Supporting the Social, Emotional & Behavioral Needs of Students
First Presenter's Institution
N/A
First Presenter's Brief Biography
Ericka Levy, Psy.D. has been a school psychologist in a large urban school district for 16 years. She earned her doctorate in school psychology at St. John’s University in Queens, New York. As a former student in her current school district, Dr. Levy understands how factors such as community violence, poverty, and implicit bias can impact students’ abilities to learn. She has spent her career advocating for and supporting students with significant emotional & behavioral disabilities and providing professional development to school districts on topics such as the identification of emotional disabilities, supporting the social & emotional needs of students, and behavioral interventions, among other topics. In addition to working with school staff, Dr. Levy enjoys working with students and parents to help them better understand how to support emotional and behavioral needs. Consulting with students, parents and staff gives Dr. Levy the opportunity to explain how maladaptive behaviors are created to keep students safe and are not always the result of an educational disability. The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has caused school districts to see an uptick in administrative referrals due to student behaviors. This has provided Dr. Levy the opportunity to remind colleagues that students don’t always come to school ready to learn, reminding others that “children need to Maslow before they can Bloom.”
Document Type
Event
Primary Strand
Mental Health
Relevance to Primary Strand
Many teachers are overwhelmed with the number of behavioral problems being displayed in the classroom and my presentation will provide teachers with multi-tiered systems of support while also explaining the effect the pandemic has had on the mental health of students.
Alignment with School Improvement Plan Topics
Climate and Culture
Brief Program Description
The overwhelming number of behavioral challenges in the classroom has made teaching difficult at times. Providing students with a tiered system of supports can keep them out of the special education loop and prevent them from falling into the "school to prison pipeline."
Summary
One of the biggest challenges in the classroom is disruptive behaviors and since returning to school, educators have observed an increase in these behaviors. The pandemic has not only wreaked havoc on classroom instruction but also on the social and emotional functioning of students. As leaders in education we often forget that many children have gone through the pandemic and experienced illness, isolation, and loss without the proper supports. Once students returned to the classroom there was a noticeable increase in behavioral and emotional outbursts and many believed the best way to support students was to refer them to the Individualized Education Program (IEP) Team. However, at times, we forget that there are steps that can be taken prior to making a special education referral. This presentation will discuss how the pandemic may have impacted students, tiered interventions that can be used to support students, and how identifying students with educational disabilities inappropriately can lead students into the school-to-prison pipeline.
Evidence
Research shows that providing students with effective instruction can decrease the students' likelihood of engaging in inappropriate behaviors. Within the MTSS model, effective instruction is just one part. MTSS also provides students the interventions needed when its needed, as opposed to the IEP process which has a "wait to fail" model. By providing students the social, emotional and behavioral interventions earlier, classroom instruction is less likely to be interrupted by students' behavior and academic performance is increased.
Learning Objective 1
Participants wil be able to define trauma and examine the effects of trauma & the pandemic on students
Learning Objective 2
Participants will be able to recognize how unnecessary referrals to the IEP Team can lead students into the school to prison pipeline
Learning Objective 3
Participants will be able to identify interventions that can be used prior to referring students to the IEP Team
Learning Objective 4
Participants will be able to pinpoint specific interventions for some of the most common behavioral challenges
Recommended Citation
Levy, Ericka, "Supporting the Social, Emotional & Behavioral Needs of Students" (2023). Southeast Conference on School Climate. 93.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/secsc/2023/2023/93
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Supporting the Social, Emotional & Behavioral Needs of Students
One of the biggest challenges in the classroom is disruptive behaviors and since returning to school, educators have observed an increase in these behaviors. The pandemic has not only wreaked havoc on classroom instruction but also on the social and emotional functioning of students. As leaders in education we often forget that many children have gone through the pandemic and experienced illness, isolation, and loss without the proper supports. Once students returned to the classroom there was a noticeable increase in behavioral and emotional outbursts and many believed the best way to support students was to refer them to the Individualized Education Program (IEP) Team. However, at times, we forget that there are steps that can be taken prior to making a special education referral. This presentation will discuss how the pandemic may have impacted students, tiered interventions that can be used to support students, and how identifying students with educational disabilities inappropriately can lead students into the school-to-prison pipeline.
