Substance abuse prevention efforts have advanced significantly during the past two decades. There is growing evidence of the effectiveness of approaches that incorporate social resistance skills training, normative education, and broader personal and social skills training. To achieve the broad-based delivery of effective prevention services, efficient and effective technologies for training teachers are needed. The goal of this project is to develop high-quality videotape segments that can augment the effectiveness of a teacher training course designed to be delivered as part of teachers' normal continuing education process. Course instructors are not sufficiently well trained in drug prevention theory and practice. As a consequence, they experience difficulties and deficits when trying to explain, justify, and demonstrate prevention concepts and methods. By providing standardized video segments to bolster training, teachers are expected to make significant gains in understanding and to implement research-based approaches to drug prevention. The goal of this project is to produce video segments that will enhance a previously-developed continuing education course in prevention. During Phase I, the ability of this method to improve teachers' understanding of concepts will be demonstrated. A video augmenting one session of the course (a session addressing norm setting) will be developed and field tested.
Drug use continues to be a serious problem in the country. The US Department of Education has recently adopted principles of effectiveness which include adopting research-based programs and models. This has created increased demand for training that will allow teachers outside of research environments to understand research-based concepts and practices. This suggests this project will result in a product that will have excellent market potential.
| Dusenbury, Linda A; Hansen, William B; Giles, Steven M (2003) Teacher training in norm setting approaches to drug education: a pilot study comparing standard and video-enhanced methods. J Drug Educ 33:325-36 |
