Sioux City Community School District hosts CHAMPS training for teachers
Teacher’s around Siouxland are taking steps to address youth behavior and mental health in the classroom.
Sioux City’s North High School hosted many of those teachers for a special training session on classroom rules and expectations on Tuesday.
More than 100 teachers in The Sioux City Community School District have attended training sessions over the summer called CHAMPS, or Conversation, Help, Activity, Movement, Participation, and Success.
CHAMPS Training is a method used by teachers and administrators all over the country and was created by a company called Safe and Civil Schools.
“Some of the things that were talked about were setting up classroom rules that are clear, and how to provide positive feedback to students, and how to just manage minor disruptions so that it doesn’t escalate into something larger,” said Dr. Kim Buryanek, Associate Superintendent for the Sioux City Community District.
Teachers attending the session say this is different from regular classroom preparation because of the emphasis on behavior and positive reinforcement.
Donny Short, 4th and 5th Grade Teacher, says CHAMPS helps to focus on topics that have only recently needed to be addressed.
“The positive-to-negative correlation that students receive in our classrooms which while not being specific about mental health, actually increases the positive engagement and positive experience in the classroom which should, in turn, impact the mental health of the students that are in the classroom setting,” said Short.
Administrators say CHAMPS training is just one part of a three-part process.
Eventually, teachers will have the opportunity to talk about mental health concerns among students.
These sessions took place over the summer to give teachers enough time to be able to memorize these tactics and implement them in the fall.