School Discipline, Classroom Management, and Student Self-Management: A PBS Implementation Guide

An integrated, comprehensive approach to positive behavioral supports and interventions

How do you help students who "act out" or "shut down" due to academic frustration or whose social and emotional issues keep them from achieving success in school? Based on Project ACHIEVE, a nationally recognized model of school effectiveness and continuous improvement program, this book shows you how. Educators will find a pragmatic, easy-to-follow blueprint for Positive Behavior Support Systems (PBSS) implementation that integrates academics, instruction, and achievement with discipline, behavior management, and student self-management. Award-winning author Howard M. Knoff provides guidance on:

• Implementing a schoolwide discipline and safe schools program
• Teaching students interpersonal, social problem solving, conflict prevention and resolution, and emotional coping skills
• Guiding professional development, staff and student buy-in, and evaluation
• Strengthening parent and community outreach and involvement

Included are classroom charts and posters, implementation steps and worksheets, and action plans and checklists. Case studies from more than 20 years of research and practice demonstrate how the book′s strategies create positive climates, pro-social interactions, and effective management approaches from classroom to common school areas. The results? The students involved are more cooperative and academically engaged; have fewer disciplinary problems; are more socially successful; and earn higher grades and test scores.

As Director of Project ACHIEVE, a nationally-known school effectiveness/improvement program that was designated a National Model Prevention Program by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Service’s Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) in 2000, Dr. Knoff has trained over 1,500 schools or school districts in every state over a 25-year period.

As Director of the Arkansas State Improvement/Personnel Development Grant (SIG/SPDG), a multi-million dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs, he helps to oversee the primary SPDG goals of: the statewide implementation of Project ACHIEVE’s Positive Behavioral Support System approach; literacy and mathematics interventions for at-risk, underachieving, and students with disabilities; Response-to-Instruction and Intervention and Closing the Achievement Gap, technical assistance to schools/districts in School Improvement status; and special education and related service recruitment, training, and retention.

Dr. Knoff received his Ph.D. degree from Syracuse University in 1980, and has worked as a practitioner, consultant, licensed private psychologist, and university professor since 1978. Dr. Knoff is widely respected for his research and writing on school reform and organizational change, consultation and intervention processes, social skills and behavior management training, Response-to-Intervention, and professional issues. He has authored or co-authored 18 books, published over 75 articles and book chapters, and delivered over 500 papers and workshops nationally―including the Stop & Think Social Skills Program (Preschool through Middle School editions) and the Stop & Think Parent Book: A Guide to Children’s Good Behavior. In addition, he was on the writing team that helped produced Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools, the document commissioned by President Clinton after the first wave of school shootings in the Fall of 1998.

Dr. Knoff has a long history of working with schools, districts, and community and state agencies and organizations. For example, he has consulted with a number of state departments of education, the Department of Defense Dependents School District during Desert Storm, and the Southern Poverty Law Center. He has also served as an expert witness in federal court five times, in addition to working on many other state and local cases―largely for legal advocacy firms who are representing special education and other students in need.

A recipient of the Lightner Witmer Award from the American Psychological Association′s School Psychology Division for early career contributions in 1990, and over $18 million in external grants during his career, Dr. Knoff is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association (School Psychology Division), a Nationally Certified School Psychologist, a Licensed Psychologist in Arkansas, and he has been trained in both crisis intervention and mediation processes. Frequently interviewed in all areas of the media, Dr. Knoff has been on the NBC Nightly News, numerous television and radio talk shows, and he was highlighted on an ABC News′ 20/20 program on "Being Teased, Taunted, and Bullied." Finally, Dr. Knoff was the 21st President of the National Association of School Psychologists which now represents more than 25,000 school psychologists nationwide.

You can view Dr. Knoff′s website here: www.projectachieve.net