 | OPEN HEART - OPEN MIND   School
is one of the primary influences in a child's growth and development,
second in importance only to the family. OPEN HEART - OPEN MIND is
designed to improve the climate of underserved elementary and middle
schools by aiding at-risk children in managing their feelings so that
they are better able to channel their energies into learning. OPEN
HEART - OPEN MIND's social workers focus on the "whole child" and
the adults whose role it is to support and nurture them by implementing
the following components:Full Classroom Groups -- Social workers enter the classroom and lead groups of 25-30 students in child-centered activities such as collective projects and cooperative/competitive games. The activities focus on emotional and social education, conflict resolution and violence prevention, and are designed to develop students' social skills and positive behavior, build students' self-esteem, increase attendance, improve student academic performance and enhance classroom climate. Small Group Counseling -- Social workers provide counseling to groups of 8-12 students of higher needs that focus on improving interpersonal relationships, building self-esteem and developing appropriate social skills and classroom behavior. Individual Counseling - Social workers provide one-on-one counseling and intervention therapy for children requiring more emotional and social support than small group work can provide. Through these individual sessions, social workers address students' feelings that are counterproductive to learning and advocate for appropriate academic placement. Crisis Intervention - Social workers respond to crisis situations and provide appropriate counseling to individuals and groups in order to diffuse the impact of the crisis and to ensure the safety of the children. Family Counseling & Parental Support - Social workers conduct outreach through home visits, open houses and parent workshops in order to involve the whole family in their child's education. Teacher Collaboration -- Social workers support curriculum goals and educational practice by integrating reading, writing, math games, and other subject matter in their counseling sessions. School-Wide Activities - Social workers arrange monthly assemblies and special events in order to enhance the sense of community and partnership among students, parents, teachers and administration. These events also provide incentives for school attendance, reward and recognize students, and introduce children to life decision-making skills and global community issues. School Governance - The Clinical Director and Site Directors play a critical role in the School Leadership Team, the Pupil Personnel Committee, the Parent-Teacher Association and other school committees in order to help identify at-risk students, integrate the social workers into the school community and identify and plan improved school-wide climate strategy. District Consulting - The Clinical Director and Site Directors provide technical assistance to teachers, principals and other district personnel to broaden the impact of the Partnership with Children model. Through the use of these modalities, Partnership with Children's OPEN HEART - OPEN MIND program achieves the following GOALS:
OPEN HEART - OPEN MIND is comprehensive, responsive and flexible and is customized to the distinct needs of the school, child and community. It is proven to create an environment conducive to learning and to support the whole school community. Specific aspects of Partnership with Children's OPEN HEART - OPEN MIND program include Peer Mediation, Newspaper Groups, Environmental Groups, Summer School Program, Parent Workshops and a Train the Trainers Series. Peer Mediation In order to counteract the violence associated with gangs, drugs and other conflicts that New York's at-risk students encounter daily, Partnership with Children offers Peer Mediation. Each year, Partnership with Children recruits and trains 10-12 peer mediators from the third, fourth and fifth grades in conflict resolution skills including active listening, empathy, and how to identify underlying issues. Schoolmates who have a dispute are referred to the Peer Mediators who help them talk out their conflict and come to an agreement that they can both live with. The Peer Mediation program helps students develop skills to resolve conflicts peacefully and positively. The skills learned are carried through to the students' daily life situations where these skills continue to be modeled for others. In addition, the Peer Mediation program cultivates leadership amongst students and helps students take responsibility for creating a safe school environment. Newspaper Group In order to positively influence the climate of an entire school, Partnership with Children leads a small group of students in the production of a regular school newspaper. Eight to ten fifth and sixth grade students meet once or twice a week to brainstorm article ideas, distribute assignments, decide upon deadlines, conduct research, and write, edit, illustrate and publish newspaper content. Past newspaper editions, which are distributed throughout the school community, have included articles on reactions to the September 11th tragedy, interviews with principals and superintendents, book and movie reviews as well as games and contests. Partnership with Children's newspaper groups allow individual students to learn organizational, writing and editing skills, as well as responsibility, cooperation and leadership. They also foster school cohesion and feelings of pride and belonging. Environmental Group The goals of Partnership with Children's environmental groups are to improve the physical appearance of a school while adding to the overall feeling of the school's membership in the surrounding community. Throughout the school year, small groups of students meet to brainstorm, discuss, and plan the design, decoration and creation of a CommUNITY Garden. A day in the spring is chosen for students, teachers, administrators, parents, volunteers and any other interested community members to come together and get their hands dirty as they build a beautiful garden for all to enjoy. On June 11, 2002 such a garden at P.S. 67 in Fort Greene, Brooklyn was dedicated to the memory of all the victims of the World Trade Center disaster. Summer School Program During the summer of 2002, Partnership with Children implemented its first Summer School Program which was designed specifically to support children who were struggling academically and who were adversely impacted by the events and aftermath of September 11th. The success of that summer has allowed for Partnership with Children's Summer School Program to continue today. Social workers are present throughout the school day to provide individualized academic support, respond to and address crises, and to lead special group projects, including Peer Mediation and Newspaper Group, in the afternoon. Through its Summer School Program, Partnership with Children is able to help students improve their test scores, allowing them to be promoted to the next grade, provide a safe and healthy place for children to spend their summer afternoons, and develop positive feelings and behaviors instead of feelings of anger, grief, and resentment. Parent Workshops Parental involvement is a critical component of a child's success in the classroom. Through parent workshops, Partnership with Children is committed to increasing parent's participation in their child's educational process. Titles of past parent workshops include:
Train the Trainers Series In response to the urgent need for information and resources on how to comfort grief-affected and traumatized clients and staff in the aftermath of September 11th, Partnership with Children developed and implemented the Train the Trainers Series. The Train the Trainers Series is a set of workshops that provide strategies and techniques for individual, small group, large group counseling as well as a framework for practice that includes crisis remediation, psychological reactions to terrorism, helpers' reactions to terrorism, and predictors of long term problems, to caregivers of children and adolescents in New York City social service agencies. In implementing the program, Partnership with Children utilizes the practiced expertise of its degreed social work staff, incorporates state of the art crisis response and terror aftermath interventions, and employs many of the proven therapeutic modalities used in its Open Heart - Open Mind program. Partnership with Children has offered its Train the Trainers Series to the agencies affiliated with the Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies, and has provided specialized trainings for Partnership for After School Education, Kingsbridge Community Center, and the Independent Living Center at Hunter College. | ||||||||||||
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