Waking the Sleeping Giant

What's New, Nov/Dec 2002 by Sokoloff, Michele

With technology spending in U.S. school districts reaching above $7 billion, why are there so many unmotivated, uninvolved students? Why are kids leaving school property mid-day to self-medicate? What reasons can there be for so many students to be cutting classes whenever they please?

We are getting quite sophisticated in our reporting of student records, and installing computerized student assessment software, computerized report cards and attendance records software. What are we doing to reach out to the huge number of our students who are emotionally stressed and anxious, frustrated and afraid? Schools would be drastically different places if we attended to both student academic progress and emotional growth.

Most educators will agree that there are no simple answers on how to reach out to those kids who are troubled and in fragile states of being. We do know that the materials and resources we use with kids can influence who they are and what they learn. We also know that the way we present information can impact on students in unique, individual ways. And we know that students learn best when they are interacting with an adult who shows a genuine interest and involvement with them and not one who is pandering and pretending to respect them.

What we do know is that individuals in companies continue to invent, devise and create interesting resources, equipment, software and hardware devices. For many of these forward-thinking people, their mission and challenge is to facilitate educating the whole child, both academically and emotionally.

One such curriculum is the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) program. It is designed to help students with decisionmaking skills and drug refusal skills. This curriculum has been revised to improve its ability to help students' beliefs be more resistant to substance abuse (800/223-3273).

The Life Skills Training program teaches students to recognize and challenge common misconceptions about substance abuse. Students learn how to deal with peers and media pressure to engage in tobacco, alcohol, and other drug use (800/636-3415).

The Project Alert program focuses on the dangers of alcohol, tobacco, marijuana and inhalants use. The aim is to reduce both the initiation of drug use and the transition to regular use (213/623-0580).

Making the Grade: A Guide to School Drug Prevention Programs has been updated and expanded. It reviews over 50 curricula that helps inform about the most widely used drug prevention programs in schools (Fax: 202/414-6199).

There are alcohol prevention curricula as well as programs to reduce tobacco use addiction. All of these life skills resources are created to teach students self-control, coping skills and how to handle media and peer pressure. The variety and versatility of resources available to reach out to students who are falling through the cracks is a hopeful sign of the times. You will be amazed, as we at What's New Magazine were, at the scope of programs and advancements now affordable to you and your school.

We hope this issue spurs you on to bring some different teaching tools, resources and equipment into your classrooms and school. Who knows, you may be the one who wakes up a sleeping sinking giant . . . a student. We would be delighted to hear about your efforts and successes.

Michele Sokoloff

michelesok@whats-new-mag.com