EDPS 509
Students’ Emotional Wellness in Educational Environments
CREDITS: 3 hours
PREREQUISITES: None
EMU PROGRAM THEME
Inquire, advocacy and leadership in education for a diverse and democratic society
CATALOG DESCRIPTION
Deals theoretically and practically with concerns of teachers and parents regarding deterrents to students’ psychological wellness. Focuses on ecological factors as stressors and strategies to lessen their effects on learners.
PURPOSE/RATIONALE
This course is being updated to reflect current research in the problems in child psychology as they relate to schooling. In addition, the focus is being shifted from a model that focuses on problems to one that focuses on maintaining wellness. In addition, the course will address many new research areas that were not present in the earlier version (e.g. full-service schools, federal mandates, brain-based research) and is therefore being changed from a 2 credit to a 3 credit course.
This course is offered as an elective not only for students in the graduate Program in Teacher Education, but also for those in cognate areas, such as Educational Leadership, Social Work, Physical and Occupational Therapy. Most importantly, it will fulfill the requirements for the Master’s Degree in Educational Psychology. EDPS 507 emphasizes an understanding of the ways that normative and situational stresses conspire to compromise the wellbeing of learners from preschool through high school and the strategies that school-based personnel can use to lessen this emotional burden. A major emphasis is placed on ecological psychology, thereby examining the factors external to the individual learner – standardized testing, mismatches in varying milieus- and institutional responses to these phenomena. A considerable period of time will be spent on the examination of case studies (N of 1) that highlight the individual’s response to larger environmental issues. In addition, it is anticipated that because most students will have background knowledge of or prior experience in developmental issues, this course will serve as a re-emersion into the ways that learning and development intersect.
COURSE OUTCOMES/OBJECTIVES
1. to increase students’ understanding of the development of emotional systems.
2. to acknowledge and support the roles of school-based personnel in the well-being of learners;
3. to study the underlying assumptions of brain-based learning;
4. to design and implement strategies for students’ well-being;
5. to understand the ecological connections among students, their schools and communities of reaction or influence;
6. to research ecological systems and
7. to comprehend the ramifications of children as victims
COURSE OUTLINE
I. Introduction and overview. It is assumed that students will enter this 500 level course with previous class work in development, yet this knowledge base may require an up-date regarding emotion systems and their role in central nervous system processing.
A. Developmental expectations regarding social information processing
1. Attachment
2. Disorders of attachment
3. Infant mental health ideologies and practices
4. Local initiatives
B. Inter- and intrapersonal intelligences
1. Self-science courses
2. Teaching strategies for emotional well-being
a. Teaching/learning environments
b. Reflective practice
c. Supportive presence
d. Interventions for bullying
II. Ecological psychology
A. Systems and eco-analyses
1. Microsystems: family, school, child
a. Physical and emotional abuse
b. Neglect
2. The playground
3. The neighborhood
4. Case studies of individual classroom environments
B. Expectations of emotional regulation
1. Developmental standards
2. Factors in a trusting environment
3. The school in relation to its neighborhood ethos
4. Full service models
a. Resources
b. After-school personnel and programming
C. The Macrosystem: federal mandates, local initiatives and learners’ self -concept
D. Full-service schools
1. Teacher attitude
2. Environmental considerations
3. Research
III. The development of roles, norms, values and assumptions regarding race, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, immigration, bilingualism (Spanish, Arabic, Ebonics) and gender.
IV. Brain-based learning
INSTRUCTIONAL PROCEDURES
Instructional procedures will be based on a model of reflective practice which places learning in a dynamic relationship among the professor, the graduate student and the content of the course. This process assumes that the professor will be actively engaged in the materials and methods of instruction and that she will honor the informed contributions of the students. In addition, this paradigm is founded on the philosophical belief that the learner constructs his own understanding of the course by augmenting or discarding a previously held notions of emotional wellness; therefore, the class will be comprised of both small and large group discussions with catalysts from the professor.
ASSESSMENT AND REQUIREMENTS
Students will be assessed regarding the extent to which they can implement theory into practice. A series of ecological analyses that will incorporate on-line research will be used to this end. The first analysis (micro level) will comprise 15% of the grade; the second, (meso) level, 30%, and the third, (macro level) 40%. The quality of the analyses will be judged on students’ abilities to transfer research findings into practical applications. The remaining 15% of students’ grades will be based on informed classroom participation; therefore, class attendance and active participation in discussions are requirements.
SUGGESTED TEXTS AND READINGS
Bornstein, Marc, Ed. (2003). Well-being: positive development across the life cycle. NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Demasio, A. (1994). Descartes’s error. NY: Grosset/Putnam.
Ferguson, A, (2000) Bad boys: Public schools in the making of Black masculinity. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press
Finkelhor, D. (1995). The victimization of children: A developmental perspective. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 62,2, 177-193, April.
Garbarino, J. (1992) Children in danger: Coping with the consequences of community danger. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Garbarino, J. (1999) Lost Boys: Why our sons turn violent and how we can save them. NY: Anchor Books.
Kotulak, R. (1996). Inside the brain: Revolutionary discoveries of how the mind works. Kansas: Andrews McMeel.
Ratey, J. (2002 ) A user’s guide to the brain: Perception, attention and the four theaters of the brain. NY: Vintage Books.
KNOWLEDGE BASE: BIBLIOGRAPHY
Baker, J. A. & Dilly, L.J. (2003). The developmental context of school satisfaction: Schools as psychologically healthy environments. School Psychology Quarterly, 18,2, 206-221.
Berry, J. (2004). An ecological perspective on the development of competence. In Sternberg, R. (Ed.) Culture and competence: Contexts of life success. D.C. USical Associates, 3-22.
Bower, B. (1996). Growing up in harm’s way. Science News, 149,21,332.
Bronfenbrenner, Urie. (1986). Ecology of the family as a context for human development research. Developmental Psychology, 22, 723-742.
Clauss-Ehlus, & Caroline, C. (2003). Promoting ecological health resilience for minority youth: Enhancing health care access through the school health center. Psychology in the Schools, 40, 3,265-278.
Geffner, R. (Ed.). (2003). Bullying behaviors: Current Issues, research & interventions. NY: Haworth, Inc.
Karen, R. (1998). Becoming Attached: First relationships and how they shape our capacity to love. NY: Oxford University Press.
Kegan, R. (1994). In over our heads: The mental demands of modern life. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Keyes, C. (2002). A way of thinking about parent/teacher partnerships for teachers. International Journal of Early Years Education, 10, 3, 177-91, October.
Kochman, T. (1981). Black and White Styles in conflict. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
LeDoux, J. (1996). The emotional brain: the mysterious underpinnings of emotional life. NY: Touchstone.
Overstreet, S., & Mazza, J. (2003). An ecological-transactional understanding of community violence: theoretical perspectives. School Psychology Quarterly, 18, 1, 66-87, Spring.
Tilleen, S., Maher, S., & Rosario, C. (2003). Building community connections for youth to reduce violence. Psychology in the Schools, 10, 5, 549 -63.
Visser, M. (2004). Implementing peer support in schools using a theoretical framework in action research. Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology,14,6