Taught: The Podcast
Taught is a podcast where educators and others discuss how they really feel about education, burnout, and strategies to make the world and education burnout-free.
Taught: The Podcast
Taking Back Teaching: Transforming Education with Trauma-Informed and Restorative Practices Part 2
What if transforming educational environments could be as simple as asking, "What happened to you?" instead of "What is wrong with you?" Join us on a journey through the evolving landscape of trauma-informed practices in schools. We take a deep dive into the critical need for a comprehensive, multi-year approach that goes beyond traditional training. From gaining administrative buy-in to equipping everyone in the school, including bus drivers and cafeteria workers, with the necessary tools, we explore how a supportive environment can be established. We also highlight the importance of recognizing "big T" and "small T" traumas and shifting from punitive responses to empathetic understanding to tackle student behavior and learning challenges head-on. Filled with heartwarming anecdotes from the classroom, this episode is an ode to the unpredictability and joy of teaching, serving as a reminder of why educators remain passionate about their profession, despite its challenges. Whether you're an educator or simply interested in the future of our schools, this episode offers profound insights and inspiration.
Want to know about Lara? Visit her LinkedIn and get connected!
https://www.linkedin.com/in/laramerchant/
Check out this resource that Lara mentioned:
Psychology Today
Season 1 :
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Interested in being a guest on the podcast? Email promelef@gmail.com. Include your name, role in education, and a summary of your story.
Here's the book that started it all:
Taught: The Very Private Journal of One Bad Teacher
Available @ Amazon in ebook or audio:
https://a.co/d/1rNZ84h
For immediate help use link for resources:
https://www.healthcentral.com/mental-health/get-help-mental-health
Other resources:
Amy Schamberg Wellness: https://www.amyschamberg.com/about
NHS - Resources for Grief and Burnout
https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/feelings-symptoms-behaviours/feelings-and-symptoms/grief-bereavement-loss/
Melissa Anthony MA, LPC Trauma & Grief Counselor
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists/melissa-j-anthony-grand-rapids-mi/944381
teachers get so many initiatives thrown at them that if they hear they're going to be doing some more trauma stuff, it's like are you kidding me? Yet another approach, another thing to learn. Well, the difference with it is it's not a one and done training and should never be a one and done training. So a lot of schools go about it the wrong way. Or even if they do several trainings, it's still not enough to become truly trauma informed and really trauma transformed which is living and breathing it in the school.
Speaker 2:How much I miss not knowing. Don't forget this is part two of a two-part episode. If you missed part one, go to taughtbuzzsproutcom. So you know we've talked a lot about trauma on this podcast, specifically in the area of education, in prior episodes, and your current trajectory has you working towards transitioning systems to a trauma-informed approach. Can you break down for us what this means for any system to be using a trauma-informed approach or trauma-informed practices?
Speaker 1:Sure, it's a really big answer because there are lots of pieces to it. So just to let you know ahead of time you know we talked briefly about how trauma is a buzzword, right, and so many people kind of roll their eyes about it now because they just hear it talked about so much. And I think also teachers get so many initiatives thrown at them that if they hear they're going to be doing some more trauma stuff, it's like are you kidding me? Yet another approach, another thing to learn. Well, the difference with it is it's not a one and done training and should never be a one and done training.
Speaker 1:So a lot of schools go about it the wrong way or even if they do several trainings, it's still not enough to become truly trauma-informed and really trauma-transformed, which is living and breathing it in the school. So the first step is you need the buy-in right. You need the buy-in from the administration and you might not get buy-in from everybody in the school, and that's okay because it will just become the climate and the culture of the school and it will be an expectation. So a robust trauma-informed framework will take a good three to five years to implement. It's not an easy, you know, one-year deal, so it really is a huge process, and everybody in the school is trained. So that might be another thing that schools are missing.
Speaker 1:So I'm even talking about, like the bus drivers and cafeteria workers, custodians, anyone who's going to interact with children. They need to be trained in this, and so, yeah, the trauma-informed approaches are just living and breathing. They become part of job descriptions. It's the way they're hiring people and the conversations they're having through that, making it very transparent that this is how we operate as a school. You know, is that going to work for you? If not, is it?
Speaker 1:not the right match. So, and through that, you know, people are learning the difference between, like, the big T trauma and the small T trauma. And the difference between those is the big T trauma are like those ACEs we talked about the really big, obvious things the abuse, the natural disasters and the little T traumas are a little bit harder to identify sometimes because we've all had them. We might not realize it, but there are things that maybe we didn't get as a kid, that we should have had. So things like the love we really needed, the attention we really needed. A lot of kids miss that. It might not be neglect in the big sense of the word, but it's definitely we're not getting what we need as a kid in the big sense of the word, but it's definitely we're not getting what we need as a kid.
Speaker 1:So learning about that, learning what trauma does to the brain and the body, is really important. Informing the health implications of trauma later on in life, educating about the approaches, of course, and just making sure people are not going to inadvertently re-traumatize. And just making sure people are not going to inadvertently re-traumatize well, not just students, but even the adults, right, yeah, so that's a huge piece of it is even how we interact with each other, how administration is going to interact with us and treat us. So that's a huge part of the trauma-informed approach, too that I think people kind of miss. So some of the other things are.
Speaker 1:One of the biggest things that people hear a lot through trauma-informed care is it really changes the perspective on how we look at students. So if you see a student who's always just doing things like flipping tables and just getting angry all the time and you look at the kid, you're like my gosh, what is wrong with you? Well, it changes the perspective of like well, they're acting that way because something happened to them, and so then it gets you a little more inquisitive, like wow, what really happened to this kid to make them so angry? What's going on? So um?
Speaker 2:yeah, you know, actually, one of the things that makes me think of is the first one what is wrong with you implies that there's something wrong to be fixed. And the second one what happened to you is an empathetic approach to understanding where that kid's coming from. Boy, that's a huge shift, thank you.
Speaker 1:Huge shift, right.
Speaker 1:Huge shift on how we treat students Absolutely, and I think, yeah, it'll change it from being really punitive to more empathetic and really trying to work with them on things and helping them calm down.
Speaker 1:So another big part of being a trauma-informed school is, if you think about like a house of cards and how you need that foundation really really strong, you know, as you build up so it doesn't all collapse, well, you need your teachers really strong and the support staff, because they are the foundation of the school and, like we've talked about, if they're not, you're going to have burnout, people are going to leave or people are just miserable and not doing their jobs well and people are stressed out. So we have to make sure we're supporting our teachers. So that's where the administration needs to come into, so they're treating their teachers and all school employees in a trauma-informed way as well. It's not just about the students, so we just want to make sure that the educators are not feeling unsafe at school. You know, they're not feeling like there's emotional abuse or they're experiencing racism or sexism or ableism, that those kinds of remarks aren't tolerated, or even having unattainable expectations, as we've been talking about, because if that happens, the schools will crumble. And they're starting. They are, they are crumbling.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they are.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So after the administration is trained, then everyone you know is starting to model that with each other. And then the teachers are trained and the ownership is really on the administration. So they need to be the ones who are really fostering this climate and culture of the school. So they're modeling it, they're reinforcing it. When harm happens, they're helping to fix it and not just letting those things go, because that can be really dangerous and toxic.
Speaker 1:The other big piece which phases, you know, whatever organization comes in to do the trauma, informed transformation and the trainings, is there's a cohort of teachers. That or not just teachers, it could be a para educator, a teacher, a librarian you know somebody from each part of the school who become the trainers. So when new people come into the school, which happens all the time well, they're not going to be trained, so they need to be if they come within that three to five year time frame of how long this takes. So that can phase that organization out and it becomes the school's job to just keep it going. And then after that, that's when the work with the students happen and there's a lot of which hopefully is being done anyway, but a lot of social, emotional skills being taught coping strategies, communication skills. They're taught developmentally appropriate ways about their mind and body connection, to understand that and what happens to the brain and the body when it is distressed. And the other piece of this where you know, when we were talking about initiatives, is trauma-informed approaches work really well with other frameworks that schools often use, like the PBIS or the MTSS. You know the multi-tier systems of support, the positive behavioral systems, so they align and it's not like you have to get rid of one. They can complement each other. So it's not like this is going to take over something you feel like has already been working well in your school.
Speaker 1:So when we look at approaches like what are those actual approaches? What are those? What do those mean? Well, it means that everybody does feel seen and heard. There's honesty and transparency among the administration and everybody working within the school and with the families. Nonviolent communication. We want to make sure all people are feeling emotionally and physically safe in the building.
Speaker 1:There's diversity among the workforce, so that means students have representation. That is so important that they feel that and they see that there's acceptance of different ways. People, you know, wear their hair, which often I've heard from a lot of people. They can get fired for things like this or how they dress, which is a part of their culture. Those things become a non-issue, and as it should be. Diversity is also demonstrated through classroom materials, through the books, through the things that they're learning, so it's really inclusive as well within the classroom, and everybody does feel included.
Speaker 1:Again, that goes with having a voice and being heard. It's an equitable system, so everybody gets what they need as individuals. So we know, especially working with children, it's not a one size fits all. Especially with special ed too. There are children who learn best through auditory means, others need visual things, others need certain tools in order to get through their day that other kids don't have access to because they don't need it. So that's what being equitable is about.
Speaker 1:And then there's responsibility and accountability, so when harm is done, people are called out on it and then there's an opportunity to repair that harm, which is a huge piece of of this. Yeah, I mean, I think about how many times does like a behavior support person come into the classroom and remove the student from a. They don't have a relationship with right and they pull the student out, and then they do whatever they need to do, and then the student just reenters the classroom but nothing is done. There's no repair to what was happening in the classroom or no repair with the teacher or another student. So that's a big piece that's been missing.
Speaker 1:A huge piece of trauma-informed care is building relationships with students, and I always like to say connect before you correct. So if there's, like I just said, you know, the behavior person coming in should not be the person intervening with a student. If there's no connection, no relationship, and so one of the things you can do if a child is becoming really dysregulated, instead of immediately trying to support them or, you know, talk with them, just kind of get on their level and be like whoa, you're looking really upset, like what's going on. You know, just really trying to connect with them can make all the difference and make you know you're approachable that way too, right? So there are. I don't know if you wanted to say anything about any of that before I go on.
Speaker 2:Well, actually I have a couple of things, but probably the biggest one is that I don't think I have ever heard of any system or approach that takes care of the adults in the building all using these practices with each other. Then we're automatic models. It's going to come naturally for us to teach the kids and then hold them accountable. And it made me think I had years ago I had an administrator come in. We had a weekly staff meeting in the morning. And he came in and he said I'm going to have a really serious conversation with all of you this morning and share something deeply personal. And he sat down and he told us about how he had been victimized as a child within a school setting and that there was going to be a court case and he wanted all of us to know in case it made national news.
Speaker 2:And I remember, as he was sitting there telling us this in a staff meeting, that he and we don't know how many people sitting there perhaps had experienced similar traumas themselves and all of a sudden were put in that situation to everyone involved because the administrator would have known perhaps a different way to get his message across in a way that wasn't so shocking to some of the staff members. They kind of felt like they were blindsided and put into a space they didn't want to be in, but also the people there would have known how to handle the situation in terms of maybe saying, okay, maybe we don't talk about this right now, we could advocate for each other, and that is just such in our current day and age that advocacy and connection with one another, so that we are helping elevate each other instead of re-traumatizing each other and you feel like you have support and safety and security in the environment that you're in. I mean, I can see where that's a huge game changer for any school that's able to implement it successfully.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and I think that's another reason why when schools aren't doing it properly and why it doesn't work, is because of that missing piece. It's like, okay, so we come in and we teach educators about trauma, we teach them about how to interact with students who are dysregulated, okay, but you're doing nothing for the adults, nothing and it's all. We're all a part of this system, right, and we all impact each other because we're all working with each other day in and day out. Yeah, these things are really important.
Speaker 1:One thing I did want to mention is that you know, when people are learning about trauma, it can be triggering. So that's another thing is you want these professionals who are coming in to do the training to understand that and to be able to teach these things in ways that will be very respectful and allowing people like you know, we might be covering some hard topics. It may generate something, a memory for you that might be uncomfortable. Making sure people feel comfortable, they can leave the room if they want to, if they need a breather, and also just practicing some of that within the training. You know, like, let me show you some things you can do to help regulate yourself, because sometimes we don't even know how to regulate ourselves.
Speaker 2:That's right, that's right.
Speaker 1:Regulating children right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:The other thing I wanted to say, which I think is a misconception, is that people worry about this notion of a school being trauma-informed. I just want to make clear it doesn't diagnose, it doesn't pathologize that's not what it's about. And it doesn't treat. It also doesn't treat these things because we're not professionals to treat the trauma wounds. We're there to make sure we're not making it worse. We're there to support them and make them feel safe. So I just wanted to make that distinction. That's for the therapist to do.
Speaker 2:I'm really glad that you did, because this is something I'm sure you have heard your fellow educators say. I don't want to be a therapist. I've been put in all of these roles and we usually list a bunch of them. You know, I'm now a nurse, I'm now, you know, a chef, I'm now all of the and therapist is always in there, Definitely not a role we want to play, but a fabulous bridge. This is a fabulous bridge where we're not being a therapist, but we are helping bridge that trauma for the student or the family or ourselves, until we can get to the professional piece that we need.
Speaker 1:Right, and I think offering resources is totally a valid thing for schools to be doing for their families and for their employees Right, and that can be part of the employee assistance program. You know they should have these resources, these trauma informed resources of where to go. And I just want to throw out there which I do in a lot of my LinkedIn posts that psychology today is actually a great resource, at least here in the States. You know, you just Google in your zip code and you say what kinds of things, keywords of what you want in a therapist Like it could be trauma, could be sexual abuse, it could be PTSD, could be men's issues, whatever you put it in, and it will give you therapists who work on those specific things and it will tell you what their credentials are. It'll tell you what they have for availability and if they take insurance or not. It's an amazing resource. So I just wanted to throw that out there. If people are looking for a therapist.
Speaker 2:We'll put the link in the show notes.
Speaker 1:Perfect, perfect. So also thinking about trauma-informed systems, change. There are some frameworks out there. One of the really popular ones that seems to be taking off in a lot of schools is restorative practices, and whenever we talk about this, we always have to say that those are rooted in indigenous cultures around the world, because you need to give credit where it's due, right, because that's where it comes from. And what restorative practices really are about are relationship and community building, which we know is so important about respect, responsibility and accountability, like we talked about holding everyone accountable for their part in causing harm, um and uh. Reintegration, which we also mentioned, right. So if a child or a student is removed from the classroom or even the school, what's the plan to reintegrate them? We can't miss that piece, and so there are a lot of in restorative practices.
Speaker 1:They do circles where they literally sit in a circle, and what the goal is. That is that's also community building. But it's also gets students and it's for adults too. It gets them to understand different perspectives because everybody has a voice. Everybody gets to share what they're feeling about, whatever the topic is. It builds healthy communication skills, because you learn how to take turns, how to actively listen. It addresses conflict, and it does that through open dialogue and active listening and absolutely respects confidentiality. That's one of the rules is that nothing leaves the circle outside of this room. It stays here. And so what a circle looks like is there's always a facilitator, which would most likely be an adult, in the room. For the students anyway, people sit in a circle, there's a check-in where everyone kind of checks in if they want to, and then there's an open sharing about the topic, and that's the opportunity where everybody has a voice and there's actually a talking piece or stick or whatever you want it to be, and maybe different students can come up with one each week, or whatever they can come up be part of that process, and it actually goes around. And if you don't want to speak, that's fine, there's no judgment, but you have the opportunity to if you want to, and so that talking piece of course gets you, so you're not talking over the person who has the talking piece, it's their turn. And so it also focuses on impact and collaborative problem solving, and then there's a closure. So an example of that would be if.
Speaker 1:Well, I actually saw it in action in a little elementary school. It was a really kind of cute thing. It became a school-wide circle. So you can have circles in the classroom. If it applies to the classroom, only If it applies to the entire school, then you would do an entire school circle. And so in this elementary school somebody had damaged children's artwork that was on the wall. They had, like torn it or colored on it and that really hurt the person who created that art. And so they decided to have a school-wide circle.
Speaker 1:Everybody had a chance to talk about how that made them feel, if they wanted to, and then everybody had a voice to say, well, how can we fix this, how can we make it better? And then the facilitator actually gave the opportunity. Whoever did it, you can come out now and tell us now, which can kind of feel shocking and scary, but how much different is that than somebody who's already making themselves a spectacle in the classroom and then you have to bring attention to them because they're being removed? Much different is that than you know somebody who's already making themselves a spectacle in the classroom and then you have to bring attention to them because they're being removed. So at least this gives them the opportunity to come clean and then you know share what they're feeling in response to how they made everybody feel, and then everybody has an opportunity to talk about. Let's talk about how we're going to fix this in the future.
Speaker 1:So of course that would look very different in a high school setting. I'm sure there would be some bigger issues, and if there are really big issues where parents have to be brought in, then there are circles for that too. The parents actually become part of a circle with only the people who are involved. You wouldn't add in other people, because that just doesn't make sense. And then teachers and administrators can also have their own circles when there are meetings and they're run the same way. So it just becomes a way of communicating and problem solving and I find it really beautiful and teaches communication skills. That's so huge, something we're never taught.
Speaker 2:For real, we're not. We're really not.
Speaker 1:I agree, yeah, and I think what's really nice too is about restorative practices is it removes the punitive actions and the punishment and it really works on repairing harm and the accountability and solving the problem rather than just punishing. Because what does that do? You know? Nobody learns from that. So, yeah, Um, one thing too, I just wanted to mention is that, um, there are a lot of schools um, it actually has made news in the past that have removed their school resource officers, their police officers in the schools, because that can be a re-traumatization for a lot of students.
Speaker 1:Um, you know, there we see in the news all the time how there are people of color or people with disabilities who tend to be targeted by police.
Speaker 1:So that's entirely that's frightening to see an armed uniformed officer in your school. Or, you know, a child was there when their parent was arrested by a police officer. So a lot of them have just vowed to remove them and they feel like they actually cause more harm than good. And we have seen in the news too in the past how they actually the school resource officers have been the ones to instigate situations or make it worse instead of deescalate it, and then they end up really harming a student, sometimes very physically, and so, and I think that's due to just improper training um, right, they just trained how to work in the school with students. So, um, I think a huge goal of restorative practices and trauma informed practices is that's going to help reduce the school to prison pipeline, which is very important, so there will be less. We will see less expulsions, less suspensions, less escalation of behaviors, so it's something that's just a really important piece for students and for the teachers for students and for the teachers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm thinking about how, in order for a group of students to decide, because, I mean, our resource officers tend to be in pretty rowdy schools where people aren't feeling safe, and so that safety then is the and the responsibility for creating the safe environment is falling on the student community, and that they are feeling, in some instances, that they are so capable of creating it that they don't need a backup from the resource officers. And, having been in some of those schools that you know, some of them are like man, we need two or three resource officers. Knowing what's going on there, the level of fear, it's really saying something that that these practices, in some cases, are already showing that they're capable of creating that level of safety. That's amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think if you give you know, you give students agency and you give them responsibility and independence, I mean it's amazing the stuff that they can come up with right and we need to value that more.
Speaker 2:And teaching those communication skills, because that is something that's very frustrating to me, just as a human, is that oftentimes we expect someone with no exposure to have this higher level skill that they've never even observed. But it's well, this is how we do it, so you've got to get on board, get that student, and I think a lot about I think about this a lot in terms of students who do not come from middle class or higher socioeconomic status households, and then they are expected to come into the classroom and have all of these hoity toity, manners and ability to understand these social mores that they've never been exposed to and then tend to get labeled things that they're probably not. They just didn't have that skill set, and so I think this falls in alignment with that. So where do you see this type of work, taking education specifically in the future, and how do you think it helps with burnout?
Speaker 1:I think trauma-informed schools is a game changer for so many reasons that you know we've already talked about for the overall health and well-being of teachers and students.
Speaker 1:You know it's just so important that we're all taught self-regulation strategies and you know it'll reduce those escalation of behaviors.
Speaker 1:It promotes, like we just said, healthy, respectful communication. And when everyone is feeling safe, I mean that's a huge part. When they're feeling safe, cared for and supported, teachers can teach and children can learn Right. And that's what we want to make oh, that's what we want out of being in school. I also feel like and this is my part of, you know, feeling like we're making a big step in the whole scheme of things is I think it can help to stop generational trauma, because if we're teaching children these skills and they're practicing them day in and day out at school maybe not at home, but they are at least at school with their peers and with their teachers, adults, people in authority you know there's an opportunity for when they get on older in life that they're going to be able to pass on those skills to their children and maybe not all of that other stuff that they carried with them from their childhood and not hopefully not passing that on because that's so easy to have happen.
Speaker 2:It really is. You tend to use the skills that you're taught in the way that you're taught them Right. Absolutely. I just love this. I love this conversation. It makes me hopeful. I feel that hopeful piece.
Speaker 1:That's wonderful.
Speaker 2:So I'm going to, you know, I like to give everybody a magic wand for a moment on the podcast and say you know, if I gave you a magic wand and I said there's one thing, but only one, that you could change today to improve education, what would it be?
Speaker 1:Well, you know, everybody would have a whole list, right? Yeah, so it's the reason I'm here. I think if we implement trauma-informed practices and really make it a transformation within schools, I wholeheartedly believe that will change everything. It'll just change everything for students and for teachers.
Speaker 2:I have to tell you, laura, I think you've convinced me, because oftentimes I'm I'm grumpy on the podcast, I'm like we need to overhaul the whole thing, just throw it all out and let's start over. But, um, wow, I mean, you're giving me a lot to think about that. I am going to continue to. I'm going to have to come back on. That's all there is to it. We're going to have to do a part two. So, because I I just think of all the areas, I mean this hits so many of them. Okay, but all right. So, speaking of trauma, I have to ask my questions here at the end. Educators can and do experience secondary trauma frequently, and it's important that the public at large knows about these things, in my opinion. Would you share one of these moments from your career with us to your comfort level?
Speaker 1:Sure, First I just want to explain what that is like the secondary, or sometimes it's called vicarious, trauma. So oftentimes teachers, therapists, anyone who is working with people who have experienced trauma in their lives, when you're dealing with it day in and day out, like that's going to have an impact, right, Right, and especially because educators are so dedicated to this field and to helping kids progress and be successful, it's a lot to carry with you and to take home. You know you're carrying home all these stories of all these kids and it's very sad and it's frustrating because we feel we can't, we're helpless in the sense that we can't change that for them and we can't change that for them. So that can really, in a sense, traumatize, through the work that you're doing, the adult who's doing that work. I think for me personally and it's kind of funny, kind of not, but I had so much of my own stuff going on and so much of my own trauma in my life that I was dealing with that when I came home. I couldn't help but just think about my own life. So I really I really did leave all of that at school, which was healthy in that sense, to do that, because it is important that we can separate or else it's going to eat us alive. But I think that was really, you know, the shift had to become on me once I, once I got home, Um, I did have an event that I would say was pretty triggering, which I'm sure all of us have had.
Speaker 1:Um, it was an interaction with a parent and it was during the pandemic and, of course, we had very strict rules about you know, if you're sick, you got to go home. Strict rules about you know, if you're sick, you got to go home. And there was a little child in my preschool who was not acting like himself and so I took him to the nurse. The nurse said oh yeah, he needs to go home. Nurse calls the parent Parent's really grumpy, doesn't want to pick up the kid. Says well, it's such a short session, they can just come home later, you know. And the nurse was like nah, you really should come and get your kid. So parents show up and I meet the parents outside and this one parent came sort of charging at us with a thermometer, but it was held out straight as if it were like he was holding a gun. It was very bizarre. And he came storming up to his child and put the thermometer on the forehead and said see, no fever, this kid can stay. And I was like, well, we never said there was a fever first of all, but there are other symptoms and your kid's just not acting like themselves and clearly isn't feeling well.
Speaker 1:Well, I got berated up and down, I was yelled at, I was sworn at, I was called names and, you know, before the name calling started, I just kind of interrupted him. I was like you seem like you're really mad right now. You know, kind of doing my connect before. I correct, Not really. And he just went off and I, as soon as the swearing and name calling started, I walked away because that's like there's no sense in engaging in that and I'm not going to be beat up by a parent.
Speaker 1:So I immediately walked into the school and I started looking for the principal. Couldn't find him. At first I went to the we do have an SRO, by the way a school resource officer Went to him. All he really did was, you know, I just said there's a very angry parent in the parking lot I think you should know about and he just, you know, looked him up. He's like yeah, he's had issues with this at other places too and I was like, okay, that's not helpful.
Speaker 1:But and then when I finally did connect with the principal, the response was, ah, he was just letting off some steam, Everybody's upset with COVID and everything. I was like that's not the sense I got from this parent. I sense that this is an angry parent and if you really look at this power differential, which I think a lot of men do not understand, between a man and a woman, right, I was outside, there was nobody else around, it was very scary and for me it was triggering because I've been treated that way before by a man, and so it really gave me this internal response of panic and heart racing. And so I just went into my office just shaking and I just cried and, just to you know, try to get this experience out of my system.
Speaker 2:Nobody was supporting me in that moment, so Well, and it just makes me think about everything that we just talked about too. I mean, it wasn't a safe space, right? Not at all, and and if you're a trauma informed system, everybody is working together to create that safe space.
Speaker 2:So that lack of support actually added to it not being and made it more traumatic, absolutely, and that's what we don't want to. Let you know. You're not the first person again who's talked about this kind of thing, where they had and I'm just going to say, intimidation, intimidation either from another colleague, a student or a parent sense of, oh, lighten up, that's not a world. Any of us, none of us, should be intimidating anyone under any circumstances. But definitely we don't go to work for that stuff. You know Right, absolutely, I'll get on my high horse here, so I'm going to hop right off now and we're going to go in the other direction, because I call this my whiplash moment. For you Talk about trauma, and now I want to know what's one of the funniest moments you've had as an educator?
Speaker 1:Well, like the show, you know, kids say the darndest things they do. They really do. And we chuckle about all these things kids say day in, day out. We always say we should write a book and put all these quotes in the book, but of course we forget. So I? There are just some that stand out to me that were really cute and funny. At the time I was working on my computer in the classroom and this little girl comes up to me and she's like what are you doing? Are you computing? Yeah, I'm computing, that's what I'm doing. Yeah, I'm computing, that's what I'm doing. And then I had another kiddo say oh, I love your hair I love your sweater, I love your face, and then one other.
Speaker 1:This was really cute too. I take my glasses on and off frequently throughout the day, and I was sitting at the table with kiddos and one of them said to me when I took my glasses off oh, you look like a mother now. And I thought what? And so then, when I put my glasses back on, he said now you look like a teacher.
Speaker 2:So it's those endearing things.
Speaker 1:You know, that just gets you.
Speaker 2:Sometimes they're not that endearing, though, because I remember I had a student that I was working fifth grader with math. It was like one of the first couple of years I was in education and I stopped talking and he's looking at me and he said you need those metal things on your teeth. It's like you need to do your math, so let's get back to it, buddy. But they do say hilarious things. Sometimes it's to your colleagues too, and it's even more hilarious. But anyway, and finally, we all have those moments that make us feel like this. This is why I chose to be an educator. At least I hope most of us have those. Can you tell us about one of those glow moments for you?
Speaker 1:I have several, but I think you know the reason why I'm in. It is because I love seeing how kids progress. Nothing gives me greater joy than knowing that I helped make that happen and I've shared this with you, know, in other podcasts too because it's such an amazing moment for me. I had a three-year-old that became dysregulated a lot and he was a biter and he was a headbanger and, oh my gosh, it was really hard to keep this little kid safe because he was just dysregulated all the time. And so in moments of calm I would work with him on some deep breathing exercises and in preschool, you know, I keep it simple.
Speaker 1:We do what we call five finger breathing, where you know you trace up the finger and you inhale and you trace down and you exhale, because I knew that was something they could do. It's part of their own body. So we did that day in and day out. We practiced that and one day he just was losing it and he put himself underneath a table and I saw him start going all on his own. And this is a three-year-old, I couldn't believe it and I just. That was a really awesome moment. That's why I'm in education.
Speaker 2:That is beautiful. Oh, I love it. I love it. Laura, I have really enjoyed having you on here. Is there anything else you'd like to share before we end this?
Speaker 1:Uh, sure, I think. Um, another piece that I love sharing is that trauma, informed care hurts nobody. So if we're doing it with people who don't need it, you know who haven't experienced trauma, which everyone has but it hurts nobody and it benefits everyone because all you're doing is really positive stuff in the school. And then, other than that, I'd love people to connect with me on LinkedIn. I'd love to connect with people on there.
Speaker 2:And again, I'll put your stuff in links in the show notes so people can connect with me on LinkedIn. I'd love to connect with people on there and again, I'll put your stuff in links in the show notes so people can connect with you. I think you've got a lot of really good information to share.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for being on the podcast.
Speaker 1:Thanks, it was a really great conversation, I enjoyed it conversation.
Speaker 2:I enjoyed it. Today's episode was produced and edited by me. The theme music is by Otis McDonald featuring Joni Ines. If you know someone who might enjoy these conversations, please share the podcast episodes as much and as often as you can. It's as simple as copying the link you use to access today's episode and sending it in a message or sharing it on social media. I'm a small, independent operation and your shares broaden our audience. Perhaps you or someone you know will be inspired to talk about teacher burnout If you would like to Taught the podcast rising up to get the message out around educator burnout. This is Melissa LaFleur. Thank you for listening to taught the podcast.
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