School Psychologist

"What is a school psychologist?" people often ask me  - this great piece is a nice succinct description of what school psychologists do!  Check it out!

How Schools, Parents Can Work Together For Successful Kids

ScienceDaily (2009-08-18) -- It is widely understood that, ideally, schools and parents should work together to ensure that children can succeed as students and citizens. But what is the right balance? And how much do teachers want parents involved in the classroom? A new study identifies ways that schools and communities can work with parents to give children the greatest chance of success.

Emailing without tears: Best Practices for School Psychologists in the Use of Email

It is a testament to the power of the Internet that there have been several books recently released which deal with the issue of “email etiquette”. There was once a time when email was a novelty, but now, it is currently a part of our common practice as school psychologists. And since email is an important feature of our practice, we should try to develop some general guidelines to ensure that all people who read them understand the emails that we send.

People seem to consider email as a hybrid of many other forms of communication. To some people, emailing is similar to the act of writing.

However, most people can type faster than they can write, and they may compare emailing to the act of speaking, an activity that for many of us is effortless. This is unfortunately a wrong comparison – when a person speaks, he or she can correct herself if the listener misunderstands them, since it is a “real time” activity. In contrast, emailing is not in “real time”; in fact, the receiver may read an email in 5 minutes or 5 days.

This fundamental assumption of email is critical: the process of email is more similar to writing a letter than it is to speaking. In contrast, most people treat it more like speaking rather than writing a letter.

As such, there are certain steps you should take in order to ensure that your email is clear and easily understood by your receiver. Here are some other general guidelines:

• Your email should be longer than a few words and way shorter than a novel. Too many people may write emails that read, “OK” or “Me too” vs. “Thank you for the invitation. Of course I will attend the meeting”. Also, emails are not the forums for novels. Always assume that the person you will write to will receive hundreds of emails in one day, so keep your message as short and sweet and to the point as possible.
• Use punctuation. But use it sparingly and only when necessary. There is a spectrum of tendencies that this guideline refers to: Some people include an overabundance of punctuation (especially exclamations), while others seem to forget everything about punctuation once they sit in front of a computer.
• Spell-check before you send it out. Spellchecking an email before it is sent out is not just a matter of common courtesy, but will help ensure that the receiver will understand your message.
• Try to not use too much formatting. Many emails include lists of points, (e.g., agendas, talking points for meetings, etc.) A good rule of thumb is that if you need to include a list that targets more than four points, it may be better to include your list as a document attachment (i.e., an MS Word or WordPerfect document). Some modes of accessing email do not allow for an easy display of list formatting. For example, many people access email from their telephones; lists often come up with garbled characters.
• Make sure you are aware of who you are responding to. All to often a sender sends an email to a group of people, and one receiver may inadvertedly respond to the entire group, when in fact that receiver may have wanted to respond to the original sender. This is also the case with listservs. Prior to getting trigger-happy with the send button, review which address or addresses you are sending the email to.
• To Cc or not to Bcc. That is the question. There are three ways to receive an email. The sender may send it To you, Cc the message to you (Cc = “carbon copy”) or they may Bcc the message to you (Bcc = “blind carbon copy”).

Sounds simple, right? Well, no, not really. First, there are users who have no idea that the Cc exists. When you receive an email, every address that the message was sent To or Cc’ed to shows up in one column, so it is hard for the receiver to know who the message was intended for, who the sender thought it might be a good idea to provide FYI (For Your Information). In cases such as this the receivers have no clue as to who should take action so either they all do something or they all do nothing. Prior to the Cc’ing people, take a good look at the people on your list – do they truly need to know about this message? If not, then get rid of them. People already receive too many emails so try to be polite and limit their work.

Bcc is an even murkier problem. The addresses in the Bcc are like Cc except that the addresses in To and Cc do not know that the addresses in the Bcc are included in the conversation. The To and Cc' addresses are blind to the Bcc addresses. Consider the problems that Bcc can engender and try to not use it; some may even consider it unethical.

• Put a signature on it. Never, ever, ever assume that the receiver knows who you are. Even if your email address is your name. At the very least, your signature for each and every email should include:

• Your name
• Your title (M.S., M.S.Ed., Ph.D., etc.)
• Your position (School Psychologist, Director, etc.)
• Your affiliation (university, district, agency, etc.)

Most email programs allow you to set a standard default signature.

• Try to minimize your use of abbreviations. Abbreviations are rampant on the Internet. But not everyone knows what these abbreviations mean. Please be polite to your receiver and explain what your abbreviations mean when you are using them. Otherwise, you run the risk of confusing people.

Here is a list of some of the more commonly used abbreviations on the Internet.

BTW by the way
FYI for your information
IMHO in my humble opinion
LOL lots of laughs
ROTFL rolling on the floor laughing
TTYL talk to you later

• Keep the formatting of your email as simple as possible. Some email programs such as America Online or Outlook allow you to customize the look of your emails by providing a background or additional characters in the email when it is sent out. In general, this is an inconvenience for many individuals, who may need to spend a good deal of time downloading extra files in order to read your email.
• Respect the thread. We have all had the opportunity to exchange a flurry of emails with one particular colleague when planning some type of activity. A “thread” is a series of emails that share the same subject or topic name. Most email services will organize these emails into an easily cohesive group that can be accessed.

Should someone email you with the subject line, “Meeting on Monday” , when you answer, you should open that email and simply respond. Many people will create a brand new subject in order to respond. Not only is that time consuming to you the sender, but also there is a risk that the receiver will view this email as a totally different issue, and may not deal with the message effectively.

• Anger Management. The use of caps indicates that someone is angry about something. Avoid them, unless you are really angry. “I can’t make the meeting,” means that the person cannot attend, while “I CAN’T MAKE THE MEETING,” means that the person cannot attend and s/he is angry at some slight to the schedule.
• If it comes from your work email address, then it comes from work. Consider this situation. A professional is at home at 9 pm, and send an email to a parent who is having problems with her child. This professional recommends something to the parent. That recommendation is coming from the office, despite the fact that the sender may have been at home, late at night. Every email that you receive or send from your work address is considered work-related; as such, it can be placed in a student’s permanent record or subpoenaed in a court of law. Please consider that before you run to send out an email.
  

For more information, please consult the following -

Websites:

http://www.iwillfollow.com/email.htm
http://www.emailreplies.com/


Books:

Miller, S. (2001). E-Mail Etiquette: Do's, Don'ts and Disaster Tales from People Magazine's Internet Manners Expert. Warner Books.

Steele, J. (2006). Email: The Manual: Everything You Should Know About Email Etiquette, Policies and Legal Liability Before You Hit Send. Marion Street Press.

Teasing

This article was written by Dr. Collie Conelly (http://www.independent.com/online_onlys/2007/02/teasing_a_real_problem_and_sol.html ) Teasing is a problem with children of all ages. Psychologists define teasing as an ambiguous message containing both humor and hostility. The ambiguity makes an appropriate response difficult.

Most children identify teasing as the number one concern that they have regarding school.

Children are typically told to ignore teasing or become aggressive with the teaser. The research on ignoring indicates that ignoring a teaser usually incites a more aggressive response from the teaser. Additionally, ignoring probably erodes the self-esteem of the target because of the inactive, helpless stance. Conversely, acting aggressive when teased is an active stance which could help self-esteem in the short run, but there are long term draw-backs. Aggressive action can easily escalate into a physical fight and recommending aggressive action communicates that harming another person is an acceptable value.

This article discusses an alternative respose to teasing called affiliative humor. As Dr. Conely describes, affiliative humor focuses upon the humorous part of the teasing message. By focusing upon the humor in the teasing message the target takes control of the interaction and transforms the interaction into a level interaction rather than a one-down interaction. The message is that we are both funny and clever. Affiliative humor jokes about the topic without putting any person down.

Attitudes regarding intelligence influence children's academics

A new study in the scientific journal Child Development shows that if you teach students that their intelligence can grow and increase, they do better in school.

All children develop a belief about their own intelligence, according to research psychologist Carol Dweck from Stanford University, often influenced by what parents and others in their environment tell them.

"Some students start thinking of their intelligence as something fixed, as carved in stone,"

Dweck says. "They worry about, 'Do I have enough? Don't I have enough?'" Others do not make effortful attempts because they have been told (and have been convinced) that since they are smart, effort is for dummies. Dweck calls this a "fixed mindset" of intelligence.

Some other children think intelligence is something you can develop your whole life. Dweck calls this a "growth mindset" of intelligence.

Dweck investigated whether a child's belief about intelligence has anything to do with academic success. So, first, she looked at several hundred students going into seventh grade, and assessed which students believed their intelligence was unchangeable, and which children believed their intelligence could grow. Then she looked at their math grades over the next two years.
"We saw among those with the growth mindset steadily increasing math grades over the two years," she says. But that wasn't the case for those with the so-called "fixed mindset." They showed a decrease in their math grades.

Dweck and her colleague from Columbia, Lisa Blackwell next investigated if they "gave" students a growth mindset, by teaching them how to think about their intelligence, what effect would that have on their grades?

So, about 100 seventh graders, all doing poorly in math, were randomly assigned to workshops on good study skills. One workshop gave lessons on how to study well. The other taught about the expanding nature of intelligence and the brain.

The students in the latter group "learned that the brain actually forms new connections every time you learn something new, and that over time, this makes you smarter."

Basically, the students were given a mini-neuroscience course on how the brain works. By the end of the semester, the group of kids who had been taught that the brain can grow smarter, had significantly better math grades than the other group.

"When they studied, they thought about those neurons forming new connections," Dweck says. "When they worked hard in school, they actually visualized how their brain was growing."
Dweck says this new mindset changed the kids' attitude toward learning and their willingness to put forth effort. Duke University psychologist, Steven Asher, agrees. Teaching children that they're in charge of their own intellectual growth motivates a child to work hard, he says.
"If you think about a child who's coping with an especially challenging task, I don't think there's anything better in the world than that child hearing from a parent or from a teacher the words, 'You'll get there.' And that, I think, is the spirit of what this is about."

Behavioral techniques uses to influence children's eating habits

Researchers in London have developed a program to influence children's eating habits using behavioral application techniques. The program was funded by the Irish government, the European Union Commission, and Unilever.

• They created an educational video program called "Food Dudes" that relies on peer pressure, peer modeling, and a reward system to persuade kids to eat more fruit and vegetables and shun fatty foods.
• The Food Dudes video stars a quartet of preadolescent kids who get superpowers from eating fruits and vegetables. The dudes battle General Junk, who steals healthy food, thereby robbing the world of its life force.
• The Food Dudes are slightly older than the kids targeted in the program, making them believable role models. Prizes like small toys, pencils and pens are also an enticement.
• "In some respects, we use the same techniques as multinationals selling junk food" said Dr. Fergus Lowe, a University of Wales psychologist who was part of the team that devised the program.
• A pilot program at 150 schools in Ireland, targeting children aged 2 to 11, doubled intake of fruit and vegetables and in some cases boosted consumption of such foods by 10 to 14 times, the organizers say.
• In one primary school, the fruit consumption of children aged five and six more than doubled. The kids were originally only eating 28 percent of their fruit; six months later they were eating nearly 60 percent. Vegetable consumption jumped from eight percent to 32 percent.
• In a control school, where the program was not used, no change in fruit or vegetable consumption was noted.
• Scotland has introduced a modified version of the program in 210 schools in Glasgow, and England is experimenting with the Food Dudes in schools in London and Plymouth. The World Health Organization recently honored Food Dudes with a best practices award.
  "People had assumed that it would be very difficult to make fruits and vegetables appealing to children, but Food Dudes has proven that that's not true," said Dr. Francesco Branca, WHO's European adviser for nutrition and food security, who is not involved in the Food Dudes program.
• In 2005, the government announced it would ban school cafeterias from serving poor-quality hamburgers and hot dogs. From this September, vending machines selling soft drinks, chocolate bars and potato chips to students will be outlawed. The poor quality of school food first rose to the national consciousness thanks to Oliver's TV series "Jamie's School Dinners," which shocked Britons by showing them exactly what kids were eating at school.
• Changing food habits isn't easy. Humans are genetically predisposed to prefer sugary and fatty foods - an evolutionary twist that made sense in prehistoric times but not anymore.
  "Back when we lived in caves and children were crawling in forests, anything that tasted sweet was generally safe to eat," said Paul Sacher, a dietitian at London's Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children. High-fat foods were also desirable because they were good sources of energy. "Today, evolutionary tendencies are actually our worst enemy," said Sacher. "We're beyond the stage where we have to be that careful, yet we still have this natural desire for sweet things."

School Psychologists and Suicide

One of my students contacted me this morning and was quite upset about a problem she was facing.

She had dealt with a child who was evidencing suicidal ideation, and she told her principal and AP about it (her supervisor was out sick). Her administration told her to ignore it. She didn't. She spoke to her supervisor and they agreed that they needed to report this.

She called the parents of the child and arranged for a hospital visit. Her administration was not amused. They apparently threatened to "get them in trouble".

I told her that this was a common reaction of administrators when school psychologists do things that are not in their control. According to the NASP Ethics Code: "School psychologists are committed to the application of their professional expertise for the purpose of promoting improvement in the quality of life for children, their families, and the school community." This child obviously did not have a good quality of life, and, her actions were an attempt to make that better.

Good job, I say. For further information, check out the NASP reprint of an article in the communique discussing what can be done for children who are suicidal.

http://www.nasponline.org/publications/cq/cq354suicide.aspx

The New Orleans problem is still at hand

This article describes how 10 months after the Katrina disaster, New Orleans and the surrounding area is still dealing with issues of depression and suicide. Click here to read the article. Although the article does not necessarily point any fingers as to who is at fault, my take is that the federal gov't., specifically, FEMA has really dropped the ball in providing mental health assistance.

Back in February, I wrote something on this issue on my other blog.




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