Now that the school year has begun, start setting your students up for success! Here are some proactive strategies you can implement immediately: Get to Know Your Students Get to know your students FOR REAL, and help them get to know each other.... Continue reading.
Donor Spotlight: Joe and Clara Stewart
When they first came to Battle Creek in 1980, Joe and Clara Stewart knew that they wanted to do one thing: help children. Joe started out working for the Kellogg Company as the Director of Child Nutrition, which is where he connected with Arlin... Continue reading.
School to Community – Handle with Care
Looking through my email I saw "Handle with Care" in the subject line along with a student’s name. I became nervous, anxious, and then concerned for the student, thinking, “this has begun... it is a reality now.” It was the first time a... Continue reading.
Calming Corner
A calming corner (also known as a calm down corner or comfort corner) is a small, designated space located within a classroom. The purpose of a calming corner is to help support self-regulation while keeping students in the classroom if they need... Continue reading.
Focus on Sensory Rooms
Sensory rooms are therapeutic spaces that provide students with personalized sensory inputs to meet their individual needs. These rooms are not just for students with impairments, however, but for ALL children. Using a variety of tools,... Continue reading.
Bringing to Life Self-Care: Who Are Your Co-Therapists?
Anyone who works with people who have experienced trauma knows that trauma can take a toll on the human heart, for both the victims of trauma and those that assist with the healing of trauma. For those of us who assist in the various capacities of... Continue reading.
Skillet the Therapy Dog
*Student identifying info has been changed to maintain confidentiality. It’s 7:45 on a Tuesday morning. The call that comes over my walkie talkie is not unfamiliar. “Skillet is needed on the bus. Skillet is needed on the bus.” Skillet, a... Continue reading.
Reaching the Caregiver
I have been thinking about ACEs lately. Not the 4-of-a-kind, win-big-in-poker aces, but those pesky Adverse Childhood Experiences ACEs. As the opioid epidemic in our communities brings death and misery to our families, we have amassed resources in... Continue reading.
Early Childhood Experiences
Positive early childhood experiences are essential for later success in school, the workplace, and the community. Services for children who have experienced Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) or those living in chronic toxic stress, including... Continue reading.
Structured Sensory Interventions for Children, Adults and Parents
The experience of trauma is often difficult to communicate through words, and is more easily described through sensory-based interventions. Sensory-based interventions are non-language activities like drawing, imagery and other forms of expressive... Continue reading.
The Training that Changed Everything
I am an elementary principal who works in the “kid business” and every year I meet so many students.They are so diverse in every sense of the word – some are topping the growth charts, some are barely making the growth chart, some have blonde... Continue reading.
The Body Holds the Truth
After 17 years of facilitating grief and trauma recovery, I recently experienced something that led me to a completely new understanding of the importance of the work we do at TLC and the programs we have developed and refined. As well as being a... Continue reading.
When Students are Traumatized, Teachers are Too
Access this article by Emelina Minero on the Edutopia website... Continue reading.
10 Steps Every Educator Needs to Know to Create a Trauma Informed School
Learning can be a real struggle for children who have experienced a trauma. But once trauma is identified as the root of the behavior, educators can adapt their approach to help students cope when they are at school. These steps create a... Continue reading.
Using Anxiety Art to Bust Worry & Toxic Stress
Benefits of Anxiety Art Anxiety Art is a powerful strategy for building resilience in kids. Today, anxiety is one of the most prevalent children’s mental health issues with the average age of onset for anxiety disorders being 6 years of age... Continue reading.
