Body Safety

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BRIEF SUMMARY

Even previous to the passage of Erin’s Law, school counselors have always been on the front lines in the fight to prevent child abuse. We are now legally required to provide age-appropriate body safety lessons at all grade levels, as well as training all staff to recognize and prevent child abuse.

Indiana and sexual abuse: Senate Enrolled Act 295, which updated existing law (IC 20-30-5-5.7), requires public schools, charter schools, and accredited nonpublic schools to use research or evidence-based instruction on child abuse and child sexual abuse for students in grades K–12. Instruction must be completed by December 15 of each school year.  See the following Guidance memo from IDOE for additional information.

KEY POINTS

  • There are many books and programs available to help educate our students about sexual abuse.
  • In cases where sexual abuse is suspected, it is critical that the child speak to someone trained in forensic interviewing as soon as possible to obtain a solid testimony. When a child makes an allegation, believe them and call the police or CPS right away so they can be referred to the nearest agency equipped to handle these cases.

SHARED WISDOM

  • Q: We are exploring our options for Body Safety presentations next year. Elementary counselors – who do you recommend?
    • A: Kids Talk has an amazing Body Safety Program.
  • Q: Has anyone put together something for high school students [for SEA 295]? Perhaps something that can be viewed virtually?
    • A: We haven’t created lessons yet, but found these videos and plan to use them in some way. Working on the “research/evidence-based” part, but felt that these will hold students’ attention, and are the best we’ve seen in quite a while. There are several, that can be divided by grade level, probably useful at the middle and high school level.
      Kids Talk usually does our presentations each year, but this year due to Covid they have provided us with virtual presentations.
    • A: We are switching to the Ripple Effects program. I know that it goes to 8th grade, but I am not positive past that. We are using it through a grant with a local mental health agency. I’ve enjoyed using it with our SEL expectations, especially with the virtual students. It is all online and the teacher can work through it with the kids or it can be assigned. Here’s a link to their informational website https://rippleeffects.com/ it looks like they do have a teen component.
    • A: We use Safer, Smarter Teens by Lauren’s Kids.  It is for grades 6-8.
  • Q: Has anyone found any resources that are free?
    • A: Please check out Prevent Child Abuse Indiana.  http://www.pcain.org  They have local chapters throughout Indiana.
    • A: We used resources and videos from https://fightchildabuse.org/ for K-6th in our building. It was great. There are evidence based lessons for K-12 on the site for FREE
  • I know we are always looking for current, evidenced based curriculum to teach child abuse. I have been looking for new curriculum for years. One of my peers found some this year:  playitsafe.org
  • Senate Enrolled Act (SEA) 295 – Child Abuse and Child Sexual Abuse Curricula – May 15, 2020
  • I found a resource for body safety lessons on the Elementary School Counselor Facebook group.  It is the ROAR curriculum.  It is not on the recommended list from IDOE, but it looks like a good resource for preschool to early elementary grade levels.  The website does mention research on its effectiveness, so it is evidenced-based.  The book is available on amazon.com for $10.  Here is the link to the website for the curriculum:  http://carecenter-okc.org/we-educate (Counselor Talk, January 2019)
  • A Discussion about Body Safety (from ISCA Conference, November 2018)

  • Q: Can anyone share what they are doing to address the sexual abuse education in middle and high school? The only things I can find either address elementary levels or are an expensive program that requires multiple lessons be given by the teachers. (from Counselor Talk, November 2018)
    • We researched what needed to be included and then videotaped a panel discussion with representatives from our police department, prosecutor’s office, and victims’ advocate program with me as the moderator. We’ll be showing it to all of our high school students tomorrow. (Greenfield Central High School)
    • We struggled to find a resource that would fulfill the requirements at the MS level and were past our school corporation’s deadline for expenditures, so we had to beg, borrow, and steal to find something to use with our students. As a stopgap measure, we combined several resources and scaffolded our lessons to what we believe is “developmentally appropriate.”  I would have been willing to share our power points used in the lessons, but it would violate copyright. The lessons can be easily purchased from Teachers Pay Teachers. I’ve provided the links below. I ended up paying for these lessons out of my own pocket, but our school corporation would have paid if I had met the deadline or gone through proper channels.  We may not be in compliance with “evidence- and research-based” materials, but we had to make do with what was available to us when no such materials exist.We taught these lessons, not the teachers.  We did not want to leave a topic such as this to someone untrained in the intricacies of such a sensitive issue. We also felt these lessons addressed this issues without making the subject matter too heavy. Our students understood the serious nature of the lessons and responded accordingly.We did “borrow” from the Monique Burr Foundation online resources to include their 5 Safety Rules, as well as their descriptions of abuse.  In every single classroom in which we presented, you could hear a pin drop while we covered these slides.  We included these at the beginning of each grade level lesson. Those slides are included here. Everything else is from the TpT resources.(These are from Teachers Pay Teachers): Grade 6 – Personal Safety (A bit elementary, but we made adjustments to make it work); Grade 7 – Social Media Safety (This was simple and easy to use. Effective lesson); Grade 8 – Healthy Relationships (This is dating specific, but we adapted it to fit all relationships. We also removed a few scenarios that we thought our students weren’t quite ready for. Know your audience and your parents). Students were very engaged.
    • A link to the slides that include the 5 Safety Rules and Types of Abuse, as well as the resources links:  Goshen Middle School Safety & Abuse Resource Links.  A shout out to Melanie Heiser for sharing the info for the Monique Burr Foundation. (from Goshen Middle School)
    • I recommend Kids in the Know.  It is a safety resource for grades K-8 and is evidence-based.  They have units on many safety topics including abuse.  I used it for grades K-4 and really liked it.  It is the resource that all schools in Canada use.https://www.kidsintheknow.ca/app/en/
  • From Counselor Talk, September 2018:
    • I found the following information after many hours of searching on-line this summer.  I have been in contact with the organization and have been very impressed by their programming, the research, and their answers to my questions.  Our team of counselors have been looking at this program along with our administrators as a possible curriculum to meet our Indiana requirements.https://safersmarterkids.org/teachers/curriculum/https://globenewswire.com/news-release/2018/05/03/1496316/0/en/School-Based-Education-Hailed-as-Solution-to-Eradicating-Child-Sexual-Abuse.htmlhttps://laurenskids.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/SSK-Executive-Report.pdfContact: Ms. Maraleen (Fudge) Brown, Executive Director, fudge@laurenskids.orgTheir curriculum is presently being utilized in 37 states.  They are research-based and evidence-based.  Lauren’s Kids Program is also on many accepted state curriculum lists.  I have been very impressed with the programming offered for k-12, special needs, and parents.  Training is also available for teachers.
    • I am looking into the Monique Burrr Foundation for Children and their Body Safety Plus Program…I was told it fit the requirements for “research and evidence-based” instruction. I actually spoke to a woman today about it, and it seems like a really great program. Right now they have lessons for students K-8 with high school lessons coming in 2019. School counselors receive the training online to become a facilitator and then teach the lessons. On top of the body safety and sexual abuse topics, included in the curriculum are topics such as bullying, cyberbullying, digital abuse, and digital citizenship
    • All Responses from Counselor Talk (for high school programming)
  • From Counselor Talk, August 2018:
    • We are using the Body Safety Training Workbook program.  It is on the approved list for K-2. It is a very basic program. It has a lot of lessons about safety, but I am using only the one focused body safety. The other lessons are on fire safety, gun safety, etc. We might have teachers do some of the other safety lessons during our morning meeting time.It is not a good program. It was written in 1986 and has not been updated. But it only cost $40. We are only grades 2&3 at my school. The K&1 school is also using this program.
    • In the Indianapolis area, there is Chaucie’s Place. There is a fee per building of $1000 and the cost of books you will need to provide to  students: the K-6 books are $1/student and the 7-12 bks are $1.25/student.  For more information, visit www.chauciesplace.org
  • Here are some ideas for presenting to elementary students:
    • We have a group from our area come in to talk to all of our kids.  They have an awesome presentation.  We are in southern Indiana, but if you are not you still might contact them to see if they would let you present it?? Libby Stinson is our person.  Her email is:  libby@comfort-house.org
    • I like the book, “Your Body Belongs to You” by Cornelia Spelman because it presents this subject in a clear way without making kiddos uncomfortable. You might reach out to local law enforcement. They may have a program ready to go and are often looking for ways to go into schools in a non-threatening way.
    • Hands are not for Hitting.  This is a great book that describes the appropriate things to do with our hands.
  • From Counselor Talk, May 2018: The couple responses I received about what curriculum elementary schools are using to meet the requirements for the sexual abuse education law were:
    -Second Step child abuse kit which was $200
    -Safer smart kids which I do not know the cost of

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This post was created by ABCD ContentManager on August 7, 2016.