NCJ Number
182275
Journal
Reaching Today's Youth Volume: 4 Issue: 2 Dated: Winter 2000 Pages: 32-39
Date Published
2000
Length
8 pages
Annotation
This article describes strategies schools can use to promote prosocial behavior, student success, and a culture that values all people.
Abstract
Research shows a diminished repertoire of cognitive, social, language, and/or discrimination skills in many of the children who engage in aggressive behavior. Educational personnel must be able to identify early warning signs of student aggression and devise interventions that halt the growth of antisocial and aggressive behavior. An overall plan to address school violence can include regulatory interventions that use consequences for antisocial behavior, technological measures to enhance school safety, and a violence prevention curriculum for the classroom. The most effective measure involved the development of schools that promote prosocial and cooperative behavior, student success (both academic and social), and a culture or climate that values all people. Such an environment will establish procedures to promote learning and student success, foster social acceptance within prosocial peer networks, and monitor student behavior to ensure safety and to provide a quick but positive response to infractions. This article outlines specific activities for achieving these goals, such as identifying the nature of student needs, encouraging social bonding and academic achievement for all students, promoting normative beliefs that support nonviolence, and teaching alternative prosocial behaviors. A table lists seven programs that have been empirically validated as effective school-based violence prevention programs. In addition to the name and source of the program, the table describes the target population and program characteristics. 34 references