Essential Question

 EQ:What is most important to creating a successful peer mediation program?

1.Important in my EQ refers to the key factors that will help create a successful Peer Mediation program. In other words what is needed in order for a Peer Mediation program to succeed. Successful in regards to my essential question means that the students in the Peer Mediation program understand how to mediate other students in a conflict.

2.Some possible answers based on my research would be support, structure and self-motivation. In order for peer mediation programs to thrive in schools they must have support from all the staff/faculty. It is important that the staff/faculty supports what the peer mediation program is doing because it takes more than one individual to lift the program off the ground and it is a lot of work. I would say structure is another answer because just like any environment, if there is no structure nothing ever gets accomplished. It is important to have a lesson plan and rules so that students can take peer mediation seriously. Last but not least self-motivation, I would say self-motivation is a possible answer due to the fact that if a individual is not motivated to continue learning about peer mediation then they will not serve as a positive reinforcement towards peer mediation. It is important that the students stay on task, it is easy to enjoy peer mediation when you're just bonding with your peers and playing games. The real test is to stay motivated when learning all the steps into becoming an effective mediator.

3. My most important printed source would be "Teaching Students to Be Peer Mediators". I would consider this the most important because it explains how we went from giving students punishments to helping them resolve their own problems. It proves that telling students what to do or giving them punishments is not effective unlike "peer mediation" which studies show it has proved to be effective in many schools around the country.