Building Trauma-Sensitive Schools: Your Guide to Creating Safe, Supportive Learning Environments for All Students

Description

In the United States, at least one in four youth experiences trauma severe enough to negatively affect their school success.* Give hope and help to these students with this reader-friendly how-to guide, your springboard for building responsive, trauma-sensitive preK–12 schools.

Drawing on her extensive experience as a school counselor, trainer, and mother, trauma expert Jen Alexander delivers a comprehensive framework for building a safe, supportive school environment that helps all students learn and thrive. You'll start with an evidence-based introduction to the profound impact of trauma on a child's development, attachment, and behavior. Then you'll get an effective multi-tier system of support (MTSS) for developing a trauma-sensitive learning environment, including both universal strategies (Tier 1) and more intensive interventions (Tier 2 and Tier 3) for students who need more support. Compelling anecdotes and sample scripts illuminate challenges and solutions, and the included forms and worksheets are valuable tools for helping educators build the mindset and skills necessary for becoming trauma-sensitive. With this engaging, highly practical guide to what works and why, your school team will gain insights and develop action plans that make a real difference in the lives of all kids, including our most vulnerable youth.

• make five key shifts in the way you view and approach students, so that youre better equipped to support them
• work together to prioritize resilience by actively putting relationships first in your school
• implement universal instructional strategies that foster safety, connection, regulation, and learning for all students
• use special supports, supplemental instruction, and coaching when universal strategies aren't enough
• collaborate effectively with families and colleagues to meet each student's needs
• incorporate restorative discipline practices that focus on restitution, not retribution
• create a personalized self-care plan to promote wellness and reduce the effects of job-related stress

PRACTICAL MATERIALS: Creative activities for teachers, powerful case stories, sample dialogues and scripts for educators and counselors, reflection and brainstorming worksheets, downloadable forms, and templates and handouts for use with students.

• Feel safe
• Be connected
• Get regulated
• Learn

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Table of Contents

• What is Trauma?
• Trauma Defined
• Prevalence of Childhood Trauma
• The Effects of Trauma on the Body

• Healthy Attachment
• Attachment Issues
• Attachment-Trauma

• Faces of Trauma in the Classroom
• The Effects of Developmental Trauma in School
• Triggers in the Classroom
• Common Approaches to Trauma in the Classroom

• What is a Trauma-Sensitive School?
• Trauma-Informed Response to Intervention
• Trauma-Sensitive Educators

• Paradigm Shifts for Trauma-Sensitive Educators

• Essential #1: To Help Students Feel Safe
• Essential #2: To Help Students Be Connected
• Essential #3: To Help Students Get Regulated
• Essential #4: To Help Students Learns

• Universal Strategies to Help All Students Feel Safe
• Universal Strategies to Help All Students Be Connected
• Universal Strategies to Help All Students Get Regulated
• Universal Strategies to Help All Students Learn

• Supplemental & Intensive Interventions for Helping Students Feel Safe
• Supplemental & Intensive Interventions for Helping Students Be Connected
• Supplemental & Intensive Interventions to Help Students Get Regulated
• Supplemental & Intensive Interventions to Help Students Learn
• We are in this Together

• Follow, Lead, Follow
• Playfulness
• Acceptance
• Curiosity
• Empathy

• Restorative Discipline Practices
• Trauma-Sensitive Consequences
• Ending on a Positive Note

• Job-Related Stress
• Final Lifeguarding Lessons
• Self-care Plans