Ep 60 // Easy Calming Strategies for Elementary Students (How Classroom Teachers Can Support Social Emotional Learning)
Inside This Week’s Episode: Students can’t learn in crisis mode. The foundation for any learning is a students’ social emotional health. Help set the stage for learning by implementing simple calming strategies that will allow students to manage and regulate their own feelings so that they can be more successful in the classroom and beyond.
Students can’t learn in crisis mode.
Before we can teach young minds, we must first teach students to tap into their feelings and emotions. Social-emotional health is the foundation for all learning so it is impetrative that we address these needs in our students before we ask them to master academics.
People today are more stressed and worried than ever before due to the pandemic and the impact that it has had on our schools is huge. And if YOU’RE feeling that way, your students are, too.
The difference between the two, however, is that your students likely don't have the coping skills to deal with feelings of worry and overwhelm.
But the problem is, many teachers aren't trained in teaching students coping skills. Teaching strategies of calm wasn’t part of our undergrad work. That’s why I wanted to bring a special guest onto the podcast who is trained and skilled in teaching young minds and hearts to breathe in the calm and breathe out the worry.
In this episode I'm interviewing Victoria from The Mindful Apple. She's a school social worker working with elementary students and has some solid tips and strategies for classroom teachers to help their students grow their calm.
Victoria knows how to take a worried mind and plant seeds of calm there instead.
She's even got a simple strategy for teachers to help them take control of their own emotional command center — and she’s sharing it all with us inside the episode.
Ready to help your students master their inner calm?
Here’s a Snapshot:
[04:38] As students continue to learn during a pandemic, trends of increase stress and worry continue to surface, even at the elementary level. Anxiety is at an all time high and students need tools to learn how to find their calm and have some emotional regulation. Students often aren't equipped with those internal strategies to manage their emotions.
[06:50] When teaching students what it means to be calm, it’s important to start with a concrete idea that students can fully understand. Victoria shares a simple analogy that all students can internalize to help set the stage for learning about calm.
[7:59] Students need to be able to recognize what calm feels like and then also recognize what it doesn't feel like — and be able to discern between those differences in their bodies. Once they can recognize the differences, they can start to be able to learn the tools and strategies for calm. Victoria shares how she walks her students through deep breaths, mindful visualizations and positive affirmations to help students to learn the difference between calm and worry.
[10:30] When students begin identifying when their body is calm (and not calm) they can begin articulating those difference in simple drawing and writing activities. These activities help students to better learn themselves so that they can regulate their emotions.
[15:18] If we want our students to build and grow strategies of calm, we must first be calm ourselves as teachers. Victoria shares how teachers can navigate their own emotional control center so that they can better model these calming strategies for their students.
Links & Resources Mentioned in the Episode
Connect with Victoria at The Mindful Apple:
Check out her Teacher and Student Resources
Take a peek at her Website
Follow her on Instagram
FREE Feelings Journal for Students: Grab a week’s worth of writing prompts to use with your students
Resources from The Mindful Apple to help support your students social emotional growth:
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