EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION

MODULE CURRICULUM MODELS

CHAPTER 7: The PATHS® and HOSO Curriculum

Objectives:

a.) Identify standards for science instruction and programming in

early education settings.
b.) Use developmental knowledge to create supportive
environments for young children.
c.) Involve students for intensive science learning

PATHS (Promoting
Alternative THinking
Strategies)

The PATHS® curriculum is a

comprehensive program for
promoting emotional and
social competencies and
reducing aggression and
behavior problems in
elementary school-aged
children while simultaneously
enhancing the educational process in the classroom. This innovative curriculum is
designed to be used by educators and counselors in a multi-year, universal prevention
model. Although primarily focused on the school and classroom settings, information
and activities are also included for use with parents. It has become clear over the last
two decades that to best achieve the educational goals we want for our students, high
quality SEL needs to be at the core of the school curriculum; and science has recently
explained why. Imaging and other basic research from social cognitive neuroscience
has ascertained that the human brain is largely evolved for processing emotional and
social information. This is the “default” mode of thinking. Moreover, the neural systems
that underlie nonsocial reasoning, cognitive working memory, and what we term
“general intelligence” (i.e., those used with traditional education) are separate from the
brain regions that process social reasoning, social working memory, emotions, and
mentalizing, and these two systems are often at odds with one another. Over the past
35 years, more than 40 published research studies (by ourselves and others, both
nationally and internationally) have documented the effectiveness of the PATHS®
program and show that the PATHS® program is the best choice for achieving optimal
educational success.
A wide variety of results has consistently shown improvements in seven major goals of
education needed for the development of healthy, happy children and future adults:

 Improved academic achievement.

 Decreased emotional suffering & behavioral problems
 Increased happiness, health, and emotional well-being

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 Improved emotional literacy, self-control, & problem-solving skills

 Healthy relationships and social skills
 Preparation for the future: Workforce
 Skills for the future: Life satisfaction, good health, & citizenship

Overview

The PATHS® Programme for Schools (UK Version) is a programme for educators and
counsellors designed to facilitate the development of self-control, emotional awareness
and interpersonal problem-solving skills. The programme consists of a variety of
lessons, and additional materials
and charts.

The PATHS® programme is

designed for use with primary
school children. The purposes of
the PATHS® programme are to
enhance the social competence
and social understanding of
children, as well as to facilitate
educational processes in the
classroom. The PATHS®
Programme for Schools (UK
Version) has been adapted for a
UK audience by Barnardo’s NI.

Social Emotional Learning Skills

An effective social-cognitive programme is important because children often show

difficulties in social problem-solving, self-control, affective understanding and self-
esteem. The PATHS® Programme for Schools (UK Version) provides teachers and
educators with a systematic developmental procedure for enhancing social competence
and understanding in children. It addresses the following goals:

Increased self-control, i.e., the ability to stop and think before acting when upset or
confronted with a conflict situation. Lessons in this area also teach identification of
problem situations through recognition of “upset” feelings.
Attributional processes that lead to an appropriate sense of self-responsibility.
 Increased understanding and use of the vocabulary of logical reasoning and
problem-solving, e.g., “if…then” and “why…because.”
 Increased understanding
and use of the vocabulary
of emotions and emotional

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states; e.g., excited, disappointed, confused, guilty, etc. Increased use of verbal
mediation.
 Increased ability to recognize and interpret similarities and differences in the
feelings, reactions and points of view of self and others.
 Increased understanding of how one’s behavior affects others.
 Increased knowledge of, and skill in, the steps of social problem-solving:
stopping and thinking; identifying problems and feelings; setting goals;
generating alternative solutions; anticipating and evaluating consequences;
planning, executing and evaluating a course of action; trying again if the first
solution fails.
 Increased ability to apply social problem-solving skills to prevent and/or resolve
problems and conflicts in social interactions.

Conceptual Units

The PATHS® Programme for

Schools (UK Version) Curriculum
includes four conceptual units. The
units are:

1. Emotional understanding
2. Self-control
3. Social problem solving
4. Peer relations and self-
esteem

These units are integrated within

the lessons and are covered at the
appropriate developmental level during each year.

 Emotional
Understanding
The lessons on emotional
understanding cover
approximately 25 different
affective states and are
taught in a developmental
hierarchy beginning with
basic emotions (happy,
sad, angry, etc.) and later
introducing more complex

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emotional states. As the ability to label emotional states is a central focus, major
emphasis is placed on encouraging such labelling as a precursor for effective
self-control and optimal problem resolution. The children are also taught cues for
the self-recognition of their own feelings and the recognition of emotions in
others, affective self-monitoring techniques, training in attributions that link
causes and emotions, perspective-taking skills in how and why to consider
another’s point of view, and information regarding how the behavior of others can
affect oneself. These lessons include group discussions, role-playing, art
activities, biographies, stories and educational games.

 Self-Control
The second unit focuses on self-control, a prerequisite for effective problem-solving.
In this section, emotions such as
anger and frustration are
discussed, differentiations are
made between feelings (all feelings
are OK to have) and behaviors
(some are OK and some are NOT
OK), and modelling and role-play
are utilized to teach children new
ways to recognize and control
anger. Some methods for helping
children to calm down and learn
better self-control, the Turtle
Technique, Three Steps for
Calming Down and the Control
Signals Poster (CSP) are also
introduced in this sub-unit. The CSP is modelled on the notion of a traffic signal and
is a revised version of the Stop Light used in the Yale-New Haven Middle School
Social Problem-Solving Program (Weissberg, Caplan, & Bennetto, 1988). The red
light of the CSP focuses on self-control.

 Social Problem-Solving
The third focus of the curriculum teaches interpersonal problem-solving. The skills
in emotional awareness and self-control are prerequisites for learning competent
interpersonal problem-solving, so lessons on this topic do not begin until the
groundwork has been covered by previous instruction. Beginning in an informal,
active manner (using the Control Signals Poster), children are taught the steps of
social problem-solving. Beginning in Primary Five (Year 4), children receive formal
lessons on each of the following steps: - Stop - What is Happening?

1. Stopping and thinking

2. Problem identification
3. Feeling identification Get
Ready - What Could I Do?
4. Deciding on a goal

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5. Generating alternative solutions

6. Evaluating the possible consequences of these solutions
7. Selecting the best solution
8. Planning the best solution Go! Try My Best Plan
9. Trying the formulated plan Evaluate - How Did I Do?
10. Evaluating the outcome
11. Trying another solution and/or plan, or alternatively re-evaluating the goal, if
an obstacle results in failure to reach the intended goal.

 Peer Relations and Self-

Esteem
Issues regarding friendship and peer
relations are introduced throughout the
PATHS® curriculum. This occurs both
in the context of feelings (i.e., angry,
shy, lonely, etc.) as well as through
role-playing and thinking about how to
solve problems that arise with friends.
The issue of self-esteem is covered in
a variety of ways including the regular
activity of giving compliments (Pupil of
the Day).

Conceptual Units

The PATHS® Programme for Schools

(UK Version) is intended to be used
across all year groups in Primary
Schools. Beginning in Primary 1
(Reception) and extending to Primary
7 (Year 6), The programme is
developmentally appropriate and
universal for all children.

For All Children

There are four major factors that are addressed by focusing on self-control, emotional
understanding, problem-solving skills and creative self-expression. First, we teach
children to “Stop and Think”, a response that facilitates the development and use of
verbal thought. Second, we provide children with enriched linguistic experiences which
will help mediate understanding of self and others. Third, we teach the children to
integrate emotional understanding with cognitive and linguistic skills to analyze and

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solve problems. Fourth, and very critically, we encourage the development of verbally
mediated self-control over behaviors.

The PATHS® Programme for Schools (UK Version) provides teachers with a systematic
and developmental procedure for reducing adverse factors which can negatively affect a
child’s adaptive behavior and ability to profit from his/her educational experiences. The
programme is designed to help children: -

 develop specific strategies that promote reflective responses and mature thinking
skills;
 become more self-motivated and enthusiastic about learning;
 obtain information necessary for social understanding and pro-social behavior;
 increase their ability to generate creative alternative solutions to problems; and
 learn to anticipate and evaluate situations, behaviors and consequences.

These skills, in turn, increase the

child’s access to positive social
interactions and provide
opportunities for a greater variety
of learning experiences. Increasing
self-control and reflective thinking
skills also contribute to the
amelioration of significant
underachievement and promote
skills which will be beneficial in
preventing the genesis of other
types of problem behaviors in the
future (e.g. alcohol and drug
abuse).

In addition, as programme activities become a regular part of the school day, less
instructional time is apt to be used for correcting child behavior problems; in this way,
classroom climate can be improved, and teacher frustration and “burnout” are reduced.

Hands On Science
Outreach (HOSO)

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HOSO works with both parents and teachers, primarily after school (but not always)
for children from Pre-k to 6th. HOSO programs provide activity guides, materials and
training bound together as units for quality control, ease of use, and convenience.
The program is nationwide, with offices based in Silver Spring, MD. Classes meet in
8-week sessions in the fall, winter and spring. Summer materials work well either by
themselves or as components of summer camps or other ongoing activities. The
imbedded data collection encourages mathematical thinking through counting,
graphing and analysis at age appropriate levels. Adult Leaders, who are often not
professional teachers (but sometimes are) practice asking questions, working on
developing evidence, analyzing results and enjoying the pleasure of science---the
joyful brain exercise of finding things out systematically.

Purpose of HOSO Programs

The primary purpose of HOSO programs is to provide an avenue for increased

participation in science enrichment for children when they are developing their interests
and sense of capacity for the future. A secondary purpose is to engage community
members in working along with the children to continue their own learning and to share
their enthusiasm for science and mathematics as an avocation as well as a potential
career. HOSO programs increase the public understanding of science/mathematics by
their presence: (What is science? How do we do it? What are the results? What do they
mean to us?)

Accomplishment/Results

Using registration data for its 23-year history, there have been hundreds of thousands of
children and tens of thousands of adults who have participated. They have used simple
materials to explore the opportunities for science in their everyday lives. Continuing
programs have a science enrichment presence in their midst. HOSO has developed an
evolving three-year cycle of activities for four different age/grade groups. The
enrichment curriculum touches upon a wide variety of topics in which science/math play
a role. The MATHSTART series for Pre-K (an NSF funded project) provides nursery and
Head Start teachers with activities focused on Number, Geometry and Probability. The
project evaluation indicated that teachers learned along with their young students.

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