# data[].attributes.body
- Academic Development
- Social/Emotional Development

# data[].attributes.body
B-SMS-1: Ability to identify and overcome barriers

B-SS-1: Effective Oral and Written communication skills and listening skills

B-SS-5: Ethical Decision-Making and Social Responsibility

B-SS-8: Advocacy skills for self and others and ability to assert self, when necessary

B-SS-9: Social maturity and behaviors appropriate to the situation and environment

B-SMS-10: Ability to manage transitions and adapt to change

# data[].attributes.body
Since returning fulltime to the building, students in grades 6-8 have experienced major social deficits that have created multiple issues for both student and teacher relationships. Because of the lack of social experiences over the past 2 years, students are unable to advocate for themselves respectfully, they lack the skillset to endure tough social situations, and age appropriate communication skills are not present. All of these deficits are a driving force to the increase in behavior referrals.

# data[].attributes.body
To collect data on their individual students

Refer those struggling socially to the counselor for the program.

Volunteer to be mentors/advocates for the scholars in the program

# data[].attributes.body
To acknowledge their scholar needs the assistance

Give permission for them to participate in the program,

Ensure their scholar is attending school.

# data[].attributes.body
To utilize the opportunity for growth.

Give 100% effort while participating to reap the benefits and grow socially.

# data[].attributes.body
To create effective small/social groups that are inviting for students to want to collaborate and learn.

Collect and Analyze data to plan lessons that are specific to the student-centered issues.

To effectively plan lessons geared toward meeting a social need for all students.

Assess the effectiveness of the lessons and program.

Make adjustments to ensure effective

# data[].attributes.body
Assess the program

Collect data to determine the effectiveness of the program

Provide feedback on how it is effecting the school culture overall

# data[].attributes.body
Mindsets-Behaviors.pdf (schoolcounselor.org)

# data[].attributes.body
American School Counselor Association. (2019a). ASCA national model: A framework for school counseling programs (4th ed.). Alexandria, VA: Author.

# data[].attributes.body
American School Counselor Association. (2013). School counselor leadership: The essential practice (3rd ed.). Alexandria, VA: Author

# data[].attributes.body
Back to the basics is the title of our social skills small groups that will be conducted with students from grades 6 through 8. These groups will be grade level specific and culturally diverse. The purpose of these groups are to give instruction and provide a space for students to learn appropriate social and communication skills. They will also provide strategies to help students adapt and handle tough social situations that they have been struggling with. The social groups will be discussion and interaction based where there will be live scenarios for students to practice these skills. The plan will also require students to do weekly check-ins with their specified teacher/mentor where they're responsible to submit a weekly reflection on how the skill taught that week has previously or will help them in the social interactions.

# data[].attributes.headline
Interview: 8th Grade Team (Peak Charter Academy)

# data[].attributes.subject
Interview: 8th Grade Team (Peak Charter Academy)

# data[].attributes.body
Robert Walter, Anne Polashock, Allison Hogue, Interview by Reginald Pate

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
At the start of the school year last August, I spent several days visiting a first-grade classroom in Austin, Texas, to see how the coronavirus pandemic was impacting teaching and learning after nearly two years of disruption. The academic impact was exactly what experts predicted: Students were all over the map in their reading abilities.

But I was struck by some less widely reported trends their teacher shared with me, like the pandemic's impact on non-academic skills, including social-emotional, fine, and gross motor skills. Many students were struggling with things like being able to use scissors, work independently, and resolve conflicts.

As the pandemic trudges on, here are three strategies experts recommend to address student (and teacher) needs, a prerequisite for closing academic gaps.

1. Acknowledge the trauma students have faced

In the past 22 months, many children have faced hunger, housing insecurity, the death of parents and family members, and isolation. Failing to address this could only hamper efforts of teachers to catch students up, said Cailin Currie, a developmental psychologist and lead researcher for a social-emotional (SEL) program created by the Committee for Children, a nonprofit focused on social-emotional learning.

This could mean adopting a trauma-informed approach to working with children or offering more counseling services, as some schools are doing. Some states, like Colorado, published a guide for schools encouraging them to offer social-emotional support for students and staff. "The pandemic is adding stressors to kiddos' lives, and depriving them of positive experiences that support their development," Currie said. If you understand that kids are coming in having dealt with a lot at home, and provide them a place where they feel safe, confident, and a sense of belonging, "that's really going to help," she added.

2. Explicitly teach children conflict resolution and other skills, even those they are already expected to know

Students often learn how to behave in classrooms and get along with peers in early childhood classrooms. These social and behavioral skills, like how to follow classroom routines and get along with peers, must be explicitly taught to kids who missed school and even to older children who mastered these skills previously, Currie said.

"How can you learn if you don't know how to pay attention? If you don't know how to control your impulses, if you don't know how to kind of persevere through those daily challenges?" she said. "If you want to kind of, jumpstart learning and focus on learning, ignoring SEL won't get you there any faster."

It can help to teach kids how to name their feelings, validate and normalize those feelings, and focus on what they can control, said Katie Dorn, a licensed school counselor and therapist and the CEO and cofounder of EmpowerU, which offers a social-emotional learning program for elementary and secondary students. That practice "really gives [students] that confidence that they can manage the hard things, instead of being afraid," she said.

3. Support the emotional needs of teachers

Supporting staff is even more important this year, experts say, as teachers are facing an enormous task. That could mean providing mental health resources, using federal funds to hire support staff, or including educators in discussions and decisions around the school.

For Heather Miller, the first-grade teacher I interviewed, the work has been relentless. "My brain is constantly going over how I'm going to help the kids," she said late last year. At the same time, Miller has dealt with the same woes as other working parents with young children. By mid-October 2021, she had used up her paid sick leave taking care of her toddler, who contracted several viruses from his child care center and had to quarantine after a positive COVID-19 case at the center. "It's just reality right now," she said. "It's really hard."

Experts say this is a common experience of teachers. "I've never seen educators more exhausted, overwhelmed, depleted, and really unsupported than now," said Dorn of EmpowerU. "If there's an expectation that they're going to teach [social-emotional learning], we need to be attending to their own mental health and supporting that," she added.

Brooke Mabry, strategic content design coordinator for NWEA Professional Learning, said it's also important to be realistic and thoughtful about remediation plans because teachers will ultimately bear the brunt of the burden to help close academic gaps. "I'm worried that if educators put pressure on themselves to achieve these unrealistic goals this year, or if leaders apply those unrealistic goals to educators, then what's going to end up happening is we're just going to cause more trauma and more frustration," she said.

This story was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education.

Greater Good wants to know: Do you think this article will influence your opinions or behavior?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Two Ways Schools Can Ease COVID-19's Trauma for Students-and One for Teachers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
At the start of the school year last August, I spent several days visiting a first-grade classroom in Austin, Texas, to see how the coronavirus pandemic was impacting teaching and learning after nearly two years of disruption. The academic impact was exactly what experts predicted: Students were all over the map in their reading abilities.

# data[].attributes.body
https://youtu.be/8_7tgpe6dto

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Social Awareness & Responsible Decision making (middle school)

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Get important education news and analysis delivered straight to your inbox
Leah Hampton, an eighth grader at Falling Creek Middle School in Virginia, likes to joke that without her friends, she'd sleep through school. Seeing them was "the best part of the day," she said. "They woke me up before my classes."

Her mother, Leomia Hampton, says that after classes went online in mid-March, that wasn't far from the truth. "It's very difficult to keep her motivated, very difficult to even keep her awake," she said of working with her daughter at home.

Early adolescence is a time of rapid cognitive changes, when kids assert their independence from parents, form their own identities, and become hyper dependent on (and sensitive to) interactions with peers. Their " social brains " are developing quickly, and they are hoovering up information from the world around them to figure out who they are and how they fit in.

Quarantine isolation "flies in the face of what their brains are telling them they need."
Kenneth Ginsburg, pediatrician who specializes in adolescent medicine at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

That's why both educators and researchers who study child development say the school shutdowns resulting from the coronavirus pandemic may be particularly disruptive for middle schoolers. These kids are being sequestered at home at exactly the stage in life they need their peers and teachers most.

The isolation "flies in the face of what their brains are telling them they need," said Kenneth Ginsburg, a pediatrician who specializes in adolescent medicine at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
Related: Why the preteen years are a critical period for brain development
When puberty hits, the brain reorganizes dramatically, said Laurence Steinberg, a professor of psychology at Temple University, who specializes in adolescence. The neural pathways dealing with learning about social connections become more active, helping adolescents become attuned to what other people are thinking and feeling and how best to relate to them.

It's at this age that, through interactions with peers and adults, young people acquire the ability to read facial expressions and interpret nonverbal communication, Steinberg said. There's an evolutionary reason for this social learning: Figuring out how to get along with others is key to flourishing in life.

Kids this age are "practicing who they are in relation to a complicated social world, with hierarchies, rules and nuances," said Ronald Dahl, the director of the Institute of Human Development at the University of California-Berkeley. "They are learning at a phenomenal rate."

But accomplishing all this social learning without in-person interactions is difficult, if not impossible. "The dose has been dramatically diminished," said Dahl.

Schools can help by providing real-time instruction online, opportunities for teacher-student interaction, and efforts to help students feel part of a group, even when they are working at home. But studies show that many students aren't being engaged in this way, especially kids who lack internet access at home.In a survey of teachers released in early April, only 39 percent reported interacting with their students at least once a day. The most common form of communication was email.

A paper released in May projected that, after the shutdown, sixth and seventh graders would retain an average of only 1 to 10 percent of their normal learning gains in math for the year, and just 15 to 29 percent in reading.

Students say they miss real-time feedback from teachers and peers. Class discussions can be stilted and awkward, if they happen at all. Group projects are very difficult to pull off. There are no chances to chat with peers in between classes and casually develop new friendships, at least not in the same way.

"I'm FaceTiming with my friends and everything but it's not the same. Like I don't feel that same like human connection," said Seamus Lynch, an eighthgrader at Lincoln Middle School in Park Ridge, a suburb of Chicago. And the way he works academically has changed too. Before the shutdown, in English class, if he and classmates were writing a story he'd normally workshop his writing with others. Now that's not possible.

Seventh grader Saige Jensen lives in rural northeastern Oregon, attending Heppner Junior/Senior High School. She doesn't have a smartphone or use social media, so it's difficult to connect with peers. "(It's) weird," she said. "I'm used to like tons of kids talking all the time. And it's quiet now." While she has live online classes with her teachers every other day, her family's slow internet connection makes it difficult to participate. She can email questions, but her teachers are busy and can't always respond right away. "You're trying to do work on your own that you may not know how to do," she said.

Missing out on social connections is hard for middle schoolers in general, and especially so for kids in sixth grade who are just beginning to create their social networks, said Geoffrey Borman, a professor of education policy and analysis at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

Teachers at Mott Hall Bridges Academy, a middle school in Brownsville, Brooklyn, have been trying to hold live lessons online so that kids still feel connected to each other and the school. But Principal Nadia Lopez said that, several months into the shutdown, she is very worried about her students. Credit: Nadia Lopez

"To have that just suddenly taken away from them, to have to essentially be relegated to living in a cave with their parents at home ... that I think is especially a daunting circumstance," said Borman, who led a study last year on how to improve middle schoolers' academic achievement and emotional wellbeing.
Related: What does 'career readiness' look like in middle school?
Teachers say they can see the toll social isolation is taking on their students. Andrea Nelson, who teaches seventh and eighth grade language arts and social studies at the school Saige attends, said that, in a journaling assignment, kids wrote about how lonely they are. One student messages her four or five times a day and sends her pictures of her pets. "I have kids where I'm like, 'Okay, now log off, our meeting's done. And they like are hanging on," she said.

Even in non-pandemic times, early adolescence can be a precarious period academically. When kids transition from elementary to middle school, sometimes their grades drop because of all the changes they experience, researchers say. Instead of being assigned one homeroom teacher, they move among classes; school is often bigger and farther from home; and the social experiences in middle school, while exciting, can also be overwhelming.

There's some evidence that middle schoolers may be particularly vulnerable to learning loss resulting from the shutdowns. A worst-case scenario outlined in a paper released in May projected that sixth and seventh graders would retain an average of only 1 to 10 percent of their normal learning gains in math for the year, and just 15 to 29 percent in reading. For younger kids, even in the worst-case projection, the learning losses were less acute.

"We're really concerned about depression. Because our children thrive from being together."
Nadia Lopez, principal of Mott Hall Bridges Academy, Brooklyn

Molly Hudgens is a school counselor who works with middle schoolers. She's heard from some students who prefer distance learning because of the conflicts they have with peers in school. Credit: Molly Hudgens

But many educators are doing their best to ward off social isolation and learning loss. Teachers at Mott Hall Bridges Academy, a public middle school in one of Brooklyn's poorest neighborhoods, are trying to mimic the classroom as closely as possible. Principal Nadia Lopez said many of her teachers are reading books aloud through video instead of assigning them, and holding live discussions afterward.
Related: How to unlock students' internal drive for learning
Still, more than two months into the shutdown, Lopez worries about the mental health of her students. When her teachers call homes and talk to parents and students, they're hearing that some kids are staying up later, sleeping in more. Until it closed, the school was open until 6 p.m. every weekday, with kids engaged in all manner of afterschool activities - basketball, cooking, art, softball.

"We're really concerned about depression," Lopez said. "Because our children thrive from being together."

At the same time, there are some middle schoolers who report learning better online than in person. That's in part because kids' intense connections at this age can often get complicated. Molly Hudgens, a school counselor at Sycamore Middle School in Tennessee, said several of the students she works with say they are happier with distance learning because they can avoid conflicts they have with other students.

Only 39 percent reported interacting with their students at least once a day during the shutdown, according to a survey of teachers released in early April.

Meagan Daughtry, a seventh grader at Lopez's school in Brooklyn, said she's more comfortable working from home than at school. It helps that she has a quiet space to work and that her mother, Rose Daughtry, has been there to help with any computer glitches. Daughtry was sent home from her job with the Metropolitan Transit Authority for weeks after showing symptoms of Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.
This story on middle schoolers was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.
Back in Virginia, Leah Hampton has struggled to stay focused on schoolwork without her friends around. "I'm definitely not as motivated as I was before," she said. "I don't think I'm learning as well as I was when we had to go to school."

Her mother worries what that will mean for next school year, especially if online learning continues into the fall.

"I'm concerned that her teachers won't get to know who she is, she won't get to know who her teachers are - you know, the relationship won't be there," said Hampton. The last few months of quarantine, meanwhile, have proved just how important those relationships are.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Middle school is often difficult. Try experiencing it under quarantine.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Get important education news and analysis delivered straight to your inbox Leah Hampton, an eighth grader at Falling Creek Middle School in Virginia, likes to joke that without her friends, she'd sleep through school. Seeing them was "the best part of the day," she said. "They woke me up before my classes."