Parenting with Love and Logic Free Training Seminar

Both educators and the general public often view disciplining of students to be one of the most challenging issues in schools today. From minor disruptions to major emotional issues that can affect the learning, appropriate discipline is an important discussion topic.

On Saturday, March 6, 2010 Mansfield ISD parents and teachers are invited to attend a free Parenting with Love and Logic® training seminar at Willie Pigg Auditorium, 8:30 am - 3:00 pm.

This free training seminar is provided through a LOVE CONNECTION grant through the MISD Education Foundation written for parents and teachers in the district by Mary Jo Sheppard Elementary staff.

The grant provides for a speaker from Love and Logic as well as a Parenting Curriculum kit to educate parents on some strategies that have proven to be successful. Join Jedd Hafer for plenty of laughs and lots of practical solutions to some of the most common challenges facing parents, teachers, and anybody who cares for kids. You will hear easy-to-learn strategies, for children of any age, that:

• Help them feel great about themselves
  
• Up the odds of them making wise decisions and resisting peer pressure
  
• Put an end to arguing, back talk, and power struggles
  
• Gain cooperation through the use of choices within limits
  
• Guide kids to own and solve their own problems

According to the Sheppard Elementary counselor, Teresa Franklin, the seminar is "a way to put all the adults in a child’s life on the same page and provide support for the child as well as each other. This program will benefit children all over the district as the most important people in their lives work together to help them develop into responsible citizens in society."

Love and Logic®
According to Charles Fay Ph.D. of Love and Logic, "research has shown that punishment-based approaches actually increase disruptive behavior thus the Love and Logic techniques were established to provide practical ways of teaching pro-social behavior along with responsibility while preventing ever increasing discipline problems."

These techniques are based on five principles including:

1. preserving students self concept;
2. teaching students to solve problems that they have created;
3. ability to share decision-making along with control;
4. providing empathy and warmth along with consequences; and
5. build adult-child relationships.

There will be a morning session as well as an afternoon session on a variety of topics. The training is open to any MISD parent and teacher.

Orchestra Program Implementation Update

Last November, the initial plans to the community were announced along with a presentation to the School Board on a Proposed Orchestra Program for Mansfield ISD. We will not begin an orchestra program in the 2010-2011 school year.

Mansfield ISD is still very committed to the eventual addition of orchestra to the Fine Arts offerings. However, at this time we will continue to study the issue in order to have a successful implementation. Currently at issue are facility needs at a few campuses that are too great to overcome in a short amount of time.

Starting an orchestra program is no easy task and the administration believes that by taking a measured approach and delaying the program’s start is in the best interests of the District, students, and community.

(Photo credit: Michael @ NW Lens)

Dress For Success Day Promotes Professionalism for Students

On January 27, 2010 Della Icenhower Intermediate School held it's first Dress For Success Day. On this day boys wore a tie and slacks and girls wore dresses/skirts and a coordinating top. Reggie Rhines M.Ed., Icenhower School Counselor, gave some details on this day and the school's plan for more.

"I sponsor a club called Men In Training (MinT for short). This club has been in existence for over 4 years now and is for 6th grade boys only. The purpose of this club is to promote leadership, community responsibility, and professionalism. This year I decided to do things a little differently. I felt that there is a set of skills that every young man should know by the time they reach adulthood. One of the skills is how to tie a tie. After some discussion the boys of MinT wanted to pass this skill on to others in the school and it just kind of expanded from there.

"We are hoping to promote the value of professionalism to our students. It was amazing to see how many students put on a more serious face when they came to school in a professional manner. The students had a wonderful time dressing up and many commented on how nice their classmates looked. We did turn this into a competition of sorts as well. The team with the most students dressing out got a free recess. We had over 70% of students participate in this endeavor."

Dress For Success will occur on the last Wednesday of each month for the rest of this school year at Della Icenhower Intermediate School. [See the photo gallery from the day.]

We missed 'Love the Bus Day'

Thanks to last week's snow day, we had a variety of school and athletic events or activities that had to be rescheduled, moved, or otherwise altered in some way. We've made an adjustment to the calendar to make up the day at the end of the year. The flexibility from our District community has helped us get back to needs at hand.

However, there was one item that was overlooked from Friday, February 12 - Love the Bus Day.

The MISD Transportation Department team provided some great information about the work that they do in honor of Love the Bus Day:

• Annually, Mansfield ISD buses transport students 2,479,445 miles.
• Mansfield ISD has 210 buses within its fleet.
• It takes an average of 3 weeks of training before a driver can drive a bus by themselves.
• Each morning, we actually deliver students to campuses 430 times prior to the campus initial bell. During the day, we have nearly 100 buses shuttling students from campus to campus or from home to campus or campus to home. In the afternoon, we take all the students home again.
• With a fleet of 32 Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) buses, MISD is the largest district in the state to use CNG.
  
• We have received grants from Texas Emissions Reduction Plan, Department of Energy, North Central Texas Council of Governments, and the Texas Comptroller (State Energy Conservation Office) in addition to grant funding for emission reduction trap program and for seat back cover education program.
• A modern school bus has the structural strength to hold twice its weight on the roof to prevent a crushing effect if there is ever a rollover. The bus is designed to absorb a side impact in such a way as to channel the impacting car to the area below the floor of the bus, thus protecting the student riders. Our buses generally have 2 roof exits, 2 door exits and 4-6 window exits, should emergency occur.
• Our drivers have a combined 937 years of driving experience.
• All school buses must meet noise level requirements that prevent passenger compartment noise levels from exceeding 85 decibels, consistent with the advice of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health to prevent hearing loss.
• According to the Transportation Research Board, a part of the National Academy of Sciences, a child is 13 times safer in a school bus than in other modes of travel. Children driving to school or riding with other teenage drivers are 44 times more likely to be fatally injured than in a school bus. (“The Relative Risks of School Travel,” 2002).

What can parents do to help keep kids safe on and off the school bus?

• Walk your child to and from the bus stop. If possible, wait with him or her until the bus arrives.
• Be alert to traffic. Check both ways for cars before stepping off the bus.
• Wait for the bus driver’s signal before crossing the street.
• Walk in front of the bus; never walk behind the bus to cross the street.
• While waiting for the bus, stay in a safe place away from the street.
• Before leaving the sidewalk, look for the flashing lights.
• Never go under the bus to retrieve something you’ve dropped.
• Teach your child the importance of staying seated on the bus.
• Get to know your bus driver. He or she is a trained professional who sees your child every day; he or she would be happy to tell you about the safety features on the bus and the responsibility drivers have for keeping their young passengers safe.
• Get to know the parents of other riders. You will learn about the other children your riding along with your child.
• See the MISD Transportation bus safety page.
  

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The Love the Bus program, founded in 2007 and coordinated by the American School Bus Council (ASBC), is celebrated throughout February in school districts across the country as a way to raise awareness and appreciation for the hundreds of thousands of school bus drivers who safely transport more than 26 million school children to and from school each day. It is also an opportunity for parents and children to learn more about the safety and environmental benefits of school bus transportation.