In addition to participating in this study, I attended an informative and enlightening webinar discussing these results. My takeaway was that although awareness of student and teacher mental health challenges is growing, actions to improve things are still lacking. Programs like Learning the Calm.
What we do as Early Childhood Educators matters! Current Preschoolers have all experienced trauma--remember COVID-19? They couldn't have loved ones and friends around in those first few years when it's most important. But our positive experiences with them now can help them thrive.
Learn how to take a difficult conversation and turn it into a collaborative brainstorming session by planning ahead and being curious about the other's point of view. Effective, kind, and empathetic communication is critical in working with kids and improving our overall mental health as caregivers.
I love this article from Breathe for Change about how effective communication skills can improve our mental health. This is an area I've been working on for awhile now, and I definitely agree.
