated with effective learning. Students have a right to express their views and pursue intellectual and artistic attainment free from ridicule. When victims speak up, the responsibility to halt objectionable speech and actions lies with the bully. Students possess the right to be heard by adults when they report victimization. Staff members hold the ultimate responsibility for the safety and well-being of students. Leadership is essential in building a physically and psychologically safe school environment.

2 Course Description If a school is filled with fear, teachers can t teach and students can t learn. How can teachers and administrators provide leadership in creating a safe and supportive school environment for students and staff members? By completing this course, teachers and administrators will understand their role in creating positive and safe school environments. Content in the course reviews recent FBI reports on school shooters and examines the complex issues that impact school safety. You will also learn the following items: Interventions at the classroom, school, and system level that provide for greater school safety for everyone. Issues of cultural sensitivity, corporal punishment, psychological maltreatment, bullying, and sexual harassment as factors in school safety. How to critique your own school environment and develop a safety plan specifically to meet the needs of your school. Course Objectives By completing course assignments and professional reading and participating in online discussions, you will be able to accomplish the following objectives: A. Examine the complex issues that impact school safety. B. Identify interventions at the classroom, school, and system level that provide greater student and staff safety and increase student learning. C. Recognize the various, individual roles people play in creating a positive, safe school environment. D. Outline how issues of cultural sensitivity, corporal punishment, psychological maltreatment, bullying, and sexual harassment affect school safety. E. Apply current research and best practice strategies in the development of a safeschool plan that fits the needs of an individual school. Course Outline The course has six lessons with subtopics for each lesson. They are outlined below: 1. Student Aggression: The Current Status a. Violence Continuum b. School Characteristics that Either Promote or Reduce Violence c. Comprehensive Statistics from National, State, and Local Areas d. Lessons Learned from Columbine e. Secret Service Study on School Violence f. Conducting Threat Assessments in Your School 2. School Violence and School Climate from a Practitioner's Perspective a. Teacher's View b. Principal's View c. State Department's Role in Safe Schools d. National Trends in School Violence

3 3. Student-Oriented Interventions a. Preschool Interventions and Classroom Management b. School Crisis Teams c. Public-based Day Treatment Programs d. Gang-Oriented Interventions 4. School-Oriented Interventions a. Academic and Curriculum Interventions for Aggressive Youth b. Moving Beyond Crime Prevention to School Empowerment c. Security Policy, Personnel and Operations d. Controlling Vandalism e. Early Warning, Timely Response 5. System-Oriented Interventions a. Families with Aggressive Children b. Coping with the Consequences of Community Violence 6. Special Topics in School Violence a. School Violence and Cultural Sensitivity b. Victims and Victimizers: The Two Faces of School Violence c. Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA): The Silence That Kills Each lesson is organized into the following sections: Lesson Objectives, Required Readings, a Study Guide to Required Readings and Professor Comments, and Assignments. In each lesson, a Study Guide and Professor Comments is provided. This study tool should assist you in focusing on certain points from the reading that are worth noting. However, the study guide can be used in any one of three ways, depending on your own learning style. You may... Read the required reading first and then read the study guide. The study guide will assist you in reviewing sections of material. Read the study guide first, and then complete the required reading for the lesson. The study guide will prepare you for what you are about to read. Read the study guide and required readings in tandem. This approach will allow you to review my comments about the readings as you read the material for the first time. Something to Think About In the Study Guide and Professor's Comments, you will find a lightbulb graphic followed by a list of questions. These questions are posted as "triggers." In other words, they are designed to trigger your thoughts about the lesson concepts and how they apply to your experience. You are not required to submit your responses and this is not a graded component; however, if you feel inspired to respond and would like to share your thoughts, you may do so in the Discussion Board area of Blackboard.

4 Course Materials Goldstein, Arnold & Conoley, Jane. School Violence Intervention: A Practical Handbook. New York: Guilford Press, ISBN-10: or ISBN-13: The following are additional course materials used throughout this course; however, all of these course materials are available within the specific lessons. Clarksean, Lidia, and Mary Helen Pelton. Safe Schools: A Reality Check. Leadership, September/October 2002, DeVoe, J. F., K. Peter, P. Kaufman, S. A. Ruddy, A. K. Miller, M. Planty, T. D. Snyder, D. T. Duhart, and M. R. Rand. Indicators of School Crime and Safety: Washington, DC: U.S. Departments of Education and Justice, Dwyer, K., D. Osher, and C. Warger. Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, Fein, Robert A., Bryan Vossekuil, William S. Pollack, Randy Borum, William Modzeliski, and Marisa Reddy. Threat Assessment in Schools: A Guide to Managing Threatening Situations and to Creating Safe School Climates. Washington, DC: U.S. Secret Service and U.S. Department of Education, Garbarino, James, and DeLara, Ellen. On the Anniversary of Columbine: Ten Lessons Learned and Forgotten. ChronicleOnline, April 19, Pelton, Mary Helen. Changing a Culture of Violence, One Step at a Time. Principal Leadership, December 2002, Projects and Assignments Student Profile. In the course introduction, you will reflect on a student (identified through a fictitious name) you have known or worked with who had violent tendencies or emotional troubles. You will address the following questions: What were his or her characteristics? What brought the student to your attention? What were his or her actions in the school setting? What interventions did you or others employ to assist the student? You will use your personal reflection on this student at the end of the course to analyze what could be done differently. If you don't know or haven't worked with such a student, interview your administrator or your EBD teacher about a student. It is important that privacy be protected in this assignment by (1) selecting a student through informal social networks and (2) utilizing a pseudonym in your report submitted for this class. (10 points) Threat Assessment. Based on the Secret Service's report, Threat Assessment in Schools, you will conduct a mini-threat assessment in your own school. This learning activity allows you to analyze a situation at your own school, using the lesson material as a guide. The assignment should help you identify what threats exist with certain students or within your school. (20 points) Ground-level Interviews. Throughout the course, you have four opportunities to interview others and gain "ground-level" insight into the issues in your school or community. You must select ONE interview outlined in lesson 1, 2, or 3. I expect that the knowledge gained from the course lessons and reading be integrated into the interview questions and analysis of the results. You will compile the interview results and what you have learned in a written document that you submit to your instructor. The interview opportunities include various topics, such as school dropout statistics and their relationship to young adult criminal activity, gang-oriented inventions in your community, and others. I will present more information about these interview opportunities in the lesson material. (20 points). Personal Reflections and Threaded Discussion. One component for course completion requires you to post a response to a reflection question posted in lesson 2 OR lesson 6. These questions ask you to reflect on the readings or provide responses to the professor's comments or questions. This activity is designed to tie new information you have learned in the course to your existing knowledge, experience, or beliefs.

5 Reflection questions are posed to students throughout the lessons and posted as Forums in the Discussion Board area of Blackboard (on the navigation menu to your left). Again, you will choose ONE and post your response to that question in the Discussion Board. (10 points) A specific number of words will not be expected, yet, some students will feel more comfortable with a guideline. Therefore, for each lesson the expectation is at least five paragraphs (single-spaced), to be posted within the discussion thread. Reflective comments will be evaluated on three dimensions (for 10 points). Three points will be awarded based upon technical accuracy. This means that the information is understood and reported correctly, though most (90%) of the information must be reported in the student's own words. All direct quotations must be professionally documented (quotation marks, page numbers, and a reference section). Three points will be awarded based upon students correct use of vocabulary and nomenclature newly developed during the course. The final four points are awarded based upon depth and reflectivity. Depth means that the student has produced sufficient material to explore the topic thoroughly (estimated two pages double-spaced). Reflectivity refers to two dimensions of integration, both of which need to be present. First, students must integrate newly learned material with information learned in previous courses and past reading. A second dimension of integration and reflection is that the student can relate newly learned concepts and information to specific life experiences (your experiences or your experiences with young people or both). Crisis Analysis. In lesson 3, you will complete an analysis of a crisis in your community or school. Based on your own opinion, you will select three incidents that may very likely occur at your school and describe why you think your school may be at risk. The remaining steps of the analysis include reviewing an actual incident that occurred at your school and sharing the knowledge you gained from answering the question: If we had to do it over, what would we do differently?" You will address community awareness and how to incorporate this issue in safe-school planning and violence prevention. (20 points) Independent Literature Review and Corresponding Lesson Plan. Given the research-based, best practices established in the course, you will critically examine one fiction or nonfiction book from a selected list (posted in the Texts/Bibliography section of Blackboard). In no more than two pages, single-spaced, you will be required to submit a lesson plan that corresponds to the book and could be used in your own classroom. (20 points) Your lesson plan should include the following components: 1. Learning Objectives 2. A Brief Description of the book if nonfiction or a short plot summary if the book is fiction 3. Background Materials used for your Lesson 4. Lesson Content 5. Instructional Strategies you will use to incorporate the book material and lesson concepts 6. Homework or Learning Activities you will have students complete 7. Evaluation Standards you will use to measure student understanding of the material Schoolwide Safety Plan. You must design and create a defensible (i.e., supported by research and recommendations of experts) schoolwide safety plan. This safe-school plan should be practical and immediately useful to your district. This may be completed individually or preferably in groups of two to three (or by school). If several educators from your school are taking this course, it is preferred that this be a joint project and that you develop a schoolwide plan. If you already have a safe-school plan, you may send me a copy of the plan with your critique of the strengths and weaknesses of the plan. The plan should, on one hand, solidify your knowledge and, on the other, be a practical document that will be a valuable step in your journey to create a safe school and supportive learning environment. Your safeschool plan (or a critique of your current plan) should reflect the readings, concepts in the lesson notes, and best practices you learn throughout the course. (50 points)

6 GRADING The grading in this course will be pass/fail. To earn credit for completion of the course, you must earn a minimum of 105 points and complete the final project of a Schoolwide Safety Plan. Assignment Points Schoolwide Safety Plan 50 Threat Assessment 20 Personal Reflections & Threaded Discussion 10 Crisis Analysis 20 Student Profile 10 Independent Literature Review and Corresponding Lesson Plan 20 Ground-level Interviews 20 Total Points 150 Submitting Assignments and Course Completion This course is a form of independent study. You have up to nine months to complete this course. This is the maximum amount of time you may have to complete this course. Naturally, the advantage of this type of course is that you can complete it at your own pace; therefore, you can complete the course at any time within the nine months. There are six lessons in this course. Lessons must be completed in consecutive, numerical order. No more than two lessons will be accepted in any seven-day period. To properly and efficiently review and grade your lessons, you must submit written assignments as a Microsoft Word document (with a.doc file name) or a Rich Text File (with an.rtf file name). Your document file name should be your first initial and last name followed by the lesson number. For example, the file name would be jsmithlesson1.doc or jsmithlesson1.rtf when you submit the lesson assignment. Within a lesson, most often, there is an assignment description and a link titled View/Complete. Whenever possible, use this link to submit your lesson assignment. This link allows you to type your assignment in a space provided OR you may attach a file. It is highly recommended that you save your assignment responses in a word-processing document format, in case of electronic submission problems. Once you have submitted an assignment, you must fill out the lesson notice form to notify your instructor and the UND Professional Development for Educators office. This form alerts the instructor that you have submitted the lesson and that it needs to be reviewed or graded. Scholastic Dishonesty Students enrolled in this course are expected to be aware of the seriousness of scholastic dishonesty. Unacceptable behavior such as submitting someone else's work as your own, cheating on exams, or plagiarizing can result in failure of the course or other sanctions. For a more detailed description of these policies, please refer to the UND Code of Student Life, Section 3-3 at