Relationship, Responsibility, and Regulation

Trauma-Invested Practices for Fostering Resilient Learners

Kristin Van Marter Souers, Pete Hall

• Publisher: ASCD
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781416626886
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education Teaching Methods

An ASCD Bestseller!

In this stirring follow-up to the award-winning Fostering Resilient Learners, Kristin Van Marter Souers and Pete Hall take you to the next level of trauma-invested practice. To get there, they explain, educators need to build a ""nest""—a positive learning environment shaped by three new R s of education: relationship, responsibility, and regulation.

Drawing from their extensive experience working with schools, students, and families throughout the country, the authors

• Explain how to create a culture of safety in which everyone feels valued, important, and capable of learning.
• Describe the four areas of need—emotional, relational, physical, and control—that drive student behaviors and show how to meet these needs with interventions framed around the new three Rs.
• Illustrate trauma-invested practices in action through real scenarios that identify students' unmet needs, examine the situation from five stakeholder perspectives, and suggest interventions to support students and their families.
• Offer opportunities to challenge your beliefs and develop deeper and different ways of thinking about your role in your students' lives.

Educators have a unique opportunity to influence students' learning, attitudes, and futures. This book will invigorate your practice and equip you to empower those you serve—whatever their personal histories.

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Part 1

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Building the Nest

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Culture of safety.

Systems of meaning.

Need versus behavior.

In Part 1, I emphasize the importance of establishing an environment in which our students can be OK with their not-OK. This, my friends, is the nest. Remember our new mission? Create a safe nest for students so that they learn and thrive and, when they eventually fly, they soar. This is our responsibility, it's within our sphere of influence, and it's essential for our students to experience success.

Just as we must till the soil and prepare the environment before our garden yields a healthy crop, so too must we tend to our learning environment. The first step is to create a culture of safety, which I'll explain in more detail in Chapter 1. For now, suffice it to say that it's an environment in which all feel valued and important, where we understand our students and see their potential. This environment extends beyond the learning locations where students find themselves; indeed, a safe and trusting professional environment that allows adults to work together and lean on one another in a healthy way is essential for us to do effective work with our students.

A big part of creating that culture of safety is examining our beliefs about our students and why they do what they do. That's right: we're going to look at behaviors. Student behaviors, in particular. Misbehaviors, to be sure. They captivate our attention, they generate inner tumult, they wreak havoc on our lesson plans, they confound us. When we can make sense of the factors that influence student behaviors, we can approach behavior management (as opposed to classroom management) with much more utility, open-mindedness, and confidence.

That said, this is not a behavior management book. What I'm asking you to do is to dive much deeper than that. The elements you're going to explore include your assumptions about students, your thinking about student behaviors, various ways to employ empathy, and the unmet needs that drive student behaviors. It's not about "good versus bad" or even "appropriate versus inappropriate"; it's more about asking, "Why?"

As you roll up your sleeves, dig in, and unwrap the ideas I propose in the following chapters, there are a few things I want to emphasize:

1. The ideas and lenses I share are intended to truly challenge your thinking. I will be honest: there may be times when you are triggered and even feel some heated emotions. Pete and I are at peace with that, because it means you are really challenging yourself and your belief sets. Truly self-reflective practice is not easy, and facing the necessity to change our own thinking and practices can feel overwhelming.
2. Speaking of change, I love this one of Pete's many handy mantras: "Change is a prerequisite of improvement." Sometimes change is necessary, and the outcome we experience because of our courage to do what is right is more than worth the energy we put into making that change happen. The more we challenge and understand ourselves, the more self-aware we become. So, if this section challenges your thinking and causes you to pause and wonder about your need for change, trust me: that could be a really good thing.
3. Because the following three chapters are so immersed with ideas, we really challenge you to read through these chapters carefully and give yourself time for deep reflection. It is a lot of information to absorb. Give yourself permission to step away, journal some thoughts, and engage in dialogue with a trusted companion.

Have you ever watched a bird build a nest? Marveled at the systematic, relentless way each piece is nestled in with the others? Admired the dedication and love that motivate that investment of time, energy, and care? Appreciated the selfless passion for creating an environment that will foster resilient little chicks, even though the chicks might not even be there yet? Well, that bird is you. You can do this—and for your students' sake, you must, because this culture of safety is far too important to leave to chance, to leave to someone else, or to leave off entirely.

At the risk of repeating myself, I commend you on taking this journey to trauma-invested practice. Know that Pete and I will be with you along the way.

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Chapter 1

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A Culture of Safety

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When we explore the idea of trauma-sensitive practices, our purpose is to create an environment where it is safe for students to grow, to develop, to exist, and to learn. Pete and I refer to this as a positive learning environment, or "the nest" from the mission statement I shared in the Introduction. For those of us in education, this notion of "safety first" shouldn't be surprising. More than 70 years ago, Abraham Maslow (1943) introduced his hierarchy of needs (see Figure 1.1), which explained that beyond the basic physiological needs we have as human beings, safety is the essential external factor influencing our happiness, success, and very survival.

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Figure 1.1. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

Source: From "A Theory of Human Motivation," by A. H. Maslow, 1943, Psychological Review, 50(4), pp. 370–396.

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In this context, safety refers to two big ideas: physical safety and emotional safety. The reality is, if we don't feel safe, we can't lead, parent, teach, partner, or learn effectively. Our need to feel safe supersedes everything else.

Let's examine the level of safety that exists in our communities, our districts, our school buildings, and our classrooms. Currently, our feelings of fear about our safety are heightened. We have experienced multiple events in our schools and communities that compromise our sense of trust. School shootings, acts of random violence, hate crimes, and other highly publicized and dangerous experiences can leave us feeling doubtful and concerned about our safety and that of our students.

The possibility that something "bad" will happen feels real, and many education professionals are doubting their capacity to make the right choices should a danger arise. Schools now run active-shooter drills in addition to fire drills, evacuation protocols, and earthquake preparedness—procedures intended to help us prepare for the worst. Although the odds are low that such an event will occur, those drills and policies are put in place for a reason. They were created because children and adults were murdered in schools, and we owe it to those victims to do whatever we can, whenever we can, to ensure the safety of all our students and to prevent further harm.

Safety goes beyond that extreme physical threat; it applies in a multitude of other areas as well. Let's explore what physical and emotional safety look like for ourselves and for our students.

Physical Safety

Adults. We have a need to feel that we are safe within the contexts of our settings. We should be able to walk through our doors and commence our work feeling confident that we can do our jobs safely. Many things can negatively affect our sense of physical safety, such as a student who uses aggression to regulate his or her emotions, a parent who threatens physical harm to protect his or her child, a building where the environment poses health risks, a community with adverse weather conditions, people who come to school with viruses and illnesses that compromise our own health, or the simple fatigue and lack of sleep associated with the stress of our roles.

Students. Our students also need to feel safe in their communities, buildings, and classroom settings. They need to know that school is a safe place where people care about their well-being. School should present an opportunity for them to walk through the doors and know that no harm will come to them while they are there. Many things can negatively affect a student's sense of physical safety, such as threat of physical harm from another student; a disruptive text message or Snapchat sent between classes; walking to and from school in a neighborhood riddled with crime and violence; having basic physical needs unmet and feeling tired, hungry, or cold; fighting illness and having to go to school anyway; poor classroom conditions; living in a community where weather poses a threat to safety; or living with abuse and feeling the repercussions of those experiences every day.

Emotional Safety

Adults. Working in an emotionally safe environment is critical to growth, success, and the cultivation of effective teaching and learning practices. We must feel safe enough to be vulnerable with our administrators and colleagues so that we can come forward to ask for support when we need it and access resources without fear of judgment or retaliation. When we are emotionally safe, we trust our leadership and our team to operate with the best interests of everyone in mind. Many things can negatively affect our ability to feel emotionally safe, including conflict with a coworker, toxic work environments that breed gossip and a deficit focus, lack of strong leadership, negative public perception and media coverage, hypercritical parents and caregivers, feelings of isolation and exhaustion, inability to feel safe asking for help, or feelings of failure or low self-efficacy in the job.

Students. Our students need to know that we, the adults in the building, see each one of them as valued, capable, and awesome. In a safe setting, they know that their mission is to learn and be successful. They can be vulnerable and ask for help without fear of judgment or criticism; they feel safe among their peers and treat one another with kindness; they are invested in the team, not just themselves; and they are committed to success. Many things can negatively affect a student's ability to feel emotionally safe, such as an adult who doesn't understand him or her, others' belief systems that portray and view that student in a negative light, students at school who use abusive or bullying behavior, inability to understand the dominant language of the school or community, being misunderstood by others because of cultural differences, or lacking the skills and confidence to come forward and safely seek support.

We all need to feel safe, both physically and emotionally. Without it, learning simply cannot happen. When you reflect on your work environment, how does this sense of safety apply to it?

Pete's Practice

As a school principal, I was hired to take over a school that had a significant history of—and reputation for—violence. There were reports of fights almost daily, and many students used physical aggression to settle their conflicts. When we dug deeper, my leadership team uncovered an ugly truth: the emotional safety of the adults and students was absent, so individuals within the building were always "on edge." And when we're at a heightened sense of alert, we biologically turn to flight-fight-freeze responses. Keep in mind that we all—cross-culturally and universally—choose flight first when sensing or experiencing threat. We choose to fight only when we don't see flight as an option. Many of our students at school face situations where simply leaving is not an option. We often see them access their fight response when in states of stress in an attempt to self-regulate.

Bringing Kristin into the building to help us learn trauma-sensitive strategies and to build trust within the ranks was an essential part of our overall plan to strengthen the collaborative, interdependent culture of the adults in the building. Once this took hold and we started to lean on one another, get some structures and policies squared away, and reinforce our mission and guiding values, our emotional safety metric skyrocketed. As a result, the tenor of the building shifted. The classrooms, hallways, and public areas became more peaceful, calmer, and safer. The fighting decreased, and the business of teaching and learning resumed.

Many factors were at play in this transformation, and I don't want to oversimplify the process. However, one key learning for us was that we couldn't solve the problem (lack of physical safety) solely by addressing the issue staring us in the face (kids fighting). We had to dig deeper and uncover the conditions that were contributing to that outcome (adults' lack of emotionally safety). It was surprising and incredibly enlightening to arrive at that conclusion.

Assumptions and Safety

As Pete's story illustrates, we need to be careful about how assumptions can affect safety. We often use assumptions to help us manage or make sense of a situation. We use them to enhance our understanding of something or affi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Table of Contents
• Dedication
• Acknowledgments
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part 1. Building the Nest
• Chapter 1. A Culture of Safety
• Chapter 2. Systems of Meaning
• Chapter 3. Need Versus Behavior
• Part 2. The New Three Rs
• Chapter 4. Relationship
• Chapter 5. Responsibility
• Chapter 6. Regulation
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Study Guide
• Related ASCD Resources
• About the Authors
• Copyright