Marvin B. Smith Elementary School

At Smith Elementary we are a Capturing Kids Hearts School. This past school year we were named a National Showcase School for the third consecutive year! The primary focus of Capturing Kids’ Hearts (CKH) is to develop healthy relationships between all members of the school community. CKH is a framework that helps good teachers become better by equipping them with tools with which they can build meaningful relationships with their students, provide a safe environment in which students want to learn, and develop a dialogue for team-building. Teachers utilizing the CKH framework are dedicated to building classrooms where trust, respect, and caring relationships flourish. We are committed to implementing these processes at Smith.

Outcomes

The use of CKH helps to improve the school climate by:

★ Developing safe, trusting, & self-managing classrooms.

★ Improving classroom attendance by building students’ motivation and helping them take responsibility for their actions and performance.

★ Decreasing negative behaviors such as: disruptive outbursts, violent acts, bullying, and other risky behaviors.

★ Developing students’ empathy for diverse cultures and backgrounds.

EXCEL Model

The EXCEL Model helps teachers to effectively impact their students each time they come together.

★ Engage: Students are greeted with eye contact and a sincere welcome.

★ X-plore: Teachers listen and attend to the personal, emotional, and academic needs of our students.

★ Communicate: Teachers communicate care as well as content.

★ Empower: Teachers empower students to gain the ability to "use and do" the things they have been taught.

★ Launch: Deals with how we "end and send" our students into the world. The purpose is to start our students on a course of action by ending our classes on a powerful note.

CKH Classroom Culture

Teachers demonstrate social behaviors that build relationships with others, such as greeting each student at the door every day, listening and understanding.

Teachers begin the class everyday with “Good Things” (Asking students to share good things that happened since the last time the class met).

The Social Contract

The students and teachers write the contracts together.

They discuss priorities and decide how they should treat each other.

The contract prevents discipline from becoming personal when students misbehave.

Social Contract Questions

1. How do you want to be treated by me (teacher)?

2. How do you want to be treated by each other?

3. How do you think I want to be treated by you?

4. How do we want to treat others WHEN there’s conflict?

Behavior & Discipline

After opportunities for self managing, when a student misbehaves the teacher can reference to the social contract and redirect the student with the CKH’s “big four” questions:

1. What are you doing?

2. What are you supposed to be doing?

3. Are you doing it?

4. What are you going to do about it?

Teachers utilize the four questions and ASD’s behavior ladder to manage behaviors in the classroom.

This helps to maintain consistency and accountability, while preserving the relationship.

Check out this video that shares a little more about Capturing Kids Hearts at Smith.