Learning & Behavioral Management Strategies

Features

NEW! Making It Count: Strategies for Improving Mathematics Instruction for Students in Short-Term Facilities (PDF)

Research shows that youth in juvenile justice facilities tend to have lower academic skill levels than their nonincarcerated peers, often compounded by a history of negative school experiences. This guide provides recommendations along with related strategies and examples to assist teachers, administrators, and program coordinators in navigating the challenges faced by youth in short-term facilities and in implementing research-based instruction to improve mathematics proficiency.

NEW! Adolescent Literacy Guide: Meeting the Literacy Needs of Students in Juvenile Justice Facilities (PDF)

Students who are unable to read when released from a correctional facility often face a host of social and economic difficulties, including future unemployment and welfare dependence. This guide builds upon NDTAC's previously published issue brief on literacy by providing five research-based recommendations and numerous strategies designed to assist administrators, teachers, and Part D coordinators in improving literacy skills and outcomes for these youth.

Improving Conditions for Learning for Youth Who Are Neglected or Delinquent

Learning is not just a cognitive process; research shows that powerful social and emotional factors affect learning. By providing students with support that addresses their social and emotional needs and by building positive social and emotional conditions for learning, staff in facilities and schools can help improve learning outcomes that cannot be addressed through academic remediation alone.

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Strategies, Models, and Innovations

NDTAC Issue Brief: The Importance of Literacy for Youth Involved in the Juvenile Justice System

Youth who have low literacy skills generally face significant barriers to economic and social success and are more likely to be involved in the juvenile justice system. In addition, if these youth are incarcerated and their literacy skills are not improved, outcomes tend to be negative. This issue brief illustrates the correlation between low literacy and involvement in the juvenile justice system and explores the impact of reading interventions on youth during and after incarceration.

NDTAC Issue Brief: The Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) Model

How can schools and juvenile justice facilities decrease discipline and antisocial behavior problems and create environments conducive to teaching and learning? A systematic approach to positive behavior support and discipline has long been the standard approach to classroom management used by successful practitioners.

Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports(PBIS) in Juvenile Justice Settings

As data showing the successes of the PBIS model in both schools and institutions spread, more neglected and delinquent facilities are becoming interested in the possibilities of PBIS for their populations. Two institutions that have implemented PBIS with dramatic results are the Iowa Juvenile Home (IJH) in Toledo, Iowa, and the Illinois Youth Center (IYC) in Harrisburg, Illinois. In this article, NDTAC highlights how PBIS was implemented, how it works, and what the results have been at each of these facilities.

Corrections Learning Network (CLN) Expands Education of Confined Audiences

NDTAC provides an overview of CLN. CLN is a distance-learning initiative that targets its programming not only to incarcerated audiences, but also to corrections professionals. CLN offers corrections-specific coursework in the areas of parenting, anger management, transition, and job success.

Distance Learning

NDTAC provides an informational brief on distance learning, including different types of media being used, the pros and cons of distance learning, and innovative examples of how distance learning is being used in classrooms across the country.

The Good Behavior Game

“The Good Behavior Game helps teachers manage their classrooms, and it balances discipline and academic instruction,” First Lady Laura Bush said of the work at George Washington Elementary School in Baltimore. “This model is simple and inexpensive, and it can work for children in schools across our country.”

Character Based Literacy Program (CBLP): A Curriculum for Youth in Detention

NDTAC provides an overview CBLP. CBLP focuses on replacing antisocial behaviors, thoughts, and values with prosocial behaviors, thoughts, and values. Developed at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University and used in more than 215 schools in three States.

Arizona: Merging Two Worlds

NDTAC provides an overview of the Merging Two Worlds (M2W) curriculum. M2W is a transition and career exploration and planning curriculum designed to help students prepare for reintegration into the community, school, or workforce upon release from a secure care environment.

Events & Presentations

Conditions for Learning: Promoting Social, Emotional and Academic Growth in N and D Programs (August 2007)

David Osher highlighted how the four conditions for learning—safety, support, social emotional learning, and challenge—promote academic growth.

Measuring Conditions for Learning (September 2007)

David Osher provided insight into how data can and should be used to evaluate practices that support a positive learning environment. The presentation expanded on the August 2007 Webinar on Conditions for Learning.

The Importance of Reading Literacy (June 2006)

Peter Leone, JoAnn Murphy, and Marcia Kingman discussed the importance of reading literacy in juvenile correctional education and explored some reading literacy programs currently in use in N or D programs and facilities around the country.

Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) (January 2006)

Mary Quinn, Melva Clarida, and Craig Rosen discussed PBIS and its use in juvenile justice settings. Our presenters introduced the concept of PBIS and detailed its use in two facilities.

Literacy and Transition Curricula, Part II (May 2005)

Mary Beth Curtis and Dorothy Wodraska presented information on two curricula for N or D students: one focusing on increasing essential literacy skills, the other on preparing students for the critical transition from facilities back to community schools.

Educating N or D Teachers and Students: Curricula and Literacy (April 2005)

Carol Cramer-Brooks and Robert Michels presented information on curricula for both teachers and students in the N or D education system.

By building partnerships with schools, families, and community agencies, wraparound services and programs help youth achieve established goals and transition back into their home communities. The author provides readers with a basic understanding of the wraparound process by describing its basic elements and highlighting situations in which it is most useful. She also explains commonalities between wraparound and PBIS and how they improve student outcomes.

Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS) in Juvenile Justice Newsletter

This issue of the PBIS Newsletter, published by the National Technical Assistance Center on Positive Behavior and Intervention Supports, describes the unique characteristics of juvenile detention and correctional settings and how schoolwide positive behavior and support is adapted to these settings. The newsletter also provides examples and resources.

Behavioral Issues and IDEA: Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS) and the Functional Behavioral Assessment in the Disciplinary Context

In this article, the authors discuss the connections between the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and PBIS.

The Implementation and Outcome Evaluation of the Intensive Aftercare Program: Final Report

This report discusses the findings from a study conducted by the National Council on Crime and Delinquency on how the Intensive Aftercare Program was implemented, how well it reduced rates of delinquent and criminal behavior, and how it affected other areas of the adolescents' lives that have been linked to recidivism.

School Failure, Race, and Disability: Promoting Positive Outcomes, Decreasing Vulnerability for Involvement With the Juvenile Delinquency System (PDF)

This 2003 National Center on Education, Disability, and Juvenile Justice (EDJJ) publication examines school failure, disability, and ethnic minority status and discusses how these factors place children and youth at risk for involvement with the juvenile or adult criminal justice system. The authors identify both effective and ineffective practices with respect to improving outcomes for these at-risk youth and those who are clients of the justice system. This paper also discusses how policies for addressing misbehavior and juvenile delinquency might be reframed to focus on evidence-based practices that work. These suggestions provide the basis for a set of recommendations for changing public policies and professional practices.

Preventing Youth Delinquency: Identifying School Risk and Protective Factors

Although a strong body of research on what makes a student at risk for delinquent behavior exists, few studies have examined the variables within schools that exacerbate or counteract these risks. The results of EDJJ's three multimethod studies suggest that school-level characteristics can help minimize the risks for youth delinquency. Using both quantitative and qualitative procedures, these studies examined three school characteristics related to delinquency.

Curriculum, Assessment, and Accountability in Day Treatment and Residential Schools

This study examines how day treatment and residential schools for elementary-age students with emotional and/or behavior disorders implemented policies related to new amendements of IDEA.

Tools

The NDTAC Assessment Toolkit: Measuring Student Academic Progress

NDTAC's Assessment Toolkit is designed to help State administrators and local program managers track and improve their academic assessment procedures and results for students who are neglected or delinquent. NDTAC has designed different versions of the Assessment Toolkit for State administrators and program managers at the local and facility levels.

The National Evaluation and Technical Assistance Center for the Education of Children and Youth Who Are Neglected, Delinquent, or At Risk (NDTAC)