COVID-19 has created new stresses for families, educators, and students. It has also intensified existing stressors. For communities to be ready to return to school, we must reassure and inspire them by providing a clear and motivational path for re-entry. This plan will buffer stress, reduce anxiety, and inspire communities to return with energy for the work ahead.
Explicitly buffer stress, anxiety, frustration, and negative mindsets while reassuring and inspiring people about the year ahead.
- Set a goal that all educators will feel safe, confident, and ready to learn and then ask what it would take to create the conditions for those feelings.
- Show transparent and optimistic leadership in communication. Explicitly message “We’ve got your back,” “We are all learners,” “We are all getting better,” “You can do this!” “You are a powerful change agent in the lives of our students.”
- Be explicit about expectations. Avoid sending mixed messages about balancing work and home.
Consider making a social contract with all staff or within departments—a set of commitments that leaders check in about regularly and to which you hold each other accountable.
Greeley-Evans School District 6
Greeley will create a plan to increase joy, self-awareness, positivity, and empowerment among directors, building administrators, and all staff. They will achieve this by creating a toolkit that builds on all of their SEL ‘intelligence.’
They will also distribute a survey that collects information on connection activities, including interests and areas/passions, as well as race/gender/identity information to feed data for affinity groups that will develop community and collaboration among school.
Greeley will be leveraging online environments to facilitate activities such as weekly funnies, visual notetaking, and other adult SEL activities. These efforts will be kicked off with a “Happiness Advantage” video, and by sending toolkit 1 to all building directors and staff.
Clear Creek School District Re-1
Clear Creek School District has identified the need to create professional development for staff surrounding the ‘6 B’s,’ among other strategies for social-emotional learning to better prepare their educators for their roles and unique challenges they will face as schools reopen in the fall.
This will take place during the initial 2 weeks of the 2020-21 school year and may be used in any of the participation models that they envision, as determined by the pandemic level. The ‘6 B’s’ are as follows: Balance, Breathe, Belong, combat Boredom, get Better, reflect on Blessings. By addressing this and other strategies for SEL, they will shine a light on sources of inequity and inequality within their community (issues concerning race, poverty, and other inequalities).
Teachers and support staff will also be trained on outreach with the goal that ‘no students fall through the cracks,’ and that all students are ‘OUR students.’
Clear Creek PD for Staff on 6 B’s and Other Strategies for SEL
Explicitly buffer stress, anxiety, frustration, and negative mindsets while reassuring and inspiring people about the year ahead.
- Set a goal that all students will feel safe, confident, and ready to learn and then ask what it would take to create the conditions for those feelings
- Address the 6 B’s with students: Balance, Breathe, Belong, combat Boredom, get Better, reflect on Blessings
- Consider making a social contract in every class—a set of commitments that you check in about regularly and to which you hold each other accountable. This is in addition to the learning alliance—which is essentially a social contract also—between teacher and student. This set of commitments is for the classroom community.
- Empower students to create structures that are mutually inspiring. Peer-driven ideas can emerge this year that...
Be transparent and optimistic in your communication with students. Explicitly message “We’ve got your back” “We are all learners” “We are all learning new skills” “You can do this!”
Cañon City Schools Fremont Re-1
Cañon City School District will be seeking to reassure and inspire students in their opening process this fall by instituting ‘Reopening Plan B,’ for at minimum the first two weeks of the school year with the option to extend this further depending on the COVID-19 situation in their area.
Their goal is to identify and ‘buffer’ the stress, anxiety, frustration, and negative mindsets of students while reassuring and inspiring them for the year ahead. Administration and teachers will connect personally with all students and families by various means in order to proactively identify areas of academic/social emotional needs while also employing instruction around physical safety in a COVID-19 world (social distancing, use of masks, etc.).
Cañon City will also provide remote/digital opportunities for parents and the community to continue involvement with the school while maintaining an emphasis on clear communication throughout the planning process to return to the eventual in-person learning environment. Cañon City will continue to implement its use of the BIMAS2 (Behavioral Intervention Monitoring Assessment System) psychological evaluation survey to students, and also expand its use to their families/guardian, to better assess hopes, needs, and anxieties throughout this process.
Explicitly buffer stress, anxiety, frustration, and negative mindsets while reassuring and inspiring people about the year ahead.
- Enlist the input and wisdom of families and community partners in all discussions and decisions about reopening - before decisions are made - to learn from their expertise and perspective, and build the collaboration that will allow this next phase of schooling to succeed.
Form parent support groups specific to COVID-19 impacts. Host these in the community with plans for social distancing. Plan for the virtual continuity of these groups, should another shutdown be required.
Colorado Springs District 11
D11 is seeking to reach a deeper understanding of the experiences of their families and to establish trust between staff and communities. They will do this by launching restorative practice (RP) training for teachers and staff with the goal of reaching and establishing meaningful relationships with their students of color and families.
The training will include, at minimum, RP circle facilitation and cultural competency lessons. Families/community members will be welcomed to these trainings and circles, and these opportunities will be marketed to the target populations stated above. Circles are expected to include storytelling of experiences around race, language, LGBTQ+, and underserved groups in schools. Each circle will conclude with a resolution and a designated person to ensure the follow-through of that resolution. External partners will be contacted to assist in this plan. Reflections and feedback will be regularly gathered from the circles in order to revise protocols and continue with the program.
The Coping Skills Toolbox
Baldwin County Public Schools
Buffering Stress During Difficult Times
Colorado Education Initiative
Mindfulness Toolkit
Transforming Education
Mindfulness in Education: 31+ Ways of Teaching Mindfulness in Schools
PositivePsychology.com
Self-Care and Wellness Resources for Educators and Students
Breathe For Change
Eight Tips for Teaching Mindfulness in High School
Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley
Practice Videos
Still Quiet Place
