BOYS TOWN Education Model
The Boys Town Education Model is a comprehensive program that incorporates a systems approach to helping children learn how to change their behaviors. With a focus on teaching, it offers a proactive, positive approach to discipline rather than one that is reactive and merely punitive. In other words, it enables educators to do something for children and with children instead of doing something to children.
The model is a program that can be integrated into the entire school day and across the curriculum. This allows students to not only learn new skills but also to learn how to use them in a variety of social situations. It does not, however, lengthen the school day, eliminate required course work, or extend graduation credits.
The BOYS TOWN Education Model:
· Allows educators to focus on teaching rather than controlling behavior as students learn how to better manage their own behavior
· Gives educators a systematic way to address appropriate and inappropriate behavior
· Provides teachers with a definition of when students should be referred to the office and procedures for doing so
· Shows educators how to teach social skills to student and how to make this instruction part of the regular school curriculum
· Offers training for teachers, administrators, and support staff
Results
Research conducted on schools that use the Boys Town Education Model indicates that:
· Students’ time on task increases by up to 20 percent within two years of implementation.
· Office referrals decrease by as much as 50 to 75 percent during the first year of use.
· Because students spend more time on task and have fewer office referrals, teachers spend less time dealing with disruptive behavior.
· Students report getting along better with other students, teachers, and their parents.
· Parents report improvements in their children’s behavior at home after the Education Model is introduced at school.
· Teachers can integrate behavior training into day-to-day teaching and respond to disruptive behavior immediately, without detracting from regular instruction time.
Components of the BoysTown Education Model
This behavioral model (rooted in principles of applied behavior analysis and social learning theory) involves the identification of desirable prosocial behavioral expectation, the effective use of instructional strategies to teach those expectations, the applications of an incentive system, and the effective implementations of reinforcement principles.
These elements have been developed and refined for use within a school context in the Social Skills Curriculum, Teaching Interactions, Motivation Systems and Administrative Intervention procedures.
Overview of Curriculum Skills and Teaching Interactions
The Social Skills Curriculum offers a defined set of sixteen basic social skills encompassing Adult Relations, Peer Relations, School Rules and Classroom Behaviors. The sixteen social skills are as follows:
· Following Instructions
· Accepting Criticism or a Consequence
· Accepting “No” for an Answer
· Greeting Someone
· Getting the Teacher’s Attention
· Asking for Help
· Disagreeing Appropriately
· Accepting Compliments
· Having a Conversation
· Making an Apology
· Asking Permission
· Staying on Task
· Sharing Something
· Working With Others
· Listening
· Appropriate Voice Tone
Teaching Interactions
The Teaching Interactions guide how to teach through specialized approaches similar to the direct instructional techniques and role-play activities.
· Proactive Teaching
· Effective Praise
· Corrective Teaching
· De-escalation Tools
Additional Support:
· Common Sense Parenting for Parents
· Paraprofessional Training/Support Staff
Arlington ISD’s BoysTown Trainers:
Networks: Arlington; Lamar; Sam Houston
Networks: Martin; Seguin; Bowie
National Resource and Training Center
14100 Crawford Street
Father Flanagan’s Boys’ Home
Boys Town, Nebraska 68010