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By Michael Ryan. Parade. Full Text (733 words) Copyright Parade Jon Oliver, a teddY bear-like man, had the kindergarten students' rapt attention. "What do we always try to do?" he asked the kids at Thorpe School in Danvers, Mass. "Our best!" they shouted back. "That's right," Oliver told them. "Now, let's take some self-control time." As if by magic, the squirming energy of the classroom dissolved into a serene silence. All the children and adults in the room sat quietly, hands on their knees, eyes closed, until Oliver ended the session. Self-control time is not meditation, nor is it a form of punishment like time- out. "It's a breathing exercise to help children be more focused," says Oliver. To an outsider, this practice might seem odd, but experts say it may help to solve one of our society's greatest problems: violence in the schools. Twenty-four years ago, Jon Oliver established the Lesson One Foundation, a Boston-based nonprofit group that brings its program, called Skills for Life, into elementary schools throughout the Northeast. Now its ideas are spreading nationwide. Oliver began developing the idea behind Skills for Life when he worked as a teacher. He recalls dealing with a particularly disruptive student: "When I talked to her, she said, `My father held a gun to me. My parents are getting a divorce.'" Oliver theorized that if kids learned early in life to respect themselves and others, to control their impulses and understand that anger need not always be acted upon, they would be less likely to act out violently as adults. "We're not just a violence-prevention program," Oliver explains. "If you wait until high school and then try to teach violence-prevention, you're already too late." In one fourth-grade class at Thorpe, Oliver blew bubbles while the kids exercised self-control and concentration by resisting the impulse to burst them. "We draw analogies between the bubbles and an object like a gun," says Oliver. "Kids may be tempted, but they shouldn't touch it." "I'm sold on the program," says Bob Brinkley, Thorpe's principal. "I'm learning from kids here that Skills for Life is making a difference---not just in the playground but also outside of school. They're telling me that kids aren't shoving each other." Oliver believes that children can be taught to behave responsibly, even if they see bad role models in real life and in the media. "If they see adults using guns or drugs, they have the internal skills to avoid following what they see," says Oliver. "We're helping to break the cycle of violence." He adds that self-control could have helped prevent tragedies like the Columbine shootings or the Michigan slaying of a first-grader by a classmate. At Welch Elementary School in Peabody, Mass., Jordana Cardosa, a fifth-grader, describes how her behavior has changed: "Before, when I got mad at somebody, I'd always get into a fight. Now I've learned to use my self-control and deal with it." The program also teaches confidence. Jonathan Heller, a teacher at Welch and a soccer coach, recalls how it helped one student in a citywide tournament: "He was so nervous before the first game that he wanted self-control time. The other kids didn't know what he was doing---but he played an outstanding game. By the end of the tournament, everyone was doing it." At Welch, things were so bad that teachers contributed their own money to sponsor the program. Today, Welch---with a high proportion of kids from single-parent families, many of them impoverished---has changed from a teacher's nightmare into a dream. A study by the Harvard School of Public Health found that teachers, parents and students all noticed less fighting after Skills for Life began. Harvard plans to do more projects with Lesson One. And in a national study of violence-prevention programs, Phillip Heymann, a former deputy attorney general, concluded: "One or two things stand out from the review. Lesson One is one of them." ___________________________________________________________________ To learn more, visit www.lessonone.org on the Web; write Lesson One, 306 Dartmouth St., 3rd Floor, Boston, Mass. 02116; or call 1-617-247-2787. ___________________________________________________________________ What "Skills For Life" Teaches: * A positive attitude. Students pledge to create a positive classroom climate, which sets the stage for all other skills. * Self-control and confidence. Through educational games, discussions and literature, students internalize these skills. * Responsibility. Students learn how to take responsibility for themselves and understand the consequences of their actions. * Problem-Solving and Cooperation. Students work together to resolve conflicts. |
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