Last year, Medical Lake School District had implemented Positive Behavior Intervention Support as a way to improve school climate and it is now ready to roll out “Sound Discipline.”
Sound Discipline is a program that focuses on helping students build relationships and social skills with teachers and their peers. The program will also help teachers connect with students and address students’ behavioral needs and the root causes of that behavior.
“Let’s say there’s a student who is having difficulty being in class, the teacher and the students will work on an agreement to address the behavior, versus just giving them detention,” Kim Headrick, director of teaching and learning, said. “Addressing that issue, there’s a much better success in having that behavior change by working with the teacher rather than that student (receiving) the consequences.”
Headrick said the district began examining Sound Discipline as a teaching tool last year.
“We’ve been looking at Sound Discipline for a little over a year with ESD 101 through the Spokane Spirit grant,” Headrick said.
Headrick added that Sound Discipline also fits in with the Department of Defense grant the district received in 2015. The grant helps the district provide resources for social and emotional issues, as well as the academic needs of military students.
“Dr. Jody McVittie (founder of Sound Discipline), describes students as a lot like an iceberg,” Headrick said. “What most of us see is just the top part of the issue and there’s a bigger underlying issue. If we chip away just at what’s on top, we don’t get the underlying source of the issue.”
Staff will work with PBIS and data teams to identify specific areas of need on a monthly basis. There is currently a middle school student-led PBIS team. Headrick said buildings may implement student-led teams in the future if there is a need for it.
Part of staff’s roll out for Sound Discipline began on the first day of school with students learning classroom procedures.
There’s also a community element to the program where staff will work with parents on their childrens’ behavioral needs. Staff will also develop training opportunities for parents, as well as work in conjunction with parent advisory groups at each of the buildings.
Headrick said the staff’s main goal for implementing Sound Discipline is to help students build personal relationship with all of the adults in their lives, as well as be healthy mentally and physically when they are at school.
“It’s difficult for a child to be successful academically if they are suffering through trauma,” Headrick said. “We hope to keep our students healthy mentally and physically so they can do their best in academics.”
For more information on Sound Discipline, contact the Medical Lake School District office at (509) 565-3100 or visit http://www.sounddiscipline.org.
Al Stover can be reached at al@cheneyfreepress.com.
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