Second Step teaches skills in empathy, impulse control, problem solving, appropriate social behavior, and anger management. For example, in the unit on empathy, students learn to identify and predict the feelings of others and to provide an appropriate emotional response. In the impulse control unit, students learn problem-solving and communication skills, with a focus on how to handle and solve interpersonal conflict. In the anger management unit, students learn techniques for reducing stress and channeling angry feelings into constructive problem solving. The parent education program focuses on teaching these same skills to parents, as applied to parenting situations.

The Pre/K to grade 5 kits contain photo lessons, complete with discussion guide, teacher notes, activities, and a teacher's guide, which offers a description of each teaching unit, background information, suggestions and resources for handling difficult classroom situations, homework, parent activity sheets, and take-home letters. In addition, the Pre/K kit includes puppets, sing-along tapes, and posters. Grades 1-5 kits include classroom posters and video lessons that accompany each of the units to serve as a model for teachers and students. The grades 6-8 curriculum includes overhead transparencies and "Check It Out," a video focusing on specific behavioral skills. All curriculums are self-contained and easy to implement. The "Family Guide to Second Step" contains videos and a facilitator's guide for a six-session parent education format.

The Committee for Children offers regularly scheduled 1-day Second Step staff trainings in Seattle and 3-day Second Step trainer trainings across the United States and Canada. Onsite trainings are provided on a contractual basis with the Committee for Children. The Committee for Children provides no-fee implementation planning support services (via its toll-free number, 800-634-4449) for schools, districts, and agencies, to help ensure quality results from use of the program.

Components

Second Step consists of 20 scripted lessons. The lessons are taught for about 45-50 minutes a day to teach development of:

• empathy,
• problem-solving skills, and
• anger-management techniques.

The 45-50 minute lessons, used one to three times a week, are each broken into three parts: discussion, activity, and role play. In addition, older students in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades, also participate in discussions, use overhead transparencies, and watch video segments demonstrating good behavioral strategies.

The Second Step program is creating change in student prosocial behavior. The Kennedy Middle School used the program throughout its school year and during follow-up it was found that when faced with a hypothetical conflict scenario, 62 percent of students in a language arts class wrote a peaceful response to the problem. Not only are students knowledgeable about peaceful resolutions, but also there has been an effect on student behavior, as a result of the curriculum.

In a randomized control study, researchers found that some students behavior had taken a positive turn after only 17 hours of classroom exposure to the Second Step curriculum. Direct observation of student behavior in various settings (i.e., classroom, cafeteria, and playground) during different stages of the intervention (i.e., baseline, two weeks after completion, and 6 months after completion) revealed:

• Decreases in physical aggression (p.= .03), and
• Increases in neutral and prosocial behavior (p.= .04).