Leading Schools Through Trauma

A Data-Driven Approach to Helping Children Heal

Michael S. Gaskell

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000433227
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education Administration

Leading Schools Through Trauma is a data-driven resource for education leaders and administrators preparing to help students heal from acute traumas. Traumatizing experiences are inevitable and cyclical, and we see them at individual, local and large-scale levels. As a school leader you need concrete tools to help learners flourish in their wake, especially amid the challenges of our current moment. This book offers a strategic approach to sustaining community wellness and stability, using real-time, short-term data sets accessible to teachers, and guiding students toward incremental, progressive goal-setting. Evidence-based practices for recognizing traumas, scaling formative assessments and providing teachers with problem-based professional development will help you and your staff develop growth plans that are collaborative with and individualized for students.

1
Introduction – Our New World Order and How to Help Traumatized Students

DOI: 10.4324/9781003162971-1

Children are showing increased impacts of trauma and the evidence for why is becoming clearer: they suffer from an increased breakdown in the social structures that equip them with the tools to lead a well-balanced life. Werner and Smith (2001) conducted a remarkable, 40-year study on hundreds of individuals from childhood to middle age, demonstrating how they responded to trauma throughout their life. This study revealed incredible and convincing results, which led to important strategies to support the development of individuals and, more importantly, their recovery from trauma.

Werner tracked the developmental stages of these nearly 700 individuals from 1955 until they entered middle age, on the island of Kauai, in Hawaii – an island community away from the hustle and bustle of big city life. Geography offered a unique element for studying subjects as they were virtually isolated from many disruptive forces, offering unique controls for observation.

This study revealed that, as per conventional wisdom, high-risk life circumstances in early life often lead to a cycle of challenges later in life. Yet among the group, Werner found a significant proportion, about one-third of the high-risk individuals, who displayed resilience. Remarkably, they developed into caring, competent, and confident adults despite their troublesome developmental histories. They beat the odds.

What made this even more encouraging was that the evidence further revealed different stages for recovery. In other words, there was not a specific age or developmental marker that shuts down the possibility for recovery. Windows of opportunity opened throughout development. Different subjects showed surprisingly promising recovery in childhood, and beyond.

How was this possible and what can be done to arrange, if possible, the same safeguards for our ever-increasing community of distressed learners? Werner and Smith (2001) identified protective factors in the lives of resilient subjects, which helped them balance out risk factors at critical stages in their development. Among these factors were a strong bond with a non-parental caretaker (teacher, coach, mentor, etc.) and involvement in a social group, such as religious or other community affiliation. Much of Werner’s work provided the foundation for later development of best practices in larger, less controlled settings, where most children reside within integrated residential communities.

Promising? Yes. However, the problem with much of this evidence was that it was not easily transferable to everyday classroom practices, for teachers, trained in content. Teachers may have had a basic developmental psychology understanding. Yet, they do not possess a comprehensive clinical background in trauma from extensive training in subjects like abnormal psychology.

That is where this text offers a solution; a promising and refreshing, practical approach to help teachers and educational leaders support children suffering the impact of trauma. As importantly, this text provides workable techniques for how to get children to persevere not just despite but often because of the difficult life circumstances they face in their young lives.

While scientific bases for effective practices matter and much of this text is based on scientific (as well as anecdotal) evidence, practitioners do not have the luxury of time to immerse themselves in technical training that clinicians receive training in. Those in the trenches, in classrooms across America and beyond have at the core an expectation to fulfill, and that is to help students achieve academically. These performance gauges are not often measured in emotional wellness. Yet emotional wellness must always be soundly centered for learners to excel. This field guide vows to assert the value of wellness and provides the guidance, a roadmap to chart the course in aiding children in the greatest need.

This text is written with the practitioner in mind; the busy educator who needs fast yet effective tools to aid children in their social development, especially when their development has been inhibited by trauma. The recognition that educators spend more time with students than any other adults outside the home, including counselors and therapists further supports the need to enlist these strategies and techniques. The symptoms of trauma are too great and the reasons too complex for teachers to delve deeply into scientific theory. Best practices are offered while framing this important context.

Increasingly, events both broadly and more locally have increasingly thrust trauma into the spotlight, and that is not a bad thing. In an era of expanding uncertainty, we should tune into to the true nature of student challenges, and leverage these as opportunities to inspire and support all learners who are under duress from risk factors. Motivated by those that rise to the occasion to assist, we often see an outpouring of love and support in times of crisis. Dedicated support can, if properly approached, truly support children who face the daunting hurdles of trauma.

Educators who develop a plan organized around a reckoning that traumatic experiences endured by students will position them to connect and help these children to achieve. Teachers can more adeptly frame their methods for aiding children and help them succeed far beyond expectations. Throughout this book, case studies and scenarios will be provided to characterize scalable methods and how to administer them, quickly and efficiently.

As school communities navigated their way through events that revealed the trauma from a once in a lifetime pandemic in the year 2020, and racial equality issues escalated onto the national scene, exposing a harsh view of inequities, we were reminded of how vulnerable these events make children and, for that matter, adults. The fragile nature of the circumstances surrounding stability in our world continue to shift. This changes how we can and should view teaching and helping children.

We can embrace opportunities to nourish the growth of children in the face of their personal challenges that cause distress. After all, trauma and post-traumatic stress are often pointed out as causing severe, even disabling conditions in children. Recognizing this now, more than ever is a testament that it is time to act, in a strategic manner, and in such a way that effectively reverses this cycle.

Consider a different perspective: for every child who has experienced post-traumatic stress, there are some who have experienced post traumatic growth; the ability to grow and excel because of their trauma, not despite it. Many inspiring stories abound in invigorating ways that show us, with courage and hope a way out, a better outcome. Leveraging a challenging experience conveys the message that through productive struggle, children can persevere, prevailing against the odds. In fact, acute forms of trauma can even enable them to grow through and from this experience.

We often hear the accounts of heroes like Olympic athletes, whose stories about overcoming the odds seemed insurmountable. These are often rooted in their fight against traumatic obstacles Integrated into the roadmap provided in this text are various accounts of successful counter punches; ways people found to fight back. Further, the user of this text can treat it as a guide, to shape and accelerate their opportunities to impact traumatized learners. It is not an end all but rather, a way to navigate, with several options to choose from to get to the end point. This guide is complimentary to clinical supports, rather than a replacement for them.

Teaching and leading schools matters more than ever, and this is heightened by how traumatic events, whether they be localized and personal, or broad and global, are a part of kids’ lives. The reader should consider how to prepare themselves with the resources, tools and most of all, road maps to guide their route toward helping children and their families. The goal is to help families in ways that they too can strive through, beyond, despite, and perhaps because of their inevitable challenges. Accepting this as our reality is the first step in truly helping children move beyond the effects of their trauma.

Implementing steps to guide practitioners serves as the guardrails that can aid our students. The resources provided are derived from a research base and anecdotal, experiential resources, of over 20 years of the author’s work with distressed children. One educational leader recalled his first day teaching in a combined autism and behaviorally disabled classroom. A child entered who had just been physically abused by his intoxicated mother. No college training program prepares beginner teachers to handle circumstances like this, and certainly not to treat their trauma.

Legal obligations often take precedent in urgent circumstances like this one, and often at stake is covering the school. That is important but do not lose sight of the child, who will not simply and suddenly recover with a cheerful, “welcome” greeting and smile. Instead, look at the practical approaches, short and long term, which will be offered throughout.

That young teacher had months to reach this child. He finally did, with patience and intuition. Yet if he had had access to this guide, it could have taken much less time and been more impactful. Experience is a part of this plan. Time-tested practices are vices for aiding students as they find ways to overcome their ever-increasing challenges. This happens both in a child’s own day-to-day life, and in the world around them.

Developing a coordinated plan helps to frame methods for aiding students, and guides them to succeed beyond expected performance, as illustrated in the scenarios integrated throughout this text. These examples provide tangible, real world and scalable methods educators can apply quickly as a resource, right from a finger on a page of this guidebook.

A successful process for implementation must be concrete, applicable regardless of resource limitations, and available across the diversity of landscape that represents our nation’s schools, and broad educational institutions. As previously mentioned, there is no silver bullet contained within this text, nor a prescription that fits precisely into your school, as if to apply an exact method for success. Roadmaps do not account for traffic jams and accidents happen along the way. Yet there are always ways around these obstacles, to the endpoint. Implementing flexible methods affords this kind of navigation flexibility.

The practitioner who adapts methods, applies them step by step, and commits to these, while balancing the necessary adjustments is more likely to help many children recover, much of the time. Doing so in a manner that adapts to the practitioner’s circumstances, school culture, and context are critical That is why one of the major considerations in this book calls on you to apply each step within your school’s unique framework. Not mine, nor your cross-state colleagues, but yours. To work, it must be authentic to your community, not serve as a commercial endorsement.

Educators often struggle in their caring demeanor with a desire to save everyone, rather than accepting the greater likelihood that “most of their students, most of the time” can succeed. Indeed, we became educators because we wanted to help all students. We strive to reach all children. We are nurturers, serving as surrogate parents who endeavor to believe in every one of our precious students, including the vulnerable.

These are the ideals that led us to teach; to not give up on any child, under any circumstance. Over time, we may have become jaded at the dim outlook of some of our learners. This happens in challenging environments, where the odds may seem insurmountable, or in communities struck by economic devastation or other hardships. The reality is that at-risk populations such as impoverished and racial minorities continue to face discrimination, often the result of “unintended microagressions;” those unaware that their subtle behaviors contribute to the inequity.

Because educators entered a field believing that they must refuse to give up on any child, they can become disappointed by the end results, when even just one fails. Instead of expecting perfection, we should reframe our thinking regarding our commitment for improving the odds with children in need of help. That is our calling. Why not consider increasing the opportunities that children can and will succeed, on a scale, rather than an end all, of success or failure?

Consider the plight of 100 students. A standard bell curve suggests that approximately one-third of them will struggle to succeed, while another third of them would be ok, and that the top third will excel beyond expectations (Sherrington, 2017). Wouldn’t it be inspiring to change the direction of that bell curve and increase the odds? Nudging the numbers over to the right, the side where more success is demonstrated as a path to success would be far more encouraging than an end all, of success, or failure.

If you looked at that random sample of 100 students across a school system, and knew these odds, how would you feel if you could alter the trajectory of the bottom third of the bell curve, and eliminate perhaps half of those low performers? Granted, there are still children who will continue to struggle. Yet this growth change is a motivator for educators and the challenge to cut that number, even in part, is well worth the commitment to apply tactics that will help. Patterns of persistent resistance can shift to patterns of upward trajectory, not in whole, but as a broad overall trend toward a direction of success. That is progress.

Outlined in this book are three strategic processes, intertwined into a blueprint that together creates a more synergistic approach to fostering student success, as they work to excel beyond their distress. References to traumatic events serve to represent a large sample of impacted students, and the way in which we can attack problems that children may encounter. Creating this synergy takes each one of these ideas, coordinated together, and fosters a compound effect created by combining, or stacking, them in a cumulatively influential methodology.

The strategies outlined are not necessarily ordered steps, although more acute student challenges should be addressed first, before initiating others and proceed along a continuum. These stages are tracked alongside each other. In other words, “stacking” these methods together puts in motion a proactive approach that will work for many, not all, in ways that illuminate this synergy. 1+1+1 = greater than 4, in this case. By implementing these together, we multiply exponentially the benefits received by our students.

Practitioners who apply one or two of these steps can certainly increase the potential to help a child to succeed beyond their obstacles. Yet combining and phasing all three parts together in and out at approximate intervals, potentiates a network of greater and greater possibilities for success. You can visualize these flowing in and across each other as the child is exposed to each (Figure 1.1). For our students’ sake, this tactical approach and the time and resources invested in them are well worth implementing.

This text proposes a practical way to address these interconnected components in a child’s overall recovery and growth as a learner. First, the state of wellness of the child must be examined. We must recognize the potential for trauma through identifying the signs. Second, data collection from frequent micro-formative assessments is to be gathered, organized, and utilized to inform the practitioner. This must happen while not inundating the child with exhaustive and lengthy assessments. Thoughtful caution in implementation at this phase is necessary as an overabundance of these all at once can be traumatizing to a child, in their own right.

Figure 1.1 Three-Part Cycle of Phasing

Credit Line: Antonia Germanos

Finally, inspiring your once traumatized students to set meaningful and practical goals as they lay out a path toward long-term, sustainable growth and success increases the likelihood of the ultimate goal to achieve. Practitioners can practically aspire to help children reach this through a calculated path as outlined in this guidebook. The text further allows educators to instill a prescription that is manageable for each individual child, knowing that reaching many (if not all) of your students will increase their success, with adaptability for course corrections.

Experiencing broadly traumatic events has overwhelmed the resources of school communities, as they navigate with caution, through threats, and repurposing for how to teach and educate around and through these predicaments. Events in, around and beyond school communities present understandably distressing experiences and when a stressful event has occurred, we must turn our attention to how we return the child to school, safely and successfully.

We can further use this as a longitudinal road map for individual and in large-scale trauma in the future. Using the three-step process, here is how:

1. Start with high interest, rapport building opportunities: cultivate relationships early and often. Remember how important icebreakers were? Multiply that value by ten. Remember, kids return to school with less structure, and greater challenges as they arrive to a new school year, and more so from a recent traumatic experience. It is sometimes hard to imagine how impacting this can be.

The effects of trauma can be far more impactful than we adults, distracted by our own demands of standards requirements, classroom management expectations, and curriculum guidelines, are often able to stop and notice. This is not an indictment on teachers, rather a recognition and step forward. We cannot ignore this. ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Meet the Author
• Preface
• 1 Introduction – Our New World Order and How to Help Traumatized Students
• 2 Recognizing Trauma in Learners, Macro and Micro
• 3 Treating the Trauma – Resources and Teacher Sensitivity
• 4 Implementation and Training on Trauma – Preparation and PD
• 5 Actionable Ideas to Institute Right Now
• 6 Formative Assessment – Establishing and Applying What Is Most Relevant
• 7 Goal Setting – Small Wins Psychology and Why It Matters
• 8 Instituting an Individualized Plan in Collaboration With Student(s)
• 9 Considerations for Educators’ Management of Their Trauma – How to Grow as Models for Learners
• 10 Next Level Success – Putting It All Together to Step Into Flow
• Appendix A: Letter on Aerodynamic Chairs
• Appendix B: Sample Facilitator’s Guide
• Appendix C: Two-Minute Intervention Worksheet
• Appendix D: The One-Sentence Intervention
• Appendix E: For Being Strategically “Unreachable”
• Bibliography