As the proud elementary school principal of Glacier Hills Elementary School of Arts & Science, I spent a lot of time this summer reflecting on the past 18 months. What did it mean to lead a school through a pandemic? What are the short term, and long term implications for my students, staff, and community? I knew I had a responsibility to address our collective trauma as a school community.
We started with a foundational research base offered by CASEL, CASEL (The Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning). This provides evidence-based social and emotional learning (SEL) resources to educators and policy makers.
To begin, we wanted to respond to COVID. However, this goal quickly became so much broader. We came to realize that CASEL’s framework is best practice, in or out of, a pandemic. SEL really is a high leverage strategy for dealing with inequities across the board. From here, we were ready to get started!
Start with Foundational Support
A core team is critical for school-wide implementation. I have our social worker, school psychologist, and assistant administrator supporting me. We started by looking at the SEL we already had in place and working well.
We are fortunate to have a number of different SEL curricula at our school. Glacier Hills uses a variety of tools and resources including Responsive Classroom, PBIS/school wide expectations, Conscious Discipline, culturally responsive teaching practices, and diverse children’s literature. In addition, we will be implementing Second Step (2021 digital version) for Kindergarten-Grade 5. We have many tools supporting our SEL initiative.
At Glacier Hills, we have found MoveMindfully to be a tangible way to offer self-regulation and co-regulation strategies to staff and students. These practices, supported by MoveMindfully card decks and posters, support the variety of SEL offerings we are implementing. Our staff also received professional development including residencies, workshops, and consultations.
Remember Staff SEL
During workshop week our team presented an “Overview to SEL” to the whole staff. We started the session by having all staff take a personal inventory of their own SEL. This personal reflection process is essential in creating a strong framework. We then had staff complete a self-reflection rubric to recognize each of the CASEL competencies in their own SEL.
We continue to focus on expanding our learning of equity and SEL through ongoing reflection of practices, data analysis, and professional learning.
Talking about our own adult SEL and engaging in conversations about equity can be challenging. Participating in these important, and sometimes difficult, conversations can create stress or distress in our minds and bodies.
To help staff in these discussions, we strategically used MoveMindfully BREATHE-MOVE-REST practices to build community and provide feelings of safety. We participated in all staff professional learning around this. Simple mind-body practices can support our Adult SEL. First, we address how our nervous system reacts when we engage in these important conversations. We have found that providing MoveMindfully’s mind-body strategies is a way to help staff feel more valued and supported in this process.
Create Your Plan
As we created our plan of action for the year, we integrated key aspects of MoveMindfully and CASEL Signature Practices. We start with a regulating mind-body practice to get everyone ready to work well together and ensure a “good beginning” to our meetings. The goal is to create a meeting with an “engaging middle”. After that, we make time for an “optimistic ending” as a closure activity. This ensures time for reflection and integration before transitioning to the rest of our day. Our plan is to continue modeling this mindful meeting structure in all of our staff meetings and trainings this year.
Our team will come back together to review survey data, set realistic goals, and prioritize our agenda. Providing time for staff to plan and implement 2nd Steps curriculum is part of our school wide goal for the 2021-22 school year.
This process has grounded the why and the what of our school wide SEL model. We will continue to grow the how as we continue our work with MoveMindfully.