The Cool Spot: Helping Young Teens Resist Peer Presure

Info for Parents and Teachers

The Cool Spot was created for kids 11-13 years old by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA). The NIAAA is the lead U.S. agency supporting research into the causes, prevention, and treatment of alcohol problems. It is a component of the National Institutes of Health, within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The content of The Cool Spot is based on a curriculum for grades 6-8 developed by the University of Michigan. The curriculum was created for the Alcohol Misuse Prevention Study (AMPS), a large-scale project supported by NIAAA.

One goal of AMPS was to give young teens a clearer picture about alcohol use among their peers. Teens tend to overestimate how much kids their age really drink. When they learn more accurate information, some of the pressure to drink can subside. Other goals of AMPS were to help kids learn skills to resist pressure to drink and to give them reasons not to drink. The Cool Spot incorporates AMPS goals in these and other features:

• Reality Check quizzes kids about how much drinking is really going on in the U.S. The answers, which often surprise kids and adults alike, are based on results of the 2002 National Survey on Drug Use and Health.
• Deep Digging is a simple but powerful page that depicts why using alcohol as a solution to problems, or a way of trying to cope, is trouble.
• Peer Pressure Bag of Tricks presents animated scenes that invite kids to identify some common peer pressure “tricks.” It also lets kids know that spotting these tricks is the first step to resisting them.
• Know your No’s is an activity that introduces kids to a variety of ways to say no, and helps them learn which one is the most effective.

Compliance

The Cool Spot is compliant with the requirements outlined in the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA) which limits the collection of personal information of children under the age of 13, as well as Section 508, which requires Federal agency web sites to be accessible to people with disabilities.
For more information on these requirements please visit

• www.ftc.gov/ogc/coppa1.htm
• www.section508.gov

Sue Scheff: Visit The Cool Spot - Learn about Peer Pressure and Your Kids

Info for Parents and Teachers

The Cool Spot was created for kids 11-13 years old by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA). The NIAAA is the lead U.S. agency supporting research into the causes, prevention, and treatment of alcohol problems. It is a component of the National Institutes of Health, within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Your classmates keep asking you to have them over because you have a pool, everyone at school is wearing silly hats so you do too, and your best friend begs you to go running with her because you both need more exercise, so you go, too. These are all examples of peer pressure. Don’t get it yet?

• Pressure is the feeling that you are being pushed toward making a certain choice—good or bad.
• A peer is someone in your own age group.
• Peer pressure is—you guessed it—the feeling that someone your own age is pushing you toward making a certain choice, good or bad.

What’s so difficult about avoiding peer pressure?

Now you have the basics, but check out the other links in this section to make sure you recognize peer pressure. That way you can resist it when you need to.

For more information visit http://www.thecoolspot.gov/  

Sue Scheff - Parenting Teens - What Your Kids Are Doing Shouldn't be a Mystery

Offered by Connect with Kids

Who’s pressuring your kids? Who’s offering them alcohol or drugs? Who’s talking to them on the Internet? Whether we’re teachers, parents, counselors…sometimes we just don’t know what’s really going on in a child’s life. If you want to talk to your kids about the challenges they face, but aren’t sure what to say, our programs will help…with real kids sharing their true stories, and advice from experts, educators and parents who have “been there.”The Secret Life of Kids is a series of award-winning programs giving you an inside look at the pressures children face. Learning and talking with children about these issues is one of the best ways we can help keep them safe.

These 30-minute programs are not only educational, they also offer a springboard for discussion — instead of talking “at” your child, you can discuss what you’ve just seen together. Along with this four-program set covering important, real-life issues, you’ll also receive the four accompanying resource guides FREE along with a FREE copy of the show you just watched, Against All Odds. Don’t let your child’s life remain a mystery — let us help you protect them. Order this unique program series now!

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