Strategies
The key to working successfully with children prenatally exposed to alcohol is STRUCTURE, CONSISTENCY, BREVITY, VARIETY and PERSISTENCE. The following links will outline specific strategies educators can implement to enhance the learning environment.
- Strategies for Educating Children with FASD
- Educating Preschool Children with FASD
- Strategies for School Staff
Lessson Plans and Curriculums
Reach to Teach is a resource for parents and teachers to use in educating elementary and middle school children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD). It provides a basic introduction to FASD and provides tools to enhance communication between parents and teachers.
Better Safe Than Sorry High School: This highly engaging, flexible (1-4 class periods), inquiry-based curriculum module was developed by researchers at UNC-Chapel Hill as well as teachers and other educational consultants. Materials and lessons are adapted for use in a middle school science classroom, aligned with the National Science Education Standards (NSES) and are based on current research relevant to a life-science curriculum. All kits are FREE and include guided teacher instructions for implementation.
Understanding Alcohol: Investigations into Biology and Behavior Middle School: A middle school curriculum supplement involving 6 hands-on, inquiry-based lessons that fit into the 5E’s Instructional Model (Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate), also aligned with NSES Content Standards. It includes web-based components that include simulations of intoxicated and sober mice (varying alcohol concentrations, time and genetics, calculations and impact on BAC levels as well as depictions of intoxicated drivers, requiring students to make observations and inferences. Finally, the last lesson is a highly-interdisciplinary piece that requires students to synthesize information from a variety of primary sources in developing a justification for positions on various legal and social issues related to the science of alcohol.
My Brain, My Body Middle School:My Brain, My Body is an educational tool for middle school students. It promotes discussions about the sensitive psychosocial issues of alcohol abuse and also increases and extends the scientific understanding of students. This series of online lessons, each approximately 45 minutes in duration, is supplemented by videos, overhead transparencies, live Internet polls, lab activities, and hardcopy classroom activities. My Brain My Body is made up of three levels, representing the three-tiered inquiry approach to science instruction. In design, the lessons of My Brain My Body adhere to the 5Es Learning Cycle.
Pregnancy and Alcohol Don't Mix Middle School: This is a lesson on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome in which students are guided to discover what this syndrome is, what causes it, and how it can be prevented. Using a prepared pathfinder, students will be guided through a Web search for the answers to a set of questions about fetal alcohol syndrome.
Jeopardy With Alcohol and Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Middle School: Students will learn about fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS), and its characteristics and probable cause. Students will use the Internet to research different aspects of FAS and play a game of Jeopardy that tests FAS knowledge to reinforce the learning.
More Resources
Double Arc: Concerned teachers may refer a student through their school process. Double ARC will provide on-site consultation and strategy development. Double ARC also provides training in the Student Centered Intervention Model to new or existing school intervention teams.
The Cool Spot: The Cool Spot was created for kids 11-13 years old by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA). The NIAAA is the lead U.S. agency supporting research into the causes, prevention, and treatment of alcohol problems. It is a component of the National Institutes of Health, within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.Teaching Students with an FAS/ Effects: This resource guide is organized around areas of concern identified by experienced classroom and integration support teachers. Its goal is to provide teachers with a clear understanding of the needs of students with FAS/E. Special Programs Branch, Ministry of Education, Skills, and Training, Government of British Columbia, Canada, 1996
Strategies for Teachers: Specific classroom strategies from the National Organization on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.
8 Magic Keys: From www.mofas.org, provides information on developing successful interventions for students with FASD.