Facilitating Interpersonal Relationships in

This volume is a guide to using the Relational Literacy Curriculum with children in grades 2-5. Based on developmental and social constructivist principles, this curriculum presents a conceptual framework and a method for enhancing children's understanding of interpersonal relationships in the classroom. The Relational Literacy Curriculum: *offers a powerful method for children to reflect on challenging interpersonal episodes and to discern constructive patterns of relating through discussion and role play; *provides a process that can serve as both a prevention tool and a vehicle for managing immediate conflict; *gives teachers a strong theoretical framework from which they can make principled decisions, and a flexible format for implementing it that they can adapt to meet the particular social needs of their classroom context; and *promotes teacher reflection and learning through the use of various observational tools. This book addresses the question of why it is important to study relationships in the elementary classroom; reviews the research and literature that inform the relational literacy curriculum; lays out the process of the curriculum; explains how the curriculum can be used to address real conflicts within the classroom community; and provides guiding principles for practice. It is a useful resource for classroom teachers, school psychologists, school counselors and social workers, and a valuable text for a range of courses, including classroom management, psycho-social interventions, child development, and early childhood education.

Preface	p. xiii
List of Tables	p. xix
List of Figures	p. xxi
Relationships: Why Study Them in the Elementary Classroom?	p. 1
Mark's Story: One Child's Social Conflict	p. 1
A Teacher's Story: One Teacher's Response to Social Conflict	p. 5
What Is Relational Literacy?	p. 7
Values and Commitments in the RLC	p. 9
Overview of the RLC	p. 10
The Basic Cycle	p. 10
The Contextualizing Cycle	p. 11
Overview of the Volume	p. 12
A Conceptual Framework for the Relational Literacy Curriculum	p. 13
Introduction	p. 13
Understanding the Curricular Goals	p. 14
Goal 1	p. 14
Goal 2	p. 15
Goal 3	p. 16
Goal 4	p. 16
Rethinking Social Problem Solving	p. 17
Patterns of Relating and the Dialectic Tensions	p. 23
Conclusions	p. 25
The Relational Literacy Curriculum Discussion Process: Exploring How It Works	p. 27
Introduction	p. 27
Developing RLC Stories	p. 28
Relevance of the Story	p. 29
Language	p. 29
Story Complexity	p. 29
Dialectic Tensions as the Basis for Conflict in the RLC Stories	p. 29
Judgment-Acceptance	p. 30
Expressive-Protective	p. 32
Independence-Dependence	p. 34
Instrumentality-Affection	p. 37
Summary	p. 39
Reflecting on RLC Discussions	p. 39
The Basic Discussion	p. 39
Elements of a Good Discussion	p. 41
Anticipating Child Explanations	p. 43
Reflecting on Teacher Prompts	p. 49
Summary	p. 54
Role Playing in the Relational Literacy Curriculum	p. 56
Introduction	p. 56
Purposes of the RLC Role Play	p. 57
RLC Role Play Goals	p. 59
A Developmental Framework for Conceptualizing the Role Play	p. 61
Role Taking-Stereotyping Range	p. 61
Role Playing-Imitative Range	p. 66
Role Creating-Creative Range	p. 75
Summary of the Developmental Phases	p. 77
Other Considerations	p. 79
Conclusions	p. 81
Shifting Responsibility Within the Relational Literacy Curriculum: Making Conceptual Connections	p. 83
Introduction	p. 83
Building a Conceptual Framework	p. 84
Defining the Four Tensions With the Children	p. 85
Writing Their Own Stories	p. 85
Concept Mapping of Key Terms	p. 86
Exploring the Dialectic Tensions	p. 86
Why Make the Tensions Explicit?	p. 86
Aren't the Tensions Too Difficult for Children to Comprehend?	p. 86
How Can the Children Really Use These Concepts to Think About Their Interactions?	p. 87
Story Sorting Task	p. 87
Vocabulary-Story Matching Activity	p. 92
Engaging Children in Writing Their Own RLC Stories	p. 97
Judgment-Acceptance	p. 98
Independence-Dependence	p. 98
Expressive-Protective	p. 99
Instrumentality-Affection	p. 100
Connection Making and Concept Mapping	p. 100
Friendship Is Like a Rubberband	p. 101
Working With Children's Real Conflicts	p. 106
Introduction	p. 106
Levels of Relationships Within the Classroom	p. 108
Tensions Between Individuals and Groups (Levels 1 and 4)	p. 108
Changing Relationships (Levels 2, 3, and 4)	p. 113
Changing Relationships Within the Community (Levels 2 and 5)	p. 118
Choosing Problems to Address	p. 122
Who Needs to Be Involved?	p. 124
Variations in the RLC Process With Real Conflict	p. 125
Conclusions	p. 126
Making It Your Own: Professional Development and the Relational Literacy Curriculum	p. 128
Introduction	p. 128
The Action Frameworks of the RLC	p. 129
The Action Frameworks and Teacher Learning	p. 132
Revisiting the Values and Commitments of the RLC	p. 133
Revisiting the Meaning of Relational Literacy	p. 135
References	p. 137
Table of Contents for Appendixes	p. 141
Timeline	p. 143
The Discussion Process	p. 145
The Role Play Process	p. 161
Reflections and Connections	p. 165
Real Conflict	p. 172
Author Index	p. 175
Subject Index	p. 177
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

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Facilitating Interpersonal Relationships in the Classroom : The Relational Literacy Curriculum

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