Publisher's Synopsis
TheOwning Up Curriculum, written and developed by Rosalind Wiseman, author ofThe New York TimesbestsellerQueen Bees and Wannabes, provides a structured program for teaching students to own up and take responsibility—as perpetrators, bystanders, and targets—for unethical behavior. The curriculum is designed for adolescent groups in schools and other settings.
TheOwning Up Curriculumpresents a unique and comprehensive approach to preventing youth violence by targeting the root causes of bullying and other forms of social cruelty. It exposes the cultural expectations that teach young people to humiliate and dehumanize others as the way to achieve power and respect, then challenges them to transform this dynamic. The program also addresses the nuanced ways in which racism, classism, and homophobia are expressed in our culture and affect social cruelty and violence.
Separate sessions for girls and for boys combine group discussions, games, role-playing, and other activities to engage students in understanding the complexities of adolescent social culture. Students learn to recognize that they have a responsibility to treat themselves and others with dignity and to speak out against social cruelty and injustice.
A CD of reproducible program forms and student handouts is included with the curriculum.
Sessions for Girls and for Boys: The author provides separate sequences of sessions for girls and for boys, each consisting of a total of 17 sessions. These sessions are designed to help students achieve the following specific objectives:
- Identify and discuss behaviors and attitudes associated with groups, popularity, trust, exclusion, and bullying.
- Understand anger and how it can influence behavior and learn a strategy to enable them to communicate when angry.
- Develop a plan of action when a friend or group demeans you or someone else.
- Recognize the influence of popular culture on individuals' behavior and decision making.
- Examine how a boy's or girl's self-image affects behavior and attitudes toward others.
- Develop an understanding of how culture affects interactions between boys and girls and learn skills for communicating effectively.
- Understand the concept of reputations and the challenges in staying away from gossip.
- Define cyberbullying, understand its impact, and brainstorm solutions.
- Define sexual harassment, recognize and respect boundaries, and become aware of policies relating to sexual harassment.
- Promote understanding of the differences between healthy and abusive relationships.
- Identify and strengthen support networks and personal standards of dignity.
The SEAL Strategy: SEAL, one of the fundamental skills taught in this curriculum, is a strategy to empower people in conflict and other difficult situations in their everyday lives. The four-step SEAL process is often practiced during sessions in role-play situations.
- Stop—Breathe, observe, and ask yourself what the conflict is about. Decide when and where you can talk to the person so the person will be most likely to listen to you.
- Explain—Take your bad feelings and put them into words, be specific about what you don't like and what you want instead. Think about what you are feeling and what you want first so that you can then tell the other person.
- Affirm and Acknowledge—Affirm your right (and the other person's right) to interact with people without being ridiculed, dismissed, or harmed. If appropriate, acknowledge your part in contributing to the conflict.
- Lock in the friendship: Decide to resolve the conflict and continue being friends.
- Lock out the friendship: Decide that you can't be friends and want no further contact with the person.
- Take a vacation: Decide to take a break from the friendship but agree to talk later about reestablishing it.
