Constant student behavioral disruptions in the classroom significantly affect learning outcomes. School principals need to discover methods that support their teachers to proactively transform the disciplinary process into learning environments that encourage prosocial behavior and a positive school climate.
Teacher and Principal Concerns
According to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), it was reported that during the 2007-2008 school year, 46% of public schools had at least one serious disciplinary action, and 31% of schools dealt with fighting or physical attacks.
In a 2012 Primary Sources: America’s Teachers on the Teaching Profession study, it was learned that an average of 62% of teachers who have been teaching in the same school for five or more years reported behavior issues that greatly affect their teaching and student learning.
These increased levels of behavior problems are seen with 68% of elementary teachers, 64% of middle school teachers and 53% of high school teachers.
Figures like these have troubled school principals on several fronts. They need to:
- Identify at-risk students based on conduct in or out of the class environment, including those who are repeatedly tardy or truant.
- Identify any potential violent issues before they occur.
- Assist their teachers who are not successfully teaching but who are regularly disciplining students.
- Improve the ongoing personal and academic success of their students.
- Maintain a low count of behavioral incidents
- Proactively intervene if and when a student shows inappropriate behaviors that include bullying, fighting, and classroom disruptions.
- Find ways to increase student prosocial behavior with their teachers as well as achieve a positive school climate.
- Help introduce behavioral adjustment techniques and technologies.
The positive school climate
The positive school climate is related to multiple positive student outcomes. In other words, a good school climate is associated with greater academic performance, and less bullying and other disruptive behaviors. Improving school climate can reduce the incidence of negative behavior and improve attendance, achievement, and students’ learning enjoyment in an exciting environment.
Is reaching a positive school climate possible? Numerous intervention programs have been developed to help schools improve this process. One of these is social and emotional learning.
Boost Prosocial Behavior with Behavioral Adjustments Techniques Like Social and Emotional Learning
In response to NCES and the Primary Sources: America’s Teachers on the Teaching Profession studies, advocates have recommended Social and emotional learning (SEL) to help students with negative behaviors.
What is SEL?
Social and emotional learning, or SEL, refers to skills that are generally not part of a student’s everyday lessons. SEL consists of learning various skills, behaviors, and personal attitudes that will help them eliminate their current negative behaviors while they are in school, with their families and other loved ones, and in their wider communities. These skill sets are intended to help students both now and in the future.
SEL results in improved academic achievement. A 2011 meta-analysis of 270,034 students participating in 213 SEL programs showed that the students gained an 11 percentile point increase in their achievement. They were successful in the areas of social and emotional skills, behaviors, attitudes, and academic performance.
SEL’s five core skills
According to the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, or CASEL, an advocate and thought leader in social and emotional learning, SEL is divided into five core skills or competencies that help achieve a positive school climate for all grade levels from kindergarten through high school. These competencies are:
1. Self-awareness: Self-awareness competencies refer to how well the student can accurately recognize their emotions, values, and thoughts and how they drive their behavior. As they develop these skills, students become more self-confident.
2. Self-management: In self-management, a student learns how to manage stressors and emotions that may affect their behavior. They learn ways to effectively control their negative impulses along with ways to motivate themselves away from inappropriate conduct. They achieve short- and long-term goal-setting and learn organizational skills that help with their prosocial behavior among their teachers, principals, and fellow students.
3. Social awareness: The NCES has projected that by 2022, public school enrollments will be higher in terms of students from diverse racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds. Because of this, students will need to have awareness, respect, and empathy towards these students coming from diverse backgrounds and cultures.
Students must learn to understand these increasing social and ethical norms, learn new behaviors to adapt and acknowledge the diversity around them.
4. Relationship skills: It is crucial for students to establish and maintain healthy relationships with their teachers and peers, including students from diverse backgrounds. With SEL, they learn to communicate and cooperate with various individuals and groups, which leads to successful teamwork. Listening is essential, as is knowing that they should look for and offer help whenever it’s needed.
5. Responsible decision-making: When students are working with SEL core skills, they learn about responsible decision-making that helps with identifying and solving problems and analyzing situations confronting them. They also come to realize that there are consequences to their actions. As a result, personal behaviors and social interactions with their peers, teachers, and school principals are greatly improved.
With these core skills, teachers and principals find that SEL leads to greater academic performance and better prosocial behavior while achieving a positive school climate.
Technology for Student Behavior and Intervention
ScholarChip’s Alternative Behavior Educator (ABE) helps modify a student’s behavior through SEL-based lessons. It teaches better behavior and effectively and efficiently handles disruptive behaviors that can escalate.
ScholarChip’s integrated, tech-based ABE tool monitors and chronicles a student’s behavior throughout a student’s academic career. It flags at-risk students—including those with repeated tardiness or truancies— and automates referrals and interventions for those students, particularly when behaviors can potentially result in serious incidents. Students with behavioral issues are assigned age-appropriate learning modules in the ABE system.
Using SEL-based lessons, ScholarChip’s ABE promotes prosocial behavior by utilizing a point system. This point system assigns customized values to behaviors and classroom triggers and keeps track of both positive and negative behaviors. It promotes progress, accountability, and fun through appropriate student behavior tutorials, games, and a reward system. It also provides easy tracking for teachers. ABE then delivers data-based reports to the principal.
ScholarChip’s ABE also incorporates the complete spectrum of behavior and integrates student rewards, interventions, and tracking with PowerSchool®, Infinite Campus, and other SIS programs.
When valuable learning time now returns to the classroom, this boosts prosocial behavior between students and teachers.
ScholarChip’s ABE and SEL Promote Student Prosocial Behavior
There are too many statistics surrounding negative student behavior in the classroom and school. Teachers and principals are very often faced with the challenges of negative behaviors and need ways to address them.
ScholarChip’s technology and behavioral adjustment techniques like SEL help improve student behavior through positive learning and can avoid negative behavior concerns from occurring. Solving this problem will help create the ideal school climate for student success both now and in the future.
To learn more about how ScholarChip’s ABE and SEL can boost prosocial behavior for your students and teachers, schedule a 1-on-1 strategy session with one of our solution specialists today!
