Barbara Gruener, counselor and character coach at Westwood Elementary, is in her 25th year as an educator. Born in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where she grew up working on a large family dairy farm, Barbara graduated from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 1984 with a Bachelor of Science degree in English and Spanish.  She began a Spanish Department in a small high school in central Wisconsin before heading to Texas in 1985.  She taught Spanish and ESL classes at North Shore Middle School for a year before moving to FISD to teach Spanish and coach volleyball and softball at Friendswood High School.

Mrs. Gruener earned a Master of Science degree from the University of Houston Clear Lake in Education in 1989, followed by a Master of Science degree in Counseling in 1994.

After 16 years of teaching and counseling at the secondary level, Barbara decided to try elementary school and has found her niche as the counselor at Westwood.  

Barbara is a published author whose work has appeared in magazines such as Teaching Tolerance, Teaching K-8, and Daughters.  In the Fall of 2000, Barbara became a certified trainer for Character Counts! and she enjoys presenting her high-energy workshop - Sing, Dance, Laugh, and Build Character - to share her ideas with other educators nationwide whenever the opportunity presents itself.   In her spare time, Barbara likes to knit, bake, read, write, take long walks, visit with friends, and hang out with her family.  She lives in Friendswood with her husband, John, and their three children.

Westwood Elementary Counselor Barbara Gruener has left a little of herself with more than 500 others in New Jersey. They will use their touch of Gruener to help them have a successful new school year.

After attending Gruener's Sing, Dance, Laugh, and Building Character breakout session at the Character Education Partnership's National Forum last fall, William Osman, Supervisor for Professional Development, Mentoring & Character Education for Hamilton Township Public Schools in New Jersey, contacted the FISD counselor with an interesting invitation:  to deliver the keynote address to 500-plus elementary-school educators on their first day back to the 2008-2009 school year. 

Intrigued by the challenge of this sort of presentation, Gruener agreed and started planning how she would use her allotted block of time by asking herself, "what do I want to leave my audience with?" 
After a few conference calls and numerous emails, the venue was confirmed; it would take place at the AMC-24 Movie Theater in Hamilton, New Jersey, on the morning of September 2, 2008. 

In his introduction, Administrator Osman told a packed house that he was so inspired when he heard Barbara speak that it made him want to go back into the classroom himself. 

Starting the presentation in character as Merry Newberry, a new teacher in the audience who supposedly had heard Gruener speak in the summer and came to New Jersey to learn more about modeling, Gruener engaged the audience from the beginning.

Throughout her two-hour address, she kept them entertained and energized with stories from her 24-year teaching career and her interactive ideas and character-building techniques sprinkled with her songs, her cheers, her dance moves, and lots of laughter. 

As she shared details about her strong connection during her formative years to her character role model and first-grade teacher Miss Natzke, also known as Aunt Norma, Barbara encouraged audience members to reconnect with their mentors to thank them for making a difference, then challenged participants to celebrate the gift and privilege of teaching by becoming someone's Aunt Norma (or Uncle Norm) this year.

Following her presentation, the audience celebrated her enthusiasm by thanking her with "the mirror," a cheer that she'd taught them just moments earlier, and ultimately a standing ovation. 

The following information provides a brief description of the many counseling services available at Westwood Elementary.

Curriculum - CHARACTER COUNTS! at Westwood. Classroom guidance lessons teach and model the Six Pillars of Character - Trustworthiness, Respect, Responsibility, Fairness, Caring, and Citizenship. These sessions with Mrs. Gruener are interactive in nature and designed to emphasize the character traits of the FISD Board-adopted Character Education Program. Incentive programs like CIA (Character In Action) cards catch students applying what they have learned and honor them for their exceptional choices and model character. The counselor also schedules special assemblies throughout the year to reinforce the material in these lessons.

Coordination - The counselor coordinates activities for special events like the National Red Ribbon Campaign and Character Counts! Week. She also works with the PAL (Peer Assistance and Leadership) program to pair high-school-aged role models with students who might benefit from that extra connection and coordinates service projects like our annual Holiday Food Drive.

Parent Education - Parent-education materials are located in the Parent Resource Center to the back of the Pride Cafe. Parents are encouraged to check out the available resources and continue developing and refining their parenting skills. As an additional resource, our montly newsletter, Firm, Fair and Consistent, is available online.  Parents can also make appointments with Mrs. Gruener to discuss individual concerns as needed.  A list of area counselors and therapists is also available upon request.

Behavioral Intervention/Discipline Systems - Individualized behavior management plans will be developed for children who exhibit chronic behavior problems. The behavior management plan will be the result of the collaborative effort of the administrative staff, the teacher, the counselor, and the parent. Behavioral and Developmental screenings are also available through our counselor upon request.

Counseling - Our counselor works with students individually and in small-group sessions to assist them as they learn life-long skills like working cooperatively, making friends, processing feelings, resolving conflicts, and solving problems. Referrals to see the counselor can be initiated by a staff member, a parent, an administrator, or the student. Small-group counseling classes are offered in six-week sessions each semester. These groups are offered at each grade level and can include but are not limited to:

1. Family Matters Group - This group is offered to students who are experiencing life changes such as a move, separation, divorce, or step-family issues. Students learn about family systems and the feelings associated with these changes.  Developing appropriate coping strategies will be emphasized.

2. Study Skills for Success Group - This group is offered to students who have dropping or failing grades as a result of low motivation or poor study skills. While study skills in general will be the focus, time management and test-taking skills and strategies will also be covered.

3. Beyond Anger Group - This group will be offered to students who exhibit difficulty managing anger and monitoring their own behavior.  An emphasis will be placed on the development of impulse control and anger-management techniques that promote a cooperative interaction style with authority figures and peers.

4. Back In Control Group - This group is for those students who exhibit impulsivity in their behavior to the extent that it negatively affects their relationships with peers and their ability to perform in the classroom. Taking control and making appropriate choices will be the focus. In addition, problem-solving techniques will be addressed.

5. Let?s Be Friends Group - This group is for those students who exhibit behaviors which interfere with making friends and working cooperatively in the classroom setting. We will work on defining friendship, examining what we value in a friend, and developing the interpersonal skills it takes to seek out a friendship and make it work.

6. Lost and Found Group - This group targets students who have experienced a recent loss through separation, death or some other traumatic event. Our focus will be on moving through the grief process and learning to find ourselves, redefining who we are despite the lost piece of our life?s puzzle.

If you ever have a question or concern about your child's progress in school, want to normalize a behavior that you are seeing, or just want to talk about your child's development, please don't hesitate to contact Mrs. Gruener. Welcome to Westwood!