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Educators today must do more than just teach- they need to be aware of "red flags" that signal that a student needs help. This guidebook was written to help educators, counselors, school professionals and families identify students struggling with behavioral health problems that interfere with successful learning. It provides students with the information they need to help them understand, recognize, and cope with the negative effects of common problems like anger, depression, substance abuse, and self-esteem.

With this valuable book, educators and counselors can help kids avoid serious problems in the future. By integrating the easy-to-use activity sheets and/or the copy-ready material found in each chapter, Lifeworks can be woven into the daily curriculum for any subject. The material found in "LIFEWORKS: Behavioral Health In The Classroom" is designed to help motivate students to think about, talk about and understand the issues they are facing and to participate more effectively in the classroom and in society.

"This clear and practical guidebook provides useful suggestions for young people struggling with a wide variety of problems - from teenage depression, conflicts, peer pressure to conform, parental addiction or abuse, divorce, grief, and other common problems. LIFEWORKS provides an excellent and comprehensive resource to help teachers and counselors working with adolescents to deal with their emotions and their family problems."

- Monica McGoldrick, M.S.W, Ph.D., Director - Family Institute of New Jersey

"The LIFEWORKS program, which targets at-risk students, is a must in today's schools."

- Stephen J. Smith, Ed.D., retired Principal, Bensalem High School, Bensalem, PA

"LIFEWORKS contains information that can be of use to even the most healthy teenagers. It offers step-by-step advice on how to deal with a friend who may be suicidal. The book explains ways to deal with anger- the teenager's or someone else's. And it even makes suggestions for getting motivated to do homework."

-Evan Halper, The Philadelphia Inquirer

"Educators will have a lot of material to glean from. 'LIFEWORKS' is nearly 200 pages of problem-solving strategies, coping skills and activities 'designed to provide students with the information they need to understand, recognize and cope with common problems such as anger, depression, substance abuse and self-esteem"

-David Campbell, The Doylestown Patriot

"LifeWorks: Behavioral Health in the Classroom" breaks down 15 problems typically encountered by adolescents, identifies ways to recognize those problems and provides activities such as checklists and tests to increase students' awareness of how they react to those problems and how they should react.

DiNatale has incorporated the book's lesson plans into the school programs she runs.

While the book is intended as a resource to help educators, counselors, school professionals and families understand and help a child, its workbook-style format also makes it easy for students to explore their feelings and behavior patterns and work toward their own resolution.

"The book looks traditional," says Ronald Bernstein, president and chief executive officer of Foundations, "but it's dealing with topics kids never talk about. If you're teaching sex ed in the classroom, why not teach mental health?"

Used to voluminous dissertations expounding the theories behind behavioral health issues, guidance counselor, Ed DelViscio, says, " 'LifeWorks' is a welcome change."

"The other books I've looked at were overly conceptual, too theoretical, out of date or more anecdotal," he says. " 'LifeWorks' adheres to theory but in a more practical form."

In the Central Bucks School District, Jay Lawfer, supervisor of special education, runs several counseling groups for students with emotional support issues.

Having read "LifeWorks", he believes the book will be a valuable addition to these sessions and may one day even be incorporated into the curriculum.

"The format is wonderful," he says, "I've never seen anything as complete as this that runs the gamut of emotional issues."

As the supervisor of residential and treatment facilities for the Bucks County Intermediate Unit, Marion Lane sees adolescents with a wide range of mental health issues, one of the most prevalent being unresolved feelings of anger.

She says "LifeWorks" is different from anything she's seen because it not only explains a particular problem, but provides strategies to cope as well.

"I am a firm believer that because children are so different and have so many different issues, teachers have to have something right at their fingertips," she says.

"We get so many angry students, and this explains in plain language that the basis of that anger is fear. When you see a child with so much anger, you do not stop to think that."

Often times, teachers and school officials are reluctant to even discuss issues such as anger, depression and suicide.

"We're really just at the very beginning of mental health issues being talked about in the classroom," Bernstein says.

With more and more educators being placed on the "front line" in dealing with the consequences ot their students' emotional turmoil, both he and DiNatale felt it important to provide "LifeWorks" as a model of intervention and prevention.

"Teachers don't know what's a warning signal and what's just adolescent behavior," DiNatale says. "They're floundering. They're in school and they're frightened. We're saying these kids can't learn unless these emotional issues are dealt with."

"And this book," she says,"helps teachers be more empathetic with the kids."

- Naila Francis, The Intelligencer Record