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 SDP Newsline


June 2011

In This Issue
Nathan Hale Turn Around Room a Safe Zone for Kids
Reflections on the Nathan Hale Turn Around Room
Dr. Comer Receives Lifetime Achievement Award from the Greater New Haven NAACP
CASEL Forum Brings Together Long-Term Collaborators in Washington, DC
Faces of Learning Features a Defining Moment in Dr. Comer's Education

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Sen. Blumenthal: I Want to Comerize the U.S. Senate

By Cynthia R. Savo 

Nathan Hale, a Tier I Comer School in New Haven, was one of four exemplary schools in Connecticut that U.S. Senator Richard M. Blumenthal visited on May 16, 2011. As a member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), he is preparing for the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA)/No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). He wanted to talk with educators and students about how they became great places to learn and develop.

Reggie JPC and RB
L to R: Dr. Reggie Mayo, Dr. Comer, and Senator Richard M. Blumenthal

Principal Lucia Paolella led the tour that also included Dr. James P. Comer, NHPS superintendent Dr. Reggie Mayo and District Comer Facilitator, Shelia Brantley, Dr. Fay E. Brown, the SDP's director of Child and Adolescent Development who leads the SDP implementation in New Haven, Sen. Blumenthal's senior advisor, Michael Thomas, and Lily Adams, his state press coordinator.

 

The Turn Around Room

The first stop was the Turn Around Room, an inclusion classroom, where veteran teachers Donna Ryan and Pat Consiglio co-teach the Reading 180 program for struggling readers and provide a developmentally focused alternative to in-house suspension. "The Turn Around Room is what the name implies," said Ryan. "Any child in the school can request time in the Turn Around Room to turn their day around. Their teacher may also send them here if they think the child is getting frustrated and may act out, for a negative behavior, or they just need a short break from one another."

Lucia Pat and Senator
L to R: Lucia Paolella, Sen. Blumenthal, and Pat Consiglio

"Sometimes someone just needs to come in and sit down and chat because something happened at home like the death of a pet or a problem with a family member," Ryan said. "They can come in and take a test in a quieter atmosphere. When they come in here it's a safe zone for them where they know they can trust us, and we can trust them to be open and honest with us."

Fay and Lucia at tree
L to R: Sen. Blumenthal, Lucia Paolella, and Dr. Fay E. Brown

Pat Consiglio and Dr. Brown showed Sen. Blumenthal the Comer Pathways Tree that has a branch for each of the six Developmental Pathways: social, physical, psychological, language, cognitive, and ethical. Students write about how they have used the pathways to respond differently to situations in school, at home, or in the community that in the past would have triggered an angry reaction or inappropriate behavior. They attach the cards to the relevant pathway branch.

 

To learn more about the Turn Around Room and read examples of the student reflection cards on the Comer Pathways Tree, see the  next article, "Nathan Hale Turn Around Room a Safe Zone for Kids."

  

Applying and Integrating the Pathways in the Classroom

While one can see the application and integration of the Developmental Pathways in any Nathan Hale classroom, Larissa Giordano's 4th grade classroom was a must-see stop on the tour. When Sen. Blumenthal and the rest of the group entered her classroom, she was doing a lesson on copyright using the Development Pathways to frame the discussion. Sen. Blumenthal asked how the pathways related to copyright laws. A student said, "You can't just put you name on something someone else wrote," referencing the ethical pathway.  


While Shelia Brantley continued the copyright lesson with the children, Mrs. Giordano showed Sen. Blumenthal the Developmental Pathways bulletin board. She said that understanding development made it possible for her to tailor her instruction to the children she has in her class each year. Last year's class, for example, needed greater focus on the social and emotional pathways, while this year's class needs greater emphasis on the cognitive and language pathways.

 

After participating in Dr. Fay E. Brown's workshop on how to apply and integrate child and adolescent development knowledge and principles into her classroom, Mrs. Giordano pasted sections of the SDP's Student Development Survey into a composition book for each student. As they learned about each of the Developmental Pathways, they used their journals to reflect on their own development and to ask questions or raise issues and concerns. Mrs. Giordano would respond in writing to them in their journals. She would eat lunch with individual students to talk with them about what was on their minds. She began to journal about her own development and set goals for self-improvement.

 

Mrs. Giordano gave Sen. Blumenthal an example of how the Developmental Pathways have had a positive impact in her classroom. Several months ago on the day of the book fair, a student came to her and said that he had found a $20 bill in the hallway. The student was concerned that whoever lost the money would be upset. Mrs. Giordano took the money, and they found out whose money was missing.

 

The student who found the money said to her, "You know, Mrs. Giordano, I sure am an ethical boy." She thought it was great that he felt good about being honest and had used the pathways language. She let him use the phone to call his mother to let her know what he had done.  

 

Dr. Brown is working with Mrs. Giordano so she can share her strategies for applying and integrating the Developmental Pathways in her classroom with teachers in other Comer schools in the district.  

 

To watch a video of Dr. Brown talking about Mrs. Giordano's classroom, please click here

 

"The Wrinkled Heart"

During a brief visit to Andrea Bailey's 5th grade classroom, Sen. Blumenthal asked if someone would give him an example of the Developmental Pathways. A girl pointed to a heart made with red construction paper on the board next to him. "When you say something mean to someone, the heart folds and makes a wrinkle. If you apologize, the heart opens but the wrinkle remains," she said. "So you have to be careful what you say to people, right?" asked Sen. Blumenthal. The students nodded their heads in agreement.

 

Lessons Learned

Following the classroom visits, Sen. Blumenthal had a conversation with Dr. Comer, Dr. Mayo, Mrs. Paolella, Dr. Brown, and Mrs. Brantley in the Nathan Hale library. "I learned a lot today. I learned about a "Comer moment," the Comer Pathways, and being Comerized. I want to go back and Comerize the Senate," said Blumenthal. "It would be great if you could get them to use no-fault problem solving," said Dr. Brown.

 

Lucia JPC Reggie

 

"I used Jim's ideas 35 years ago as the principal of Jackie Robinson," said Dr. Mayo. "When you get parents, teachers, and administrators working together and on the same page, you get a good climate of relationships that provides a built-in support system for kids so they become morally developed, socially developed, and healthy. It's about the whole child. Jim has said for years that there are a lot of smart people in jail."

 

Sen. Blumenthal said that the measurement of teacher performance will be major issue in the ESEA reauthorization process. Mrs. Paolella said that the results indicators in New Haven's teacher evaluation (T-val) are linked to the goals in Nathan Hale's School Improvement Plan that draws heavily on the School Development Program process and framework.

 

Dr. Comer talked about how the SDP model "allows school people to do what they need to do to help children grow and develop, and at the same time improves test scores. Once children develop well, it's easy to help them learn. And the more you tie the learning directly to their development, then you get good outcomes. That's because learning and development are inextricably linked. While 60% of the students at Nathan Hale qualify for free or reduced lunch, they score at or above state proficiency levels on the Connecticut Mastery Tests."

 

Mrs. Paolella ended the meeting with an example of how much Dr. Comer's model and ideas have permeated the Nathan Hale School community. An irate father had called the school and demanded to speak with her. She was in a meeting and couldn't come to phone. When she called him at home, his wife answered. "Mrs. Paolella, I am so sorry for the way my husband acted. I told him, 'We don't act that way. We're a Comer school. You don't demand to speak with the principal. You ask politely and express your concern.'"

Nathan Hale Turn Around Room a Safe Zone for Kids

By Cynthia R. Savo

 

With the support and encouragement of their principal, Lucia Paolella, veteran teachers, Pat Consiglio and Donna Ryan, transformed the classroom where they co-teach the Read 180 program for struggling readers into the Turn Around Room. They had worked together closely when Pat was the special education teacher assigned to work with Donna's 6th grade class at Nathan Hale. As the name implies, the Turnaround Room is a place where any student in the K-8 school can come to turn their day around. Everything they do in the Turn Around Room "is based on the Comer philosophy and the six Developmental Pathways," said Ryan.

 

pathway signs 

"Kids come to school with things on their minds, worrying about things they don't understand about life," say Paolella. "We're trying to help them understand how to clarify things in their lives. We have normal kids with everyday problems, and we're cultivating them where they are. We're keeping the individuality and the strengths of the kids in mind."

 

This school year the focus of the Read 180 program has been on a group of 6th graders. The way the students were in September is "like night and day to the way they are now," said Consiglio. She and Ryan acknowledge that it took time and considerable effort to get where they are today. "When they come in here now they are confident, pleasant, cooperative, and extremely motivated. They know what they have to do. They might say, 'Hey, just a bit of advice. You're going to get in trouble if you do that.' Or if they interrupt someone they might say, 'Excuse me. I didn't mean that,' from a kid who would have thrown a desk at the beginning of the year."

  

rocker and blanket

Many students who come to the Turn Around Room feel angry or frustrated. They can choose several areas in the bright, cheerful room to de-escalate on their own. They can sit in the rocking chair or on a beanbag, wrap themselves in a Native American blanket, and read, draw,  listen to music with headphones, or continue working on whatever they were doing in their classroom.

 

If Consiglio and Ryan are teaching, the student can signal them that they want to speak with one or both of them. "Sometimes a student needs an intervention almost immediately, and one of us will help the child settle into the room," said Consiglio.

 

Once a student has calmed down, they use a reflection sheet to write about the situation that brought them to the room either voluntarily or at the direction of their teacher. They are prompted, for example, to think about and respond to the question: What positive actions could I have taken? What do I need to do to make me feel better about me?

 

If they were sent to the Turn Around Room, their teacher uses a reflection sheet to give their perspective on why they asked the student to leave the room, and their ideas about how to create an environment that would discourage the negative behavior from being repeated. Teachers are reminded that once the behavior has been "turned around," the child can return to class with a fresh start. Within 24 hours the teacher and the student must get together to develop a contract. "They come to some peace and agreement about better options, perhaps for both of them the next time," Consiglio said.

 

"It's beneficial to us that the entire school has been trained with the six Comer Pathways, because those strategies are not only taught to them here, but they're also constantly being utilized within their classroom," said Ryan. "Here it's just a quieter atmosphere for them to be able to get control of whatever was disrupting their day."

 

Ryan and Consiglio collaborate effectively with classroom teachers. "They depend on us a lot," said Consiglio. "They come to us for both advice and to let us know how they're doing things differently. It's bringing us even closer to classroom teachers. You go from a good idea to a great idea, and we're finding a lot of that."

 

"We give classroom teachers index cards that say two 10-minute breaks during the morning, and the student is allowed to choose when and if they come in here," said Consiglio. "That's a warm snuggly for a lot of kids even if they decide not to use the pass cards," said Ryan. "It's a comfort for them just knowing that they're in their pocket or on their desk. If they're not feeling so great that day they can just come in. The teachers have said what a difference it makes if a child was very angry or was frustrated and needed to just remove themselves instead of acting out in the classroom."

 

They have also seen students learning to advocate for themselves. "Sometimes a student needs to step up to the plate if they're having a problem, whether it's academic or behavior, with a particular teacher," said Ryan. "There's nothing wrong if it's done in a very polite fashion for them to advocate for themselves with their classroom teacher. They seem to be more and more comfortable doing that."

 

"We ask students to come to us after they have done it the right way using the ethical and language pathways," Consiglio said. "They may come back and say it was an absolute disaster, and we'll sort that out with them. We'll do some role paying to explore options about what they could have done differently. When the opportunity comes up again to go in the right direction, we ask them to write a card about how it worked and put it on the Comer Pathways Tree."

 

Comer Tree at NHS

L to R: Dr. Comer, Dr. Fay E. Brown, Lucia Paolella, and Shelia Brantley

The Comer Pathways Tree

Consiglio and Ryan came up with the idea for the Comer Pathways Tree and worked with the art teacher on the design and construction. The tree has six branches, one for each of the Developmental Pathways: social, physical, language, cognitive, ethical, and psychological. Dr. Comer was the honored guest at the unveiling of the Comer Pathways Tree in the Turn Around Room in February 2011. Students in the Read 180 program did skits on each of the six Developmental Pathways and had an opportunity to talk with Dr. Comer.

 

Every Friday the Read 180 students respond to questions Consiglio and Ryan ask them using the Developmental Pathways as the framework. Students use index cards to write about how they have used the pathways to change their behavior at school, at home, and in the community, then attach them to the appropriate branch on the Comer Pathways Tree. Here are some examples:

 

There was a kid messing with my friend and my friend wanted to attack him. I talked to my friend and said it was not worth it. I used my psychological pathway because I had confidence. We walked away.

 

We were at basketball practice and someone was talking about my dad. I was really mad but instead of fighting I used my language pathway and said 'Would you please stop talking about my dad?'

 

Mrs. Ryan was talking and I needed help so I used my language pathway and said 'Excuse me, Mrs. Ryan. I need help with my work.'

 

I was at home and my sister was in a bad mood. She wanted to argue with me and I told her that I was having a good day and didn't want to argue. I offered to help her out and I did.

 

Four times a year Ryan and Consiglio test students in the reading intervention program. "When they took their second test in December and saw how much their SRI scores had gone up, it increased their determination and motivation," said Ryan. "That was really exciting for us." She and Consiglio anticipate a jump in their 2011 Connecticut Mastery Test (CMT) scores.

 

"Once you get that rapport going you can get a lot further academically," said Consiglio. "You're not going to have the constant battles because you're already beyond the game playing. All that's gone, and you can accomplish a lot more and faster, and I think that's what it's about."

 

To watch the video of Pat and Donna talking about the Turn Around Room, please click here

Reflections on the Nathan Hale Turn Around Room

 

Dr. James P. Comer

What I was struck by about the Turn Around Room was that it operates very much like the Crisis Room that we had in the early days of the program. When teachers could see when children were getting out of hand or when they had problems they were struggling with, they had ways of helping them in the classroom. If that didn't work they allowed the children to go out of the classroom to work with someone who was prepared to receive them and deal with their feelings.

 

They do need to work on their feelings, and once they work on those feelings, they're then able to behave and learn better. The methods they learn of working differently and handling their feelings they can take back into their classrooms, and also into their communities and into their families. It's something that all children should have and receive at home and at school.

 

There has to be some knowledge of how to handle your feelings and how to express yourself in words rather than fighting, but there's no place where we train children to do that and there should be. There's no place where we train parents and teachers to do that, and there should be. That's what we're trying to do. Everybody at home and at school needs to have the knowledge and skills necessary to handle their feelings and emotions in a way that is better for them and everyone they're interacting with. That's what the pathways, the tree, and the room provide: an opportunity for people to learn how to handle their fears, their anger, and their doubts.

 

To watch Dr. Comer's video about the Nathan Hale Turn Around Room, please click here.

 

Dr. Fay E. Brown 

Nathan Hale's Turn Around Room is a terrific concept. I see it as an alternative to suspending kids. I believe that's the philosophy of Pat and Donna who run the room. They see it as a place where kids can come and experience it as a psychologically safe place to be, if they're having difficulties in a classroom. Kids have bad days. Teachers have bad days, and unfortunately sometimes a trigger in the classroom can cause a kid to act out.

The Turn Around Room gives students a chance to  turn their behavior around without punishing them, but allowing them the opportunity to think about their behavior. What happened? What could you have done differently? And if something similar happens in the future, what will you do? Will you make the same mistake or will you think differently? It's a growth opportunity and a developmental opportunity. And that for me is the philosophy of that room.

 

To watch Dr. Brown's video about the Nathan Hale Turn Around Room, please click here.

Dr. Comer Receives Lifetime Achievement Award from the Greater New Haven NAACP    

By Cynthia R. Savo 

Citing his numerous accomplishments during more than his 40 years as a professor at the Yale University School of Medicine, Bruce Alexander, Vice President for New Haven and State Affairs and Campus Development at Yale, presented Dr. James P. Comer with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the NAACP of Greater New Haven on Saturday, May 14th at the Yale Commons. The theme of the 94th Annual Freedom Fund Dinner was One Nation, One Dream: The Politics and Challenges of Education Reform.

 

The NAACP also honored Gateway Community College president Dorsey L. Kendrick, Ph.D. with the Susan Moore Lincoln Education Award. Zakiyyah Baker, a social studies teacher at Cooperative Arts and Humanities High School, received the NAACP Outstanding Education Award. Baker, who is a Co-op graduate, was named Public School Teacher of the Year in 2010. Co-op is one of the ten Comer Renewal Schools in New Haven.

 

Breaking with the tradition of having a keynote speech, the NAACP chose instead a three-person panel to respond to questions about education reform posed by master of ceremonies and WTNH anchor, Keith Kountz. The panel included Adrian Fenty, the former mayor of Washington, DC; John DeStefano, Jr., mayor of the City of New Haven; and Dr. Zakiya Smith, a senior policy advisor for education on the White House Domestic Policy Council who replaced Russlynn H. Ali, the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Education.

 

Dr. Smith said that one in every three African-American and Latino students graduates from high school, and that closing the achievement gap is no longer a moral imperative but an economic one. "The labor market has changed, and we have to as well," Smith said. "The country hasn't done a good job in the area of preparation," and that "a middle-class lifestyle can no longer be achieved without higher education."

 

"Before here was school reform, there was Jim Comer" 

Mayor DeStefano said that "before there was school reform, there was Jim Comer" who he called "an inspiration and a treasure." Mayor DeStefano has made closing the achievement gap and rebuilding the city's schools a central focus of his administration. He described the four components of his school change strategy: a portfolio approach to schools; a collaborative approach with the New Haven Federation of Teachers; New Haven Promise, a multi-faceted plan to increase college access and completion; and a community network of support for children and youth "as Jim Comer taught us years ago," he said.

 

Fenty, who served as Mayor of the District of Columbia from 2007-2011, described a different approach to overhauling the public schools in the nation's capital. He quickly "disempowered the school board" and hired Michelle Rhee to be chancellor, giving her broad powers to make sweeping, and often controversial changes, like closing schools and laying off staff. Rhee is prominently featured in the documentary, Waiting for Superman.

 

After the panel U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal made a surprise, unannounced appearance. He praised Mayor DeStefano as "the best mayor in the United States," and recognized Dr. Comer's outstanding contributions to education nationally and locally. Senator Blumenthal singled out Nathan Hale School in New Haven, which he planned to visit on May 16th, for successfully applying Dr. Comer's research-based, comprehensive K-12 education reform program grounded in the principles of child, adolescent, and adult development.

CASEL Forum Brings Together Long-Term Collaborators in Washington, DC  

By Cynthia R. Savo

Dr. Comer was on a panel with Deborah Meier of New York University and Congressman Tim Ryan the opening night of the 2011 Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL) Forum, Expanding Social and Emotional Learning Nationwide: Let's Go! on April 13th in Washington, DC. Ms. Meier and Dr. Comer are conveners of the Forum for Education and Democracy, and Congressman Ryan is in his fifth term representing northeast Ohio's 17th District. Timothy P. Shriver, Ph.D., the chairman and CEO of the Special Olympics and chairman of the CASEL board of directors, moderated the panel.

 

Founded in 1994, CASEL has worked closely with educators, researchers, philanthropists, state and federal policy makers, and child advocates to foster the development of educational approaches focused on children's social and emotional development. Roger P. Weissberg, Ph.D., CASEL's president and CEO, is the NoVo Foundation Endowed Chair in Social and Emotional Learning and the LAS Distinguished Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). He also directs the Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Research Group at UIC.

 

"I am delighted that Dr. Comer shared his vision and current perspectives about educational strategies to promote children's social-emotional development, academic performance, and life success," said Weissberg. "During the 1980's Dr. Comer, Tim Shriver, and I collaborated with New Haven educators on the K to 12 New Haven Social Development Project. Tim and I learned a lot from him then, and we continue to learn from him now as we work together on the national implementation of social and emotional learning."

 

"CASEL is a coalition, and the School Development Program is working with them because we're all focused on more than academic learning which is facilitated by social-emotional and overall development," said Dr. Comer.

Faces of Learning Faces of LearningFeatures a Defining Moment in Dr. Comer's Education
Dr. Comer is one of fifty people in Faces of Learning: 50 Powerful Stories of Defining Moments in Education who share "inspirational stories about transformational teachers, powerful learning environments, and pivotal moments of self-discovery. Taken together, these their stories uncover a common understanding of what it feels like and what is required to discover one's purpose, passion, and capacity for greatness."

Edited by Sam Chaltain, a Washington, DC-based writer and education activist, Faces of Learning is divided into five sections: challenging, engaging, supportive, relevant, and experiential, each of which illuminates a core condition of the optimal learning environment. The book adds to the collective wisdom of how to answer what Chaltain considers the only question that really matters: "How can we best support educators in their work to create schools that are more challenging, engaging, supportive, relevant, and experiential?"

To learn more, to get involved, and to share your own story, visit www.facesoflearning.net.

Dr. Comer on No Labels Education Reform Panel

Dr. James P. Comer was on a education reform panel sponsored by No Labels on May 9, 2011 at RJ Julia Booksellers in Madison, Connecticut.  The other panelists included David Cicarella, president of the New Haven Federation of Teachers who was instrumental in producing a four-year union contract considered by President Obama to be a national model; John Rathgeber, president and CEO of the Connecticut Business and Industry Association (CBIA) and a member of the Connecticut Early Childhood Education Cabinet; and David M. Walker, the president and CEO of the Comeback America Initiative (CAI). 

 

Roxanne Coady, the bookstore owner, and Dr. Debra Hauser, a clinical psychologist on the faculty of the Yale Child Study Center and a co-chair of No Labels Connecticut, facilitated the bipartisan discussion about current education practices and reform efforts.

Featured Videos on the SDP's YouTube Page
www.youtube.com/comersdp

The Turn Around Room  

Nathan Hale School, New Haven, CT   

 

Cyn Savo Interview with Teachers Pat Consiglio and Donna Ryan

 

Reflections by:

Dr. James P. Comer  

Fay E. Brown, Ph.D. 

 

Larissa Giordano's 4th Grade Classroom at Nathan Hale 


Fay E. Brown, Ph.D.


Visit the School Development Program's website using
any of the following addresses:


www.schooldevelopmentprogram.org
www.comerprocess.org
medicine.yale.edu/childstudy/comer


Our Mission
The School Development Program is committed to the total development of all children by creating learning environments that support children's physical, cognitive, psychological, language, social, and ethical development.

Our Vision
Our vision is to help create a just and fair society in which all  children have the educational and personal opportunities that will allow them to become successful and satisfied participants in family and civic life.

WILIS cover
What I Learned in School: Reflections on Race, Child Development, and School Reform
By James P. Comer, M.D., M.P.H.
 

What I Learned in School highlights, in one volume, the major contributions of world-renowned scholar Dr. James P. Comer, whose visionary work has dramatically shaped the fields of school reform, child development, psychology, and race. This small collection of Dr. Comer's work is beautifully arranged and includes an introduction and engaging updates from the author. These works paint a remarkable picture of what we've all learned so far, and what we all must learn going forward.


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Cynthia R. Savo
Editor
[email protected]