Essays, Keynotes and Papers
Bullying and Self-Esteem: Is There A Connection?
by Katy Allen
copyright © 2006 Impact Training, Inc.
What people think
One of the most widely held beliefs is that bullies have low self-esteem. A great deal of non-academic (and some academic) writing endorses this assumption. In selfhelp books, children who are bullied are told that bullies do it because they feel badly about themselves and bullying helps them feel better. In books for parents whose children are the targets of bullies, the reader is told that...continued
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How Do We Fix the Bullying Problem?
Magic Wands Don't Exist in the Real World
by Katy Allen
copyright © 2003 Impact Training, Inc.
Unless your school is Hogwarts, magic wands don't exist. And even though everyone at Hogwarts has a magic wand, interestingly enough, they have their bullies, too. And just like the world we live in, bullies come in "child" versions and "adult" versions.
Fixing a problem like bullying, ...continued
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A "Whole System" Approach to
Dealing with Violence...
Band Aids Alleviate Pain, But Don't Solve the Problem
by Katy Allen
copyright © 2005 Impact Training, Inc.
School violence is systemic. That means that there are multiple, interrelated factors contributing to the problem. Beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors at several levels...community, district, school, class, and individual, contribute to a situation where safety can be uncertain and hurtful behaviors are common. All educators know that when there is a culture of violence and aggression within a school, the classroom, or an entire system, teaching and learning are difficult. Most educators don't like working in this type of system, but changing it, at first look, is an overwhelming task.
Continued...
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Three Papers on Bullying and Relational Aggression: Research, Theory and Methodologyby Katy Allen
copyright © 2010 Impact Training, Inc.
"We don't have bullying at our school, but we have drama and gossip,
and everybody talks behind everybody's back." -High School Senior, Female, 2007
Introduction
Bullying came to the fore as an issue in American schools because of its connection to
school shootings (Newman, Fox, Harding, Mehta, & Roth, 2004; Vossekuil, 2002).
Behaviors such as taunting, name calling, and ostracism, directed at fellow students, have
been linked to lethal violence in schools across the nation. Along with this problem, attention
has also been directed to the issue of relational aggression (Simmons, 2002; Wiseman, 2002),
a form of hostility apparently common among females and problematic for students in many
schools. The purpose of this paper is to develop a literature review that explores the
chronological development of research on bullying and relational aggression within and
among national cohorts of researchers. Additionally, it will attempt to discover where and
how these various strands of research converge and diverge. Finally, it will explore how
research defines the construct of bullying with a particular focus on relational aggression as a
related concept. Continued...
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Raising Responsible and Respectful Youth
Keynote for Webster Parent University
February 12, 2011
copyright © 2011 Impact Training and Evaluation, Inc.
"...one of the things that kids do to each other that makes it hard to be a successful student, and for some students, makes it hard to come to school, is bullying."
Researchers define bullying as a form of aggression that is characterized by four primary features: (1) intentionality...in other words, the aggressor means to inflict harm; (2) the experience of harm...in other words the action of the aggressor causes pain or discomfort to the target, (3) the behaviors are repeated... in other words there is a systematic feel to the aggression. It'’Äôs not a 'one off' incident...and (4) there is a power imbalance or inequity between the aggressor and the target that is exploited. In other words, the aggressor takes advantage of the target and exploits some weakness, and the target is unable to deflect or end the abuse. The problem with this definition is..continued...
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The Other "R" or "Rs..."
What Happens in the Classroom Is More
Than Readin', Writin', and 'Rithmetic
by Katy Allen
copyright © 2005 Impact Training, Inc.
Most teachers have become educators because they love a certain subject area and wish to share that knowledge and enthusiasm with children. That was certainly the primary motivation for me when I chose English Education as my undergraduate major. Aside from studying literature and grammar, I also studied adolescent psychology and educational philosophy. But what I had very little exposure to was how to manage a classroom and intervene when students behaved in less than model ways. And I found that my difficulties as a teacher came, not in dealing with student to student conflict, but in situations where the conflict was between the student and me. Continued...
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Parent Involvement:
Terrible Torture or Powerful Panacea?
by Katy Allen
copyright © 2006 Impact Training, Inc.
A little knowledge is a curse. I spent two years studying parent involvement in education, and I acquired a little knowledge, and I am cursed. Why? Because there is A LOT of knowledge out there on the subject of schools and families and how they connect and work together (or don't work together). The result of the two years was a book called, The Rosemary Project: A Resource Guide on School, Family, and Community Partnerships, and because it is a publication that gets out of date each time something new is published, I vowed to keep it up to date by..continued...
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Sexual Harassment...
Do Kids REALLY Do It?
by Katy Allen,
Genesee Valley Parent Magazine, October 1998
Third grader Bobby comes home and complains to his mother that Sarah is kissing him at school. Bobby doesn't know how to get Sarah to leave him alone. Mom suggests that he write about it in his journal, assuring him that when his teacher reads about it she will solve the problem.
Is this sexual harassment? The words make most folks cringe. For some it conjures up images of lawsuits, courtrooms and ruined reputations. For others it dredges up awful memories of a creepy person who said nasty things or invaded private space. Regardless of what emotional hot buttons the words "sexual harassment" push, the topic has become one that cannot and should not be ignored.
The actions, words or behaviors...continued...
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