Resources for Teachers

Graduate and Postgraduate Teachers, Pre K - 12 Teachers, Undergraduate Teachers December 3, 2017

Help Your Students Believe in Themselves: Self-Efficacy in the Classroom

In his pioneering work, Albert Bandura characterised self-efficacy as the individual’s belief in his capacity to execute behaviours necessary to produce specific performance attainments. It reflects confidence in the ability to exert control over one’s own motivation, behaviour, and social environment. As teachers, this is an important element of human behaviour that can be harnessed to optimise students’ learning experience.

A host of research has already demonstrated that self-efficacy appears to be an important variable because it impacts students’ motivation and learning. But what are the factors that teachers should bear in mind to ensure that self-efficacy flourishes in the classroom?

Pre K - 12 Teachers November 27, 2017

5 Must Ask Questions For Parents in Search of the Best Early Childhood Program

You’ve read the brochures, checked out the shiny pictures, and narrowed down your choices to the programs that work in terms of location and schedule. You’ve visited the building and checked for clean toys and rooms, qualified teachers, and center accreditation. You have the center policies in brightly colored folders, and know the math – teacher/student ratios, and square footage. Somehow, though, there’s still something missing. What is the next step in figuring out where your child should spend their early childhood years? Surely the decision is more than just ratios, square footage, and accreditation.

Parents, Pre K - 12 Teachers November 13, 2017

School Psychologists: Powering Growth in Student’s Academic and Mental Health

Updated November 11, 2019

Children and adolescents in the United States face significant challenges related to academic achievement and mental health. For example, only 36% (reading) and 40% (mathematics) of 4th grade students scored at or above proficiency on standardized tests in 2015 (McFarland et al., 2017). Approximately 1 out of every 17 students will not complete high school and about 13% of the school population, representing 6.6 million youth, require special education services for one or more disabilities that invariably affect their learning and mental health (McFarland et al., 2017). Roughly 1 out of every 5 students will experience a clinically significant mental disorder chiefly including anxiety disorders, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and mood disturbances such as depression (Kessler et al., 2012). Thus, it is clear that our student population needs ongoing, effective support to meet and overcome these challenges successfully. Who will answer the call to address these needs? Fortunately, school psychologists are ideally suited to enhance student academic and mental health given their extensive training and experience in educational and mental health support strategies.

Graduate and Postgraduate Teachers, Undergraduate Students, Undergraduate Teachers November 6, 2017

Avoiding the “I’m So Busy” Trap

Anyone who has had the chance to work in more than one psychology department – either as undergraduate, graduate, or faculty member – comes to realize that every workplace is different. There are different norms, different dress codes, different colleagues, and different leadership styles. But whatever work setting you end up in, you are guaranteed to find one strong commonality:

everyone is so busy.

And you will find this commonality immediately because everyone will want to tell you how busy they are.

Parents, Pre K - 12 Teachers October 16, 2017

Does your child seem stressed to be back at school? Fear not

It is normal for some students to experience back-to-school stress. Many challenges come with the start of a new school year. This article is geared toward the typical stressors of starting or returning to school, and is not intended to focus on students showing severe cases of anxiety or depression. Many of the school-related challenges described below can cause students distress, irritability, reduced focus or academic performance. Though many of these changes simply take time to adapt to, others are readily addressable.

Pre K - 12 Teachers October 2, 2017

Starting a Campus-Wide Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) Program

“Take a Break,” says a small sign in a small corner of a second-grade classroom. A small corner that represents a big change at Dan D. Rogers Elementary School in Dallas, Texas. Last year we began small changes such as these as part of a school-wide effort to have a uniform approach to Social-Emotional Learning on our Campus. With the help of my leadership team, a group of core teachers, and our district’s Psychological and Social Services Department, we met over the summer and began to formulate lessons, gather tools, and purchase materials to begin our program which we now call, “Our Mind Time.”  This a title that was coined by one of our district social workers, Veva Lane.

Parents, Pre K - 12 Teachers September 25, 2017

A Cognitive Skill that Predicts Children’s Academic Achievement

What do young children need to be successful in school? Most people would say learning the ABCs and counting to 10. However, other important cognitive skills also are important.  Inhibition (also sometimes labeled “inhibitory control” or “impulse control”) is a skill that is very important for children’s early success in school. 

Graduate and Postgraduate Students, Graduate and Postgraduate Teachers, High School Students, Pre K - 12 Teachers, Undergraduate Students, Undergraduate Teachers August 28, 2017

But…We Do Learn from People We Don’t Like

In a quite popular Ted Talk, Every Kid Needs A Champion, Dr. Rita Pierson says many great things about relationships and education.  I have no doubt she was an incredible educator and mentor to students and teachers.  You can see it and feel it in the way she delivers her talk; she’s got it.  I believe this quote best summarizes her talk: