 About the New Edition-- Relationship Smarts PLUS
This newest unit of the Love U2® series, Relationship Smarts PLUS, contains all the core relationship concepts of Increasing Your Relationship Smarts (2004), and much more. It is a research-based curriculum that includes many hands-on activities used to build skills and knowledge necessary for making wise relationship choices.
Relationship Smarts Plus is the curriculum currently in use in the large-scale, five-year federally-funded evaluation in the state of Alabama conducted by researchers Jennifer Kerpelman, PhD and Francesca Adler-Baeder, PhD at Auburn University.
New content in this edition includes communication and conflict management skills, dating violence prevention, identity and future orientation, and a unique approach to pregnancy prevention that educates about the needs of children and the importance of “sequence”, i.e. education, job, marriage before babies.
A new feature of Relationship Smarts Plus is an engaging workbook that gives teens the opportunity to review, to reflect, and to apply what they have learned to their own lives. Another new feature is the “Parent/Guardian-Teen Connection” – activities which convey core content to parents or guardians and serve as catalysts for critical teen-parent conversations. Most invite parents to add their words of wisdom. The research, most notably emerging from the Adolescent Health Study, the SEARCH Institute and others, is quite clear on the power of parental influence. In fact “parent-teen connectedness” has been found to be the strongest protective factor for adolescents beyond class, race and family structure. Parents are the first and most important teachers even as parents continue to underestimate the influence they have on important teen decisions, like sex. Parents are generally hungry for conversation starters and talking points around issues of teen relationships. These parent/guardian-teen activities provide educators, community or faith-based organizations a way to partner with parents in helping teens navigate the choppy waters of teen and young adult romantic relationships.
Relationship Smarts PLUS is designed to work well with diverse youth. It is written in a style that is easy for teens to understand and includes “common” teen language. The curriculum is chock-full of activities that employ real-world scenarios created with the help of scores of diverse young people as well as stories from the anthology, The Art of Loving Well.
Description of Content
Relationship Smarts PLUS offers guidance on navigating the world of teen relationships. It begins with lessons on self-awareness and future orientation and planning - including maturity, values clarification and peer pressure - before addressing romantic relationships. Teens learn about the nature and ups and downs of romantic attractions while being guided to build realistic concepts of love. Topics such as attractions, infatuation, ingredients and building blocks for healthy relationships, principles for smart relationships, and how true intimacy develops are addressed. Attention is paid to how to really get to know someone, how to gauge the health and safety of a relationship, and how to take a low-risk “deciding” approach that avoids high-cost consequences and attachments to problem people. The activities in the lessons are fun, informative, upbeat, and meant to affirm that teen relationships are an important part of learning about love—filled with as much joy as confusion.
Relationship Smarts PLUS also teaches ways to deal with break-ups, broken hearts and moving forward. An important focus on recognizing abusive behaviors is included, and teens practice proactive skills to prevent and halt disrespectful or abusive behaviors in their relationships. Teens are also taught essential skills for communication and conflict management which are useful for all relationships. These communication skills are adapted from the highly acclaimed research and skills-based adult program, PREP® (Prevention and Relationship Enhancement).
Finally, teens are motivated to make wiser relationship and sexual choices by examining the consequences of early and unwed pregnancy through the eyes of a child. Related issues, such as of the role of fathers, cohabitation, healthy marriage benefits, research findings on mate selection and marital success and failure, are presented in a teen-friendly activity-based style that is meant to build confidence and knowledge.
Program Kit $325.00 - Order Now
Student Workbooks $65.00 for pack of 10 – Order Now
Optional Support Materials
• “The Art of Loving Well” Anthology * – Order Now
*The Art of Loving Well is used in all “Love U2®” units.
More about Love U2®: Relationship Smarts PLUS
More about Love U2®: Becoming Sex Smart
More about Love U2®: Communication Smarts: PREP for Teens
More about Love U2®: Baby Smarts Through the Eyes of a Child
More about Making a Love Connection
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