Why “We need to recognize trauma in the classroom” Isn’t enough for a teacher.

So, I’ve been a teacher for 8 years, and I’ve worked at a new school this year. I’ve had some struggles with a few students and their behaviors. I’ve read a lot of the trauma books and I would say that I’m fairly well read on the topic. <br><br>However, when my students act out, it still makes me mad. And I still get to class wishing I could fix their trauma with a Band-Aid. But I can’t. And I still struggle with classroom management. <br><br>I went to a training recently that really helped me. It was about how to HELP the brain when it is hijacked by trauma. And not only did it give me some great coping skills for my students, it helped me realize that I need to teach them to recognize their own hijacking and work with it. <br><br>Students who are coming from traumatic situations don’t realize that their brain is acting differently. And they don’t need to know a whole bunch about how their brain works. But they do need to recognize what’s happening in their brain that is causing them to act out. <br><br>As teachers, we’ve heard “We need to recognize trauma in the classroom,” but we haven’t been taught what to do with it. We recognize it, and then we don’t know what to do. <br><br>So, we punish the behaviors anyway. We say that they can’t behave like this in our classroom. We suspend them. We call CPS. <br><br>The reality is that students who have been through trauma can’t behave any differently. Their brain hijacks and they react in response. It’s not something that they can control. <br><br>So, what I’ve done is teach my students the tools that I’ve been given in this training. The training was on Dr. Bruce Perry’s Neurosequential Model. It’s really cool, and I think that every teacher should look into it. <br><br>What I’ve done is practice these skills with my students. We practice tapping in class. It’s not for everyone, but for some students, it helps them feel safer and more grounded. <br><br>I also work on establishing a routine. Kids with trauma need to feel safe. By having a consistent routine, it can help them feel more safe. <br><br>I use an app that helps to regulate breathing. It shows you a dot moving up and down an inhale exhale on the screen. It’s super simple, but it works really well to help students regulate their breathing when they’re feeling hijacked. <br><br>I also teach students about recognizing their own hijacking. If they start to feel themselves getting worked up, they can step away from the situation and go to a safe place. For me, this means that they can choose a spot in the classroom where they feel safe, they can go to the school counselor, or they can go for a walk outside. <br><br>I also worked with my administrator to develop a few different crisis tools. We have crisis cards, detente forms, and crisis boxes. The crisis cards are something that kids can give to me if they’re feeling worked up. It’s just a card that says crisis on it, and I know that I need to give them some space. <br><br>The detente form is something that I fill out with a student when they’re feeling overwhelmed. It lists out places where they feel safe, things that they can do to help calm down, and things that they can do after to reflect on their behavior. <br><br>The crisis boxes are boxes that have tools in them to help regulate breathing. This can be playdoh, slime, Legos, or anything else that the student thinks might help them. <br><br>Overall, I feel like it’s helped to reduce the amount of behaviors that I’m seeing. Not all of my students have responded to it, but many of them have.<br><br>I think that we need to do more than just “Recognize trauma in the classroom.” We need to teach our students how to function when they’ve been hijacked by trauma. We need to teach them how to recognize when they’re about to get hijacked and help them cope with those feelings. <br><br>I don’t think that most educators know how to do this. We’ve had the training on recognizing trauma, but we haven’t had the training on how to help it. And I think that we need to. I think that this training would make a huge difference in how we treat kids with trauma.