Get the inside scoop on Behavior Academies in this insightful Q&A with authors Jessica Djabrayan Hannigan and John Hannigan.
What inspires or drives your work?
Our work is driven to provide practical, proven solutions to common challenges educators are facing. We wrote this book with students in mind first and foremost. We wanted to create a resource where educators have the tools needed to help students learn and develop productive life skills.
Based on the most common behavior challenges we hear from educators, we created eight behavior academies—Hands-Off Academy, Check-In Check-Out Academy, Civility Academy, Organizational Skills Academy, Social Skills Academy, Upstander Academy, Motivation Academy, and Emotional Regulation Academy—to help educators implement and ultimately provide students the tools they need to succeed.
What challenges will Behavior Academies help educators overcome?
With student behavior challenges rising and frustrated educators leaving the profession, educators need targeted behavior interventions that work! Yet, despite the abundance of ready-made packaged behavior programs and curricula available, schools still struggle to find success in supporting student behavior needs.
The reason is that the response is not targeted enough. This book was written to simplify the complex, challenge-fixed mindsets about student behavior and remove any excuses for overcoming barriers to implementation. Any educator, and even parents/guardians, will find the thinking and resources behind Behavior Academies valuable.
What should educators remember most from what you’ve written?
Educators will find value in the practicality of the systematic process of a behavior academy, which provides ongoing teaching and/or reteaching support and rehearsal opportunities for targeted life skills that help students develop productive habits. Additionally, educators will find value in the 128 replacement behaviors provided in this book.
Each behavior academy includes eight targeted life skills, and each life skill offers two replacement behaviors based on the science of mental imagery and establishing new habits. Educators commonly tell us they love using these strategies with their children at home!
What professional development, if any, do you offer to support this book?
We provide behavior academy training for all educators, designed to explain the why, what, and how of behavior academies. We also provide ongoing coaching and implementation support.
Want to keep learning about how to overcome behavior challenges in the classroom? Check out these hand-picked related resources and other offerings from Drs. John and Jessica Djabrayan Hannigan:
About the Educators
Jessica Djabrayan Hannigan, EdD, works with US schools and districts to design and implement effective social-emotional and behavioral systems. Her expertise includes response to intervention (RTI), professional learning communities (PLC), multitiered systems of supports (MTSS), positive behavioral interventions and supports (PBIS), restorative practices, social-emotional learning, and more.
John Hannigan, EdD, is an author and speaker who has served in education for over 20 years as a teacher, instructional coach, principal, and county office leadership coach. His expertise includes RTI at Work™, PLC at Work®, MTSS, PBIS, restorative practices, social-emotional learning, and more.
