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Quality Counts!
Start Safe!
Quality Begins with Safety
The foundation of quality afterschool programs is safety. Safety is why so many parents entrust their children to your program and with your staff. But taking care of children involves unpredictable situations and unforeseen emergencies. How well is your staff equipped to handle these events? Is your staff aware of the children prone to asthma attacks or those affected by blood sugar disorders? Do staff members know where to locate fire extinguishers, first aid kits, and evacuation plans? Read below for free and easy ways to increase the safety of your program, as well as tips on creating an emotionally and physically safe space for the children you serve! To learn more about Dallas AfterSchool Network's safety guidelines, check out this video: Safety First: A Guide to the Dallas AfterSchool Network Safety Checklist.
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Free and Easy
Practices that increase the quality of your program immediately:
1. Ensure all participants have turned in registration forms before starting the program. The registration forms should be completed in its entirety, including emergency contact information. To view a sample registration form, click here and select Sample Registration Form or Licensing Registration Form, if you are operating a licensed site.
2. An efficient way to make sure staff are aware of children with acute health issues is to keep a list at the front of a staff binder that lists prescriptions being taken, special health concerns, allergies, noted symptoms to watch for, and emergency contact numbers. Texas has a policy for school districts to prepare for children with food allergies, including symptoms to recognize. Even if your program is not part of a school district, this important information can be found here and used as a model for food allergy policies for your site. Click here for a model action plan for reacting to children who suffer a food allergy attack.
3. Does your program have a confidentiality policy? Is your staff aware of it? A confidentiality policy is there to protect the privacy of participants' personal information and must be known by all adults working in the program. Use the resources here to develop a confidentiality policy if your program does not have one. |
As Seen in Our Programs
Tried and True Methods for Communicating Safety Procedures
We cannot emphasize enough that emergency procedures be visible and accessible during all program hours. A tablet like the one shown to the left is a great make the information accessible. To make your own emergency procedures tablet, download our template and instructions here.
 If your program borrows space, sometimes there are limitations to what can be posted on a wall. Many of our programs in this situation use trifold boards to post information like emergency procedures, emergency escape routes, daily schedules, and codes of conduct. Trifold boards are light, which means they are portable and can be carried from program area to program area.
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Academically Speaking
Appropriate activities that support learning:
Cyberbullying Education
Bullying is no longer reserved for the playground. Today, more and more youth are victims and perpetrators of cyberbullying, which is the use of technology, such as text messaging, chat rooms, and instant messaging, to taunt and demean. Cyberbullying is very dangerous, not just because of negative psychological effects it can have on the victim, but because it often goes undetected by adults due to its covert nature. For more information on cyberbullying, including activities for your participants, check out CyberSmart! Student Curriculum.
Smoke Detector Graphing
Fire drills are just the start of learning about fire safety. Practice graphing by asking each child to count the smoke detectors where they live. Compile the results and ask the kids to create a bar graph of how many people have one, two, three, etc., smoke detectors where they live. Have a group discussion about where the smoke detectors are placed and why. For more educational activities about fire safety, click here.
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Behaviorally Speaking
Suggestions for Managing Participant Behavior
Actively Engage with Participants
Active engagement is a great way to not only build relationships with youth, but to also curb behavior problems. It means listening, talking, and interacting with participants. It involves having meaningful conversations and participating in the activities with the children. When you engage with participants, they are more likely to stay focused on the activity and to have more fun! Active engagement helps maintain order and keep behavior problems to a minimum.
Create the Rules Together
In order to maintain a safe and productive classroom, there must be procedures and rules. Young people need adults and peers who set standards and uphold them, acting in ways that are respectful and responsible. But how do you get the students to follow the rules? One way is to have them create or rewrite them in their words. Through participation with developing or explaining the rules, children will have more buy-in and a better understanding of why the rules exist. Lead a discussion to make sure that the rules are positively worded, appropriate, and cover necessary topics, but let them come up with the words that mean the most to them! When you are finished, post the rules in the program areas. Share with families, too!
If In Doubt, Seek Help
No one has all the answers, and every situation is different. Seeking help when dealing with difficult behaviors is not an indication of defeat or inadequacy. When you are unsure of the appropriate action or you are unable to deal with a particular misbehavior or situation, consult your supervisor.
Still have questions on how to handle a specific behavior? Get some quick tips on what to do from Discipline Help: You Can Handle Them All, a reference for handling 124 misbehaviors. NOW also available as a smart phone app!
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It Takes a Bit of Work
These quality practices take a bit of time or money to implement:
CPR Certification
Knowing CPR could save a child's life. All afterschool programs should have at least one staff member present who is certified to perform the life-saving procedure. Training is only a few hours and is relatively inexpensive for such a vital tool. Dallas AfterSchool Network offers CPR training at a discount for client staff once a month. For more information, check our website calendar.
Be Prepared!
Implement regular fire and tornado drills and carefully follow your procedures. Document each drill you have for evidence of your attention to emergency procedures. Keep evacuation routes posted in each room to help children, visitors, and volunteers know the paths to safety. For tips on creating your emergency evacuation routes, click here.
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Research says...
This piece of research will help you explain the importance of quality to your stakeholders:
"Minimizing preventable risks to children and youth is a bedrock responsibility of our society. One of the most important breakthroughs in contemporary thinking about how to meet that responsibility is the recognition that an investment in after-school programs is an investment in an important safety measure for children." Hours That Count: Using After-School Programs to Prevent Risky Behaviors and Keep Kids Safe was put together by TASC and The Hamilton Fish Institute. Read this report for more information on best-practices in safety and tips on creating safe havens in afterschool.
"In today' s world where both parents often work, children are most likely to commit crimes or be victimized after school or before parents return home." --Mike Fahey, Mayor, Omaha, NE
Read more about the importance of afterschool programs in providing safe spaces for children in this Afterschool Alert Issue Brief from the Afterschool Alliance.
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For archived copies of Quality Counts!, click here.
Dallas AfterSchool Network is a 501(c)(3) organization making afterschool better for more than 12,000 children in our community.
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www.dasn.org
214-306-8400
2902 Swiss Avenue, Dallas, TX 75204
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