This webinar is primarily for school district leadership, principals, vice-principals, professional associations, policymakers, aspiring school leaders, and anyone interested in the well-being of school leaders.
Canadian school leaders are grappling with longer hours, increasing demands, and higher workloads than ever before, which is threatening principal recruitment, retention, and job performance. Work intensification involves managing condensed timelines and a simultaneous increase in the volume and complexity of tasks, activities, and other work demands. As effective school leaders are key to high-performing schools and healthy school environments, work intensification not only threatens school leader recruitment and retention, but also the well-being and performance of both staff and students.
This one-hour webinar originally broadcasted on June 8th, 2020 explored the results of recent studies conducted in Ontario and British Columbia on how principal wellness and the role of school leaders is changing, including strategies that professional associations, school districts, policymakers, and school leaders themselves can take to improve principals’ and vice-principals’ well-being.
Watch the webinar below:
Happy Teacher Revolution is a Baltimore-born, international movement with the mission to organize and conduct support groups for teachers in the field of mental health and wellness to increase teacher happiness, retention, and professional sustainability.
This one-hour experiential learning webinar originally broadcasted on May 28th, 2020 explored burnout, vicarious trauma, and self-care as a global professional development movement.
Watch the full webinar below:
ABOUT DANNA THOMAS
Danna Thomas is a former Baltimore City Public School teacher turned founder of a global initiative to support the mental health and wellness of educators. Her organization, Happy Teacher Revolution, is on a mission to increase teacher happiness, retention, and professional sustainability by providing educators with the time and space to heal, deal, and be real about the social-emotional demands they face on the job. Danna served as the national spokeswoman for the National Alliance of Mental Illness (NAMI) Maryland and the “Music for Mental Health” campaign. She is the recipient of the 2019 Johns Hopkins Community Hero Award and the 2019 Winner of the Johns Hopkins Social Innovation Lab. Danna’s favourite forms of self-care include playing backgammon, community hot yoga, and rocking out on the saxophone.
In this issue, Education Canada looks at the role our public schools do, could, and/or should play in exposing students to these career pathways, preparing them for future labour market needs, and facilitating their transition to trades training. Are students given adequate experiential learning opportunities to consider trades, adequate opportunity to learn about them, and adequate support in negotiating entry to post-secondary programs and apprenticeships that will take them there? How can we shift the narrative, counter the stigma and articulate the value of skilled trades to youth and their parents? How does our education system embrace the multiple roles of fostering the skills and knowledge students require to become informed, active, citizens of the world, and also preparing them to meet the workforce needs of tomorrow?
Why do children’s scores on creativity tests decline steeply through their schooling years? Schools have been blamed for stifling creativity, but Gerber argues there are other factors: in particular, the development of the capacity for logic and reason.
Have you ever had one of those moments where, in what seems to present itself as a sudden flash of insight, you recognize that something you had previously considered to be an unequivocal truth might not hold up quite so strongly? I have, and I’m still thinking about it, so I’d like to invite you on my journey up to this point.
Schools should foster creativity, and there are very few people who would assert otherwise. Education reform speakers call for increased focus on creativity development, and the B.C. curriculum places creative thinking as an essential target for core competency development. Yet in the last two decades it has often been suggested that schools, unfortunately, have precisely the opposite effect – that schools kill creativity.
Sir Ken Robinson made this idea popular in his viral Ted talk, “Do Schools Kill Creativity?”1 Citing research that sought to measure creativity in populations of people, Robinson projects a wonderfully impactful chart which illustrates the percentage of people who score at the genius level by age group. The trend is staggeringly clear; a straight down-angled line connects the data points between five-year-olds who score in the genius range for divergent thinking (at 95 percent), ten-year-olds (32 percent), and 15-year-olds (10 percent). “There is something happening to our children,” Sir Ken remarks. “School kills creativity, and that has to change.”
The polemical nature of the “school kills creativity” proclamation is effective for instilling a passion for change and better serving students, but it also causes me to wonder: are schools, in fact, the raison d’être for the decline of students’ creativity as they proceed through the education system?
Or is it possible that we are not considering the larger picture?
Think back to when you were young, as far back as your memory allows. I recall running about the house with a towel adorning my shoulders – convinced, unequivocally, that human flight was in my immediate future. One more push, a more forceful thrust of my arms, or jumping a little higher… I knew it was only a matter of when and not if I would fly like Superman. I’m guessing that you can also recall examples that showcase your childhood creative genius and belief in possibility. I can’t imagine that our God-given abilities are so easily lost as a result of our education system.
There are some things other than schooling that take place during those years of growth that, I believe, may have more to do with explaining our diminishing creativity – something less sinister, and something more sinister. Let’s consider these in turn.
First, as we age we grow in our ability to think, or to ratiocinate, which literally means to process and consider rationally and logically. When I was a child, I believed that a hero-esque endowment of flight was possible, and I acted according to that belief. I jumped. I leapt. I bounded into the air off flights of stairs, couches, and bookshelves. Over time – thankfully not too much time – the bruises and sprained ankles taught me that my belief might not reign within reasonable expectation. And as I think of this, I recognize something profound: reason tempers creative expression. I wonder, is it possible that Sir Ken’s measurement of creativity, exemplified by how many uses an individual can think of for a paper clip, favours quantity and not the quality of divergent thinking?
As one’s ability to think and reason increases, we should expect that many creative inclinations are filtered. I have bad, yet innovative ideas frequently, but I don’t act on or share them because I recognize that they don’t merit an audience. Older people will presumably not think of as many uses for a paper clip because they know what a paperclip can (and can’t) do, and thus discard possibilities that seem to lack value. The expression of creative ideation is reduced as a natural consequence of growth, development, and the maturation of logical thinking – not necessarily by being choked out by the hands of schooling. In fact, Kyung Hee Kim’s research shows that although a student’s creative Fluency score decreases as he progresses through the grade levels, his ability to elaborate on ideas, diversify areas of consideration, and stick with and develop ideas increase over the same timeframes.2 (For graphs of every measure tracked in this study, see below:)
But there is also something more sinister which comes into play – something that begins as a small weed and often grows over the years, potentially muting our willingness to engage our innate creativity. As many of us age, we stop believing in possibility, an essential ingredient fueling curiosity, the desire to explore,3 and one’s investment in creativity. Schooling, as Sir Ken Robinson points out, plays a significant role in shaping the thinking habits of children. Many teachers focus on the attainment of specific knowledge and thereby perpetuate a foundational ideological alignment with the idea that there always exists a “right” answer. Being “right” is rewarded. Being “wrong” is stigmatized and often penalized. Too often, content-focused teaching fails to recognize that a student’s ability to be “wrong” is an essential ingredient for seeing and pursuing possibility.
Creativity empowered breeds revision. It is fostered through a willingness to try, recognizing that there is always more we can learn through experiencing failure.
Failure left uncelebrated feeds into new conceptualizations of limitation. My dream of human flight died with my final plop to the floor, accompanied by the laughter and ridicule of siblings. What might have become of my passion if I had been encouraged to rework the idea, to trade in the towel-cape and seek out increasingly reasoned approaches? (Perhaps the Wright brothers had similar beginnings.) Creativity empowered breeds revision. It is fostered through a willingness to try, recognizing that an idea only dies when we accept our last failure as final.4 There is always more we can learn through experiencing failure.
It is, then, the role of the teacher to foster seeing possibility by reframing failure, to take time to consider whimsy, and to teach students how what might first be regarded as a bad or weak idea can often be reworked into a good one. Focus on asking questions over providing answers – on exploration over giving directives. Provide students with time to reason through the merit of their ideas. Facilitate and coach students to think by considering the answers to the questions, “What if?” or “How might?” or “What’s next?”5
I have never met a teacher who entered the profession with a vision of producing die-cut student minions. Instead, they became teachers because of a deep desire to help students live into and reach their potential. We learn (and teach) so that we might expose new potential solutions, insights, or abilities and then press into, or live into, those possibilities. Teachers strive to recognize possibility within the landscape of every student’s individual giftedness, then work to nurture their unique complement of talents.
How do we do this?
Spend time dreaming, on your own and with your students. Acknowledge that sometimes the dreams that seem crazy may just be the seed of the next idea that changes the world, then empower an attitude to try. Shakespeare said it well in Measure for Measure: “Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.” If we give up on something, it is finished. Where we continue to believe in possibility, creativity knows very few limits.
Photo: iStock
First published in Education Canada, June 2020
1 TEDTalks: Sir Ken Robinson, “Do Schools Kill Creativity?” (New York, N.Y: Films Media Group, 2009).
2 K. Kim, “The Creativity Crisis: The decrease in creative thinking scores on the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking,” Creativity Research Journal 23, no. 4 (2011): 285-295.
3 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, How People Learn II: Learners, contexts, and cultures (Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2018), 149.
4 R. Beghetto, “Taking Beautiful Risks in Education,” The Arts and Creativity in Schools 76, no. 4 (2018): 18-24.
5 Kolb, David & Kolb, Alice. (2017). The Experiential Educator: Principles and Practices of Experiential Learning.
Five B.C. educators with different roles and a shared interest in supporting well-being, came together in a collaborative project to grow well-being across the Langley school district. Here’s how they did it, and what they learned from the process.
What started out as four individuals from different work roles, each of us having a shared goal of supporting well-being in schools, has become a collaborative passion project to grow and sustain well-being across our district. Through this article, we look back on our journey of learning and collaborating, reflecting on some of the insights we have gained about supporting staff well-being in school districts.
Thanks to an assistant superintendent who saw an unusual, but natural, alignment in our work, we formed our district wellness team in the fall of 2017. We each had different but complementary roles – a district principal for student services, a district teacher/counsellor and a human resources manager. We also brought a health authority partner onto our team, providing a valuable broader view of the communities within which the students and educators work and live.
We started our plans with a district-wide learning series on social emotional learning and well-being, to help staff understand the importance of this learning in schools and the amazing outcomes these skills and practices provide around student health, happiness and success. It became apparent that these were the same skills and practices that we needed to build as adults, both so we could model and teach them to students and for our own health and happiness. We were starting to see the importance of adult well-being to positive outcomes for both the adults and the students.
We decided to make teacher and staff well-being our project focus. One of our first objectives was to gain an awareness of how our staff were doing, and to understand their sense of well-being at work. We wanted to gather people together to start a discussion and generate some ideas to support well-being in our district. As with many exciting and challenging tasks, this project became much more complex than we anticipated, and also very rich and rewarding. We are now at the stage of reflecting on all that we have learned, to inform our plans for how to continue the work of supporting teacher and staff well-being in our district. We’d like to share some of the themes that have emerged for us so far as we analyze and reflect on our experiences and data.
Our work to date has underscored that well-being is holistic, encompassing interconnecting aspects. In particular, we have become aware of three important facets of staff well-being.
1. Well-being is individual. An important part of increasing well-being lies with the individual person. This assumption was our starting point, and it has remained an important aspect of how we understand well-being as holistic and interconnected. Focusing on growing staff well-being had us thinking about how to support practices of self-awareness and self-care. Much of the first year of our project was learning about social emotional skills and bringing that back to the district as learning conversations in the workplace. We found that sometimes just acknowledging that self-care matters and sharing what that looks like can go a long way in supporting people to take care of themselves, especially in helping professions where we are so used to caring for others.
2. Well-being is relational. The second interconnected part that became very clear is that well-being is relational and that we are better together, both in terms of productivity/success and in terms of health, happiness and overall well-being. The main focus of our second year was on the relational aspects in our well-being work. This led us to connect with Dr. Sabre Cherkowski. She was completing a multi-year research project on teacher well-being, where she and her colleague, Dr. Keith Walker, had built a theoretical and practical understanding of what it means for educators to flourish in their work.1 Her research was framed within a positive organizational perspective that highlighted how focusing on and supporting positive human capacities at work, such as compassion, humility, kindness, and forgiveness, had a positive and generative affect that often led to increases in other aspects of work such as creativity, productivity, innovation, and commitment to the organization.
We were interested in Dr. Cherkowski’s research approach of using a strength-based, appreciative perspective to notice and nurture what was already working well and what already gives staff a sense of well-being in their work. We were also interested in learning more about an appreciative approach to positive change, focusing on what happens when the whole system is invited into the conversation to reflect on how we might promote and support well-being across our district. With Dr. Cherkowski and the consent of our district, we designed a continuation of our learning series, inviting staff across the district to join us for three dinner events that offered an opportunity to:
At each event, Dr. Cherkowski guided some 150 attendees through a sequence of reflections and activities focused on:
The conversations that emerged created a safe, caring, uplifted environment where colleagues shared their dreams and desires in their work, as well as their challenges and struggles. The evenings became a space for building the relational processes necessary for the work of nurturing well-being for self and others in our own work contexts.
We observed that teams and individuals were now working on plans to connect what they were learning about flourishing to things they might try out in their context. One example was a principal who designed a “tree of flourishing” that she took to her teachers and staff. She suggested they fill out all the ways that they, their students, and their school community were experiencing well-being. As they filled out the tree over a course of a few weeks and posted it around the school, this gave them a sense of pride and ownership for all that was working well. It also provided a touchpoint for conversations around struggles and challenges, as there was a sense of being cared for by a larger community that was working together to tend to the entire tree. Within the challenging and seemingly never-ending work of meeting school goals for all students, this principal developed a tool that evoked a sense of hope, of joy, and of agency about being well together at work.
While participants in our dinner series were working on their inquiries, we were planning to find out more about how teachers and staff were doing with their well-being. We decided to conduct focus groups with teachers and staff in different roles. Our deeper learning from these focus groups is still to come as we work with this valuable data, but we have already learned some things from this process. The first is to bring your district leadership and your union groups into the process early. This was such a helpful process and a good reminder that everyone wants well-being. We are all working toward a common goal. The second one is that health and well-being is something people want to talk about. People want to tell their stories and they want to be heard. If you are going to ask the questions, you have to be prepared to listen to the answers and be willing to co-create a plan that moves discussion into action.
3. Well-being is system-wide. Reminding ourselves to engage in our change work from the level of the system is an especially important piece, even though it often proves difficult to navigate and implement. Our commitment to growing staff well-being across the district meant that we needed to think about the system in all its interrelated parts to embed well-being for the long term. Looking back at our approach through a systems-lens, we:
We have learned that systems are relational entities, and that we need to take care to avoid assigning blame to any part of the system as a separate actor. At the same time, we need to avoid always looking outside the system for our solutions. We have come to understand that “we” are also the system – individuals and groups carrying out our work together toward shared goals, influencing and impacting all other parts of the system. There can be a feeling of empowerment in knowing that we are the ones who inform, create and follow (or not) the policies and practices of “the system.” Many of these practices are helpful to keep things moving. They create a sense of order and common understanding that help define and support our work. It can also be frustrating to realize that our implication in the system also means that many of our practices and our ways of doing things come from a historical context that is no longer applicable or helpful to us. As we learn more about systems change we are building the courage to look at our ways of working compassionately and to be open to the possibilities that follow.
As we begin to understand the interconnectedness of the system, we are also reminded that the feeling of efficacy around systems change is also very important. There is a balance between knowing that some larger changes take time and will require patience, and that other small actions can happen quickly. Focusing our attention on the ways these small changes can impact the larger system over time and contribute to well-being is at the heart of Cherkowski and Walker’s work on flourishing in schools. We are developing a sense of agency, a power to be able co-create an emerging future where decisions and practices around well-being become a primary component of our culture: the way we do things.
One of our most important learnings so far, and what may turn out to be the “secret sauce” for the work of growing well-being for all in schools, is the importance of bringing in multiple voices and ways of knowing. We also need time, space and resources for this work to become sustainable. A few passionate people cannot do this alone or in their “spare time” without it impacting their own health and well-being. In the next part of our journey we will expand our team and look at ways to make this work sustainable and impactful for the long term.
Illustration: iStock
First published in Education Canada, June 2020
1 S. Cherkowski and K. Walker, K. Teacher Wellbeing: Noticing, nurturing, and sustaining flourishing in schools (Burlington, ON: Word and Deed Press, 2018).
On behalf of the EdCan Board and Advisory Council, I would like to wish our network members across the country continued safety and well-being during this challenging time. If you’re feeling over-Zoomed, over-burdened and isolated, you are not alone.
We recognize that the stressful uncertainties associated with the “new normal” back-to-school awaiting teachers, staff and students will place even more strain on their mental health and well-being.
When the pandemic arrived in Canada, EdCan temporarily pivoted our Well at Work initiative – which aims to shift mindsets by showcasing research, policy and practice that results in healthier, happier, and more resilient K-12 staff – to Well at Home. We continue to offer our original, and carefully curated, tools and tips to help you (the front-line first-responders and system leader heroes) to take care of yourselves.
We unfortunately have had no choice but to postpone our Pan-Canadian Summit on K-12 Staff Well-Being that had been scheduled for November 2-4, 2020, but we continue to feature the foremost experts on this topic in an ongoing series of free webinars over the next few months with the goal of maintaining momentum on this crucial issue. I also encourage you to consider using our Well at Work Professional Development Discussion Kit, which offers group discussion and self-reflection guides that can help you and your colleagues unpack how you can strengthen social and emotional well-being together to achieve healthier schools.
Please continue to follow our social media accounts and subscribe to our e-newsletters for our latest blog posts and podcasts with a pan-Canadian perspective, from some of our country’s leading education thinkers, about how we move forward together. We encourage you to add your voice to this ongoing dialogue and please let us know how we can continue to support you and your colleagues to be at your best. Most importantly, please continue to be mindful and kind to yourselves by acknowledging how quickly this situation was cast upon us and how well we’ve all done to ensure that all children continue to learn.
https://edcansummit.ca/webinar-series
As we finalized the articles for this issue of Education Canada, schools and campuses across the country had been closed for about a month to reduce the spread of COVID-19. It looked like students would not be back in class anytime soon. And we were wondering how much sense it made to ship boxes of magazines to empty buildings.
Those closed schools are the reason we are not printing our May issue. Like the teachers and profs who have turned to online technology to connect with their students, we have created an online-only magazine. We invite you to enjoy the PDF version as you “shelter in place.”
In this issue of Education Canada we focus on the skilled trades, and specifically on the K-12 system’s role in connecting students to trades training.
So here’s the dilemma. While I still devoutly believe in the value of a liberal arts education, our world is full of highly educated young adults working precarious minimum-wage service jobs because that’s all they could find. Many of them never even considered skilled trades. Probably nobody ever suggested that they were worth looking into. Some students may have even been steered away from trades when they expressed interest.
Meanwhile, well paying, challenging, steady jobs are going unfilled in many trades sectors. While it’s not up to K-12 schools to qualify students for a trade, we think we could be doing a better job of introducing them to the trades as a desirable career path. We also need more options that allow secondary students to “try before they buy” (and ideally earn credits at the same time), and more fluid pathways that allow students to combine academic and skills-based training.
In our theme section, two innovative Canadian programs that give high schools students a great head start in trades (“TAP into Trades, p. 14, and “Youth Train in Trades,” p. 22) share how they fill that gap. And looking at the bigger picture, David Livingstone and Milosh Raykov (p. 18) discuss the need for expanded apprenticeship programs and better linkages between our education and apprenticeship systems. Paul Stastny (p. 25) examines our other big labour need – digital technology skills – and how the digitizing of many trades creates new opportunities, while Alison Taylor (on our website) argues for experiential and work-integrated learning programs as a means of breaking down “the binary between vocational and professional education.”
Perhaps it comes down to that old ideal of a “well-rounded education.” Shouldn’t an education include learning how to do things as well as how to know things? And can’t we, as Taylor suggests, educate students in a way that prepares them for both democratic citizenship and employability?
Photo: Dave Donald
First published in Education Canada, June 2020
Luigi Iannacci’s Reconceptualizing Disability in Education elevates the discussion of how we “do” school for learners with disabilities and outlines pedagogical practices and discourses that favourably shape the identities of such learners.
Iannacci’s narrative style will appeal to all levels of educators, from elementary to graduate schools of teacher education, and to scholars working in the areas of inclusion, special education, and literacy. I have used this book in both an undergraduate class and a graduate class on personalized learning, to elucidate the connections among inclusion, 21st century notions of student-centered practices, and the implications of using multiliteracies to reach the needs of all learners. The pre-service teachers in my class were particularly moved by Chapter 3’s recounting of the story Evan’s Paper Crane, a transformative anecdote about a student who finds joy and empowerment in becoming the “knower” and “the skillful one.” My graduate class was taken with both the scope and boldness of the writing, as Iannacci explains why current practices for students with disabilities are woefully inadequate, and calls for a reconceptualization of disability in education
This carefully crafted book will inspire educators to develop an inclusive learning environment informed by multiliteracies. Eschewing prescriptive strategies for setting up such an environment, Iannacci points to foundational principles that involve immersion in a variety of multimodal texts that enable literacy development for all students by thinking about them in asset-oriented ways, then differentiating instruction to ensure their success.
The book’s special chapter for parents provoked a productive discussion in my classes of how to approach and support the families of these learners.
It is rare to find a “good read” that also serves as an excellent reference text for educators who are advocating for learners with disabilities. This book does just that.
Photo: Dave Donald
First published in Education Canada, June 2020
Lexington Books, 2018. ISBN-13: 978-1498542753
A program offered at Kwantlen Polytechnic University, provides an immersive training experience to high school students interested in a career in trades. They take a full term of training in the trade of their choice and receive credits both for their high school graduation and toward their trade certification.
Classic thinking says: Students with strong academics go to university and those who don’t do well in school go into the trades. The Faculty of Trades and Technology at Kwantlen Polytechnic University (KPU) seeks to dispel that myth and elevate trades to its rightful place alongside traditional academics at Canada’s only polytechnic university.
Challenging that misconception isn’t easy. Trades are often seen as dirty, back-breaking grunt work.
The truth is that academics play a huge role in the day-to-day work of most skilled tradespeople. Beyond the hands-on skills of each trade, students often use lots of math, and often physics, to complete complex tasks. Effective communication skills are also a must-have, so students are expected to have a solid foundation in English. And like other professionals, tradespeople use a host of soft skills to get their work done, including critical thinking, problem solving, time management, and creativity.
Through our program, Youth Train in Trades, we hope to counter the stigma surrounding skilled trades for counsellors, parents, and students. Youth Train in Trades provides opportunities beyond the ordinary shop class to high school students who want to explore a career in trades. Through the university, students receive an education in the trade of their choice, all while still in high school.
Youth Train in Trades is a trilateral partnership between KPU, local school districts, and the B.C.-focused Industry Training Authority (ITA), which funds the program. It offers high school students an opportunity to learn a trade, while earning credits that count toward their high school diploma and Level 1 of their trades training.
The Youth Train in Trades portfolio is administered by the Associate Dean of Trades and Technology (my office and my team) at KPU. Through regular Trades Training Partnership meetings, the school district representatives come to KPU to discuss schedules, questions, supports, and other information. There are also guest speakers to inform the school districts about things such as student rights and responsibilities.
Currently, KPU has agreements for Youth Train in Trades programs with ten B.C. school districts. For the participating school districts, these programs open up a world beyond traditional academics. KPU’s Faculty of Trades and Technology offers six Youth Train in Trades programs: Automotive, Carpentry, Masonry, Millwright, Plumbing and Piping, and Welding.
The program is relatively low cost for students, as high schools cover the tuition and fees. Students are only responsible for purchasing textbooks and any required personal protective equipment. Mark Flynn, Principal of Career Education at Surrey Schools, says, “We don’t offer programs in-house where students can actually do technical training. In the school system, for it to be viable, you would have to run a full class of 20 to 24 students. If we had too small a number, we couldn’t run the program. With KPU we can adjust. There’s more flexibility.”
Flynn adds, “KPU are easy to work with because they’ve been involved with this for so long they understand what the school districts need to make it work and what our students need to be successful in a program like this.”
Welding and Millwright, in particular, offer unique opportunities for high school students interested in the trades. “They’re really popular in our district. There’s always an interest in the programs, especially for Welding,” said Flynn.
Secondary schools lack the physical space and specialist equipment needed to offer trades programs like Welding or Millwright on their own. Welders fuse metal using flame-cutting, brazing and soldering equipment to form a permanent bond, while millwrights install, align, maintain, inspect, repair, overhaul and dismantle machinery and heavy mechanical equipment.
As mentioned, KPU offers six Youth Train in Trades programs. Depending on the program, they run between 21 and 30 weeks. Most are hybrid programs, with the bulk of the program taught at the student’s high school by a KPU instructor and several weeks taught at the KPU Tech campus.
Piping, Millwright and Welding are all delivered at KPU Tech in blended classrooms, where high school students learn alongside adult fee-paying students.
A Red Seal endorsement can open up a wide range of career paths that value the fundamental knowledge and experience gained through a trades education.
KPU brings the school districts and KPU instructors together to clearly define who’s teaching what. The ITA curriculum defines these as “Line Items”. The instructors negotiate who is teaching which lines to ensure all the required ITA curriculum is covered.
Once enrolled in Youth Train in Trades, students are 100 percent committed to their respective trade. Unless done on their own time, students won’t be taking other high school courses alongside the program. Youth Train in Trades is a dual-credit program, so students are earning high school as well as post-secondary credits.
“Most of our students are in Grade 12 when they do the program,” says Flynn. “So, they’re still going forward with their Dogwood [high school diploma], and now, because the market’s so good, they’re walking out into well-paying jobs. They’re job ready. It’s just a great stepping stone.”
Students in the program learn from skilled, Red Seal-endorsed KPU instructors, using the ITA curriculum. The Red Seal program sets common standards to assess the skills of tradespeople across Canada. To reach Red Seal level in welding, for example, they will have completed their Welding Level 1 and Level 2 apprenticeships, then, depending on their life experiences and employment status, their Welding Level 3 or Level B before taking their Red Seal exam. High school students who take Welding Foundations at KPU through Youth Train in Trades earn the equivalent of a Welding Level 1 and Level 2 apprenticeship.
At KPU, a Millwright student gets the equivalent of all the theory that a Level 1 apprentice would get, says Brian Myette, Millwright instructor and department chair. “Basically, a student who graduates from Millwright is going to get about 50 percent theory, 50 percent practical training,” he says. “And we have a simulated work environment. Why? Because they’re getting credit for practical hours towards their apprenticeship and Level 1 as well.”
The program provides more than specific trade skills. Students also acquire important work skills.
“We recognize that when the students first come in, it’s going to be a big transition for them,” says Myette. “The people studying trades can range in age from 17 up. So, it’s a mix. It’s very diverse. So, they come in, and they’re with many more mature students. That environment means there’s not as much horseplay. They decide it’s time to get serious, so it’s a very good learning environment.”
The benefits of the Youth Train in Trades program are not lost on Jaeden Wildenboer, a KPU Youth Train in Trades graduate and Red Seal-certified welder.
“Honestly, I don’t know what else I’d be doing besides this if I didn’t have that opportunity,” says Wildenboer. “With the skill set and the confidence that it built for me, it opened up so much.”
Most students take Youth Train in Trades in their final semester of high school. For Wildenboer, that meant making some hard decisions.
“When I first had the choice, I did second guess it because I wanted to have my last year of high school with my friends,” he says. “But now that I look back at it, I definitely made the right decision. I’m further ahead than anyone else that I can think of and it’s all because of Youth Train in Trades.”
With his passion ignited, Wildenboer continued to work in welding, gaining valuable hours as he waited for his chance to return for more training. Wildenboer landed a job within a month of graduating from Youth Train in Trades. “That’s only because I wanted to take a month off because we were doing a family vacation that summer. Otherwise it would have been sooner,” he adds.
“I knew I wanted to go back for my B level,” says Wildenboer. “I got my Red Seal when I was 19. I’ve just been working ever since.” Wildenboer says he frequently gets job offers from other companies. “I mean, I don’t even ask them for a job, they just come to me and offer it. I have a great job.”
Now 21, Wildenboer is a big advocate of Youth Train in Trades and has encouraged several friends to take the program.
“Honestly, if I had the chance to do it again, I wouldn’t hesitate,” he says. “I thought it would be a huge step being obviously one of the youngest people in the whole university. But it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. The way the teachers had it all lined up, and all of the processes and everything we did there, it just made me overall a more confident person.”
Beyond the trades themselves, a Red Seal endorsement can open up a wide range of career paths that value the foundational knowledge and experience gained through a trades education, including being a business owner, supervisor, or trades instructor. As educators, we need to make sure that trades are seen by students as a viable career path, not a “backup plan.” Tradespeople require the same commitment and perseverance to succeed as anyone in any other profession.
Thanks to the support of ITA, Youth Train in Trades ensures students aren’t limited to what the high school has to offer and opens up a broader range of career opportunities.
Photo: courtesy KPU / Matt Law
First published in Education Canada, June 2020
This webinar is primarily for governments, education professional organizations, school and school district leaders, teachers and education support workers, and anyone interested in understanding current issues for changes to K-12 schooling for the education sector across Canada in the COVID-19 era.
In March of 2020, Canadian education systems first began to close schools in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. As well as the emergency response shift to remote learning from home, we must also begin to turn our attention to the inevitable task of planning for the future of schooling over the short and medium term. As school reopenings internationally are showing, this is not simply a return to schooling as normal. Moreover, since education in Canada is a provincial responsibility, responses to COVID-19 have been diverse and we would expect plans for the future to be appropriately varied. Fundamentally, what we will need to ask ourselves is: “What conditions need to be in place for students to learn and for teachers to teach, and how will leaders across the system adapt to support these conditions?”
This one-hour webinar panel discussion will explore how we will understand effective leadership across the education sector for the coming months and years by considering implications for governments, teacher organizations, and school leaders.
The Global Recess Alliance, a newly formed group of scholars, health professionals, and education leaders, argues that attention to recess during school reopening is essential. Recess is the only unstructured time in the school day that provides space for children’s physical, social and emotional development, which are essential for well-being and learning. When schools reopen, children will need space to heal from their collective trauma.
The Global Recess Alliance have combined their expertise to provide answers and concrete strategies for a recess that not only works under the current circumstances but paves the way for a fundamental shift in the ways schools approach recess.
Cofounded by Heidi Bornstein and Stephen Chadwick in 2009, Mindfulness everyday is a diverse team of experienced professionals dedicated to educator well-being. Mindfulness Everyday offers various mindfulness programs and practices for educators to provide them with the skills and coping strategies required to support their own mental and physical health.
This webinar first broadcasted on April 15th, provided an experiential introduction to mindfulness research and practices that benefit educators personally and professionally.
Watch the full webinar below:
About Mindfulness Everyday
At Mindfulness Everyday, we envision a society in which we relate to others, the environment, and ourselves with clarity and compassion. We promote mindfulness practices to enhance positive mental and physical health, compassionate action and resilience by providing stress reduction training and life skills for young people, educators, professional support staff and parents in the schools, and for organizations and members of the community.
As their children’s first teachers, parents contribute to their academic and professional development. While parental engagement is crucial to children’s well-being and positive development, parents can also have a negative impact by failing to meet children’s fundamental psychological needs, which are essential to academic and professional success.
Research demonstrates that children generally perceive their parents as being supportive of their psychological needs. It’s important for parents to recognize that they can have a significant impact – positive or negative – on their children’s development. Therefore, parents hoping to guide the positive development of their children are well advised to meet their fundamental psychological needs, thereby encouraging greater academic and professional success.
Guay, F., Ratelle, C.F., Larose, S., Vallerand, R.J., Vitaro, F. (2013). The number of autonomy-supportive relationships: Are more relationships better for motivation, perceived competence, and achievement? Contemporary Educational Psychology. 38, 375-382. doi:10.1016/j.cedpsych. 2013.07.005 Guay, F, Ratelle, C.F., Lessard, V., Dubois, P., & Duchesne, S. (2018). Mothers’ and fathers’ autonomy-supportive and controlling behaviors: An analysis of interparental contributions. Parenting: Science and Practice, 18, 45-65. Duchesne, S., & Ratelle., C.F. (2010). Parental behaviors and adolescents’ achievement goals at the beginning of middle school: Emotional problems as potential mediators. Journal of Educational Psychology, 102, 497-507. doi:10.1037/a0019320 Duchesne, S. & Ratelle, C.F., Feng, B. (2017). Psychological need satisfaction and achievement goals: Exploring indirect effects of academic and social adaptation following the transition to secondary school. Journal of Early Adolescence. doi: 10.1177/0272431616659561 Maltais, C., Duchesne, S., Ratelle, C. F., & Feng, B. (2017). Learning climate, academic competence, and anxiety during the transition to middle school: Parental attachment as a protective factor. European Review of Applied Psychology, 67, 103-112. Ratelle, C.F., Morin, A.J.S., Guay, F., & Duchesne, S. (2018). Sources of evaluation of parental behaviors as predictors of achievement outcomes. Motivation and Emotion,42, 513-526. doi: 10.1007/s11031-018-9692-4
REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING
It was on the third walk of the day, a couple weeks into our COVID isolation norms, that it hit me. My little girl, at the formative age of five, was living in a global pandemic. We were pointing out the teddy bears that neighbours placed in their windows for children to spot during the pandemic. It warmed my heart that so many of my community members, many without children, found old teddies and dolls to place on display to join in the bear campaign. A couple walking their dog approached from the opposite direction, and my daughter, who was walking ahead, without hesitation or reminder took her long six-foot arc around them as we passed. She turned and mouthed the word “virus” to us and carried on.
As we all attempt to restore normalcy in our lives and jobs (whatever our “normal” may be) in the aftermath of a global crisis, there is much to consider. For teachers, this is above and beyond the daily challenges we already face. For some students, COVID 19 may result in, or amplify preexisting, anxiety, depression or trauma. For others the transition back to school and routine will be seamless. Coronavirus will become a distant memory for them, and life will carry on as it did before. I think about my daughter and her support system and how she’s been so fortunate in her life. Others aren’t as lucky, before or after COVID 19.
Much is unknown about the circumstances in homes across this country during the pandemic. What happened in the months of isolation? We may never fully know. How did the long confinement affect homes where domestic violence, abuse or neglect was already present? Of course we know there were students and families who were struggling long before the global pandemic. Some children live within circumstances that are troubling and far beyond their control. Families living on the edge of poverty may have already been struggling with food and home insecurity, lack of childcare, stress over jobs, community violence and more. We know that along with increased risk factors from COVID 19, families have also been deprived of many of their normal coping measures. Spending time with friends and family, going to the mall, seeing a counselor or engaging in extra-curricular activities, among others, have been disrupted. And for many students, their place of refuge, connection or support, is school itself.
Trauma has and will continue to be a pervasive and challenging issue for teachers and students alike. This global crisis has placed a spotlight on various aspects of society, including its multi-faceted inequities – trauma included. It also has certainly served as a reminder that children in schools need more than just their educational outcomes, and that schools serve as more than just educational institutions.
Students who experience chronic trauma (persistent and ongoing, such as adverse living conditions or abuse) are at risk for developmental deficits, attachment disorders and difficulties with learning and behaviour.1 This causes problems for them in school as they attempt to navigate the social, academic and behavioural expectations for their chronological age, while potentially lacking skills in one or more of these areas. Teachers are faced with a multitude of challenges as they work to meet the needs of all their learners. It is challenging to give each child individual attention in addressing their needs while also managing the classroom and curriculum outcomes. This may result in compassion fatigue, feelings of being overwhelmed or exhausted, and a reduced ability to function as they normally would. Some identify compassion fatigue as the cost of caring.
So where do we go from here? What is the teacher’s role in supporting students impacted by trauma? Teachers are not therapists, psychologists, counselors or social workers. Many therapeutic interventions do exist, that support students in one-on-one or in small groups. These are often beneficial and necessary for some students. However, due to limited resources and access, not all students have the opportunity to engage in such programming. Additionally, as Perry2 and Bath3 have noted, research shows that the most healing for trauma-impacted children actually takes place in what some call the “other 23 hours” of the day. A supportive environment for children in all aspects of their day is essential. Equipping teachers with the understanding and strategies to provide this supportive environment can benefit both the students in need, and fortunately, also the teachers themselves.
Being trauma-informed requires educators to have a knowledge base about trauma itself. This does not require teachers to become experts in brain functioning or psychology, but rather a general understanding for the potential impact of chronic trauma for students they teach. This means understanding that trauma is a result of experiences that exceed an individual’s capacity to cope in healthy ways, and which render them unable to function normally. Chronic trauma may be a result of living in poverty, experiencing forms of abuse, experiencing racism, being witness to violence, experiencing significant loss, and more. While adversity is common (and often productive) throughout life, trauma results when our support systems and coping mechanisms for that adversity are not enough. Therefore, trauma is less about events themselves, but our responses to them.
When a child has experienced chronic trauma, the result may be delays in various aspects of their development. This may affect their social skills and ability to form relationships, their cognitive, physical and emotional development, their ability to regulate, learn and cope with daily demands. Trauma-impacted children walk through their world with a heightened sense of danger and can be triggered into a fear response for situations that are perceived as threatening. School is a place where students not only learn, but navigate various situations, relationships and challenges. Children who are trauma-impacted therefore often struggle in many aspects of school.
Attachment is protective factor against trauma. Many children who experience chronic trauma, however, struggle with relationships and trust. They also may not have fully experienced secure and healthy relationships in their lives. Building positive relationships with students is therefore critical, for feelings of safety, acceptance and love. Giving unconditional positive regard and showing patience are ways to build this trust. This does not mean lifting boundaries and expectations. In fact, boundaries are more important than ever. Setting and sticking to limits is essential, but done with patience and compassion. Teachers have the opportunity to spend a considerable amount of time with their students throughout the school year. They can demonstrate and model positive and consistent relationships and establish new understandings of what a healthy relationship is. Child psychiatrist and trauma expert Bruce Perry talks about the power of small positive encounters and interactions for children throughout the day. “Therapeutic dosing”4 as he calls it, is a simple yet effective way for these new patterns to develop. He asserts that “just as traumatic experience can alter a life in an instant, so too can a therapeutic encounter.”5
Children impacted by trauma often are on high alert, ready to respond. Learning is virtually impossible for children who feel unsafe. Physical and emotional safety are essential in schools, as is the importance of felt safety. It is possible for trauma-impacted children to feel unsafe regardless of whether or not this is reality. Teachers are able to increase feelings of safety by creating consistent and predictable environments. This means creating a safe space where classroom community is a primary focus, and being cognizant of preparing children for transitions and change. Our responses and behaviours as teachers must also be consistent and predictable. We can recognize that some behaviours we are witness to, may be a response to feeling unsafe, versus a desire to misbehave. Behaviour is about communication. A meltdown or act of defiance, might be a fear response, or manifestations of a need. Maintaining a consistent and supportive role in responding to all behaviour with compassion and understanding, strengthens the teacher-student bond and establishes trust. We can be the calm they need, when they are not. Students will often mirror our reactions and behaviours. Keeping this thought in our minds can support us in our reactions and the way we assist students in regulating their emotions.
All children have strengths. Seeking them out and helping students to see them for themselves, as “inner-wealth,”6 is an important part of supporting growth and learning. As previously mentioned, students impacted by trauma may also have deficits in areas of development. Teachers can support all students by teaching to specific “lagging skills.”7 Lessons on social skills, problem solving, organization, self-regulation, friendship skills, mindfulness, conflict resolution and more, may be valuable in filling gaps in much-needed development. Social-emotional learning is a necessary component of trauma-informed classrooms. We can acknowledge and begin with student strengths that build confidence and engagement, and seek out the areas where more explicit teaching is needed.
An often-neglected focus for teachers, yet an essential component of trauma-informed practice, is self-care. As teachers, we simply cannot give what we don’t have. We must not only take care of ourselves through intentional self-care planning (exercise, leisure activities, support networks, eating well, etc.) but also be vigilant in noticing and identifying when we feel overwhelmed. There is vulnerability in reaching out to our colleagues and administrators when we require support, but it is a valuable step for our own wellness. As colleagues, we need to support one another and create a space where everyone feels empowered to reach out. This work is not easy and cannot be done in isolation.
Returning to work after months of remoteness may bring new feelings of anxiety and fear, or heightened preexisting mental health issues. Let us name it. We must be patient with ourselves and check on our colleagues. Let’s debrief our days and take a breath. We are not alone, and the load should not be solely ours to bear. Focusing on strong working relationships and a team approach will be crucial. As teachers, we need to open our classroom doors and support one another. The feeling of pressure on the shoulders of the classroom teachers alone, increases the risk of burnout and fatigue. “Our” students are also part of the whole school community and the community beyond the school. We benefit from creating partnerships outside of the school, building relationships with parents and community members and collectively wrapping our arms around our students and ourselves.
TEACHERS’ DAYs are often a whirlwind. Decision-making is happening constantly, and our attention is split in many different directions. Teachers don’t need more on their plates. We do, however, benefit from new knowledge for making teaching and learning more successful. Fortunately, trauma-informed strategies, such as those listed above, are good teaching practices for all students – and many are already happening all through Canadian schools. If we keep relationships at the centre and have more understanding for our students through a knowledge of the pervasive impact of chronic traumatic experiences, we will be making a difference. We will be contributing to the supportive environment that children require, to reach their full potential. With this understanding, teachers too, can feel the positive impact of a trauma-informed classroom and school. Caring doesn’t always have to come at significant cost, but instead, can provide meaningful and effective experiences that leave teachers feeling more empowered and connected.
As we transition into our post-COVID lives (whenever “post” will be), it is important to recognize how this virus may have impacted the lives of our students, and our own. We must also keep in mind that well before COVID 19, some of our students have struggled with trauma and adversity that will continue to impact their lives and learning. Our students who were accessing counseling or psychological services prior to school closures, and making gains, may experience setbacks. We may feel that impact throughout our schools. During these last devastating months, this virus has certainly opened the eyes of many to various societal inequities, in addition to forms of trauma. Those issues, however, were always and will always be present in the lives of many of our students. This unprecedented event has also taught us how precious life and time truly are. The entire world seemed to stand still at moments, causing many of us to reflect upon our jobs, roles, purpose and values. I was certainly one of them. It reminded me of how strongly I believe in our nations’ teachers and our ability to care beyond the curriculum.
With small doses of kindness, intentional teaching, and a heightened awareness of trauma’s impact, we can add to the environment needed for all to heal and grow. Our students are worth it, and so are we.
PHOTO: ISTOCK
This webinar first broadcasted on May 12th discussed individual and organizational resilience in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this hour-long webinar, Dr. Graham Lowe explained:
The features of a healthy organization, especially its culture and inclusive approach to leadership, that can support your workforce now and prepare it for the recovery
How resilience is one of the defining characteristics of a healthy organization
How resilience is a psychological health and safety skill that can be cultivated within school and school district teams.
How resilience is part of a broader set of capabilities called Psychological Capital (PsyCap)
The ways that Psychological Capital (PsyCap) supports a transformational leadership style and contributes to K-12 workplace well-being.
Watch the full webinar below:
Want to watch upcoming webinars as they are released? Visit our webinar series to sign up today!
The mental health and well-being of students in Canadian schools has become a growing concern – but it’s not just children’s well-being that’s concerning. Recent research demonstrates that the well-being of both students and teachers go hand-in-hand. In particular, increased teacher well-being leads to more supportive teacher-student relationships. Despite this evidence, a Canadian Teachers’ Federation survey shows that 85% of teachers find that poor work-life balance is affecting their ability to teach the way they would like to teach.
Teachers who have a positive sense of how they feel, think, and act generally have a sense of relatedness (i.e. connectedness) with fellow staff, believe their strengths and skills are valued, and have autonomy to collaborate and provide feedback.
School staff who persist, bounce forward, and thrive in the face of adversity usually demonstrate strong relationship practices and professionalism, positive attitudes, emotional intelligence, and adaptation skills.
EMBODY POSITIVE LEADERSHIP:
Administrators who are committed to helping teachers achieve their highest potential and succeed show compassion and gratitude, know the strengths/interests of their staff, clarify roles and expectations, and provide opportunities for growth.
The factors that promote student well-being are, in many ways, the same as the factors that promote teacher well-being. A positive school climate leads to reduced teacher absenteeism, fewer teachers leaving the profession, stronger teacher-student relationships, and improved student achievement. Targeted training for school teams and leaders on mental fitness and resiliency practices that foster teachers’ sense of relatedness, competency, and autonomy represent an important first step in improving school climate, reducing teacher stress, and enhancing student achievement.
Work-Life Balance and the Canadian Teaching Profession by Bernie Froese-Germain via Canadian Teachers’ Federation Three key conditions to create a healthy workplace by Bill Morrison via The Globe and Mail Infographic: The Positive Workplace Framework (PWF) via Well at Work by EdCan
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION RESOURCES
Burke, R., Greenglass, E., & Schwarzer, R. (1996). Predicting teacher burnout over time: Effects of work stress, social support, and self-doubts on burnout and its consequences. Anxiety, Stress & Coping: An International Journal, 9(3), 261-275. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/10615809608249406 Briner, R., & Dewberry, C. (2007). Staff well-being is key to school success. London: Worklife Support Ltd/Hamilton House. Darr, W., and Johns, G., (2008). Work strain, health, and absenteeism: A meta-analysis. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology,13(4), 293-318. doi: https://doi.org/10.1037/a0012639 Hoglund, W. L., Klingle, K. E., & Hosan, N. E. (2015). Classroom risks and resources: Teacher burnout, classroom quality and children’s adjustment in high needs elementary schools. Journal of School Psychology, 53(5), 337-357. doi: 10.1016/j.jsp.2015.06.002 Jennings, P.A., Brown, J. L., Frank, J. L., Doyle, S., Oh, Y., Davis, R., DeMauro, A. A. & Greenberg, M. T. (2017). Impacts of the CARE for teachers program on teachers’ social and emotional competence and classroom interactions. Journal of Educational Psychology, 109(7), 1010–1028. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/edu0000187 Laurie, R. (2019, December). Measuring school well-being: The mental fitness and resiliency inventory and the School Happiness Index (SHI). Education Canada Magazine, 59(4). Retrieved from: https://www.edcan.ca/articles/measuring-school-well-being Laurie, R., Morrison, B. & Peterson, P. (2019, December). The Positive Workplace Framework (PWF): A strengths-based approach for thriving schools. Education Canada Magazine, 59(4). Retrieved from: https://www.edcan.ca/articles/the-positive-workplace-framework/ McLean, L., & Connor, C. M. (2015). Depressive symptoms in third‐grade teachers: Relations to classroom quality and student achievement. Child Development, 86(3), 945-954. doi: 10.1111/cdev.12344 Miller, R. (2012). Teacher absence as a leading indicator of student achievement: New national data offer opportunity to examine cost of teacher absence relative to learning loss. Washington, DC: Center for American Progress. Miller, R., Murnane, R., & Willett, J. (2008). Do teacher absences impact student achievement? Longitudinal evidence from one urban school district. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 30(2), 181-200. doi: https://doi.org/10.3102/0162373708318019 Molero Jurado, M. D. M., Pérez-Fuentes, M. D. C., Atria, L., Oropesa Ruiz, N. F., & Gázquez Linares, J. J. (2019). Burnout, perceived efficacy, and job satisfaction: Perception of the educational context in high school teachers. BioMed research international, 2019. doi: 10.1155/2019/1021408 Núñez, J. L., Fernández, C., León, J., & Grijalvo, F. (2015). The relationship between teacher’s autonomy support and students’ autonomy and vitality. Teachers and Teaching: Theory and Practice, 21(2), 191-202. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13540602.2014.928127 Oberle, E., & Schonert-Reichl, K. A. (2016). Stress contagion in the classroom? The link between classroom teacher burnout and morning cortisol in elementary school students. Social Science & Medicine, 159, 30-37. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2016.04.031 Roffey, S. (2012). Pupil Wellbeing – Teacher Wellbeing: Two sides of the same coin. Educational & Child Psychology, 29(4), 8-17. Retrieved from: https://www.sueroffey.com/wp-content/uploads/import/32-Roffey%20ECP29-4.pdf Ronfeldt, M., Loeb, S., & Wyckoff, J. (2013). How teacher turnover harms student achievement. American Educational Research Journal, 50(1), 4-36. doi: https://doi.org/10.3102%2F0002831212463813 Statistics Canada. (2020). Work absence of full-time employees by industry, annual. Retrieved from: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1410019101
REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING
The mental health and well-being of students in Canadian schools has become a growing concern – but it’s not just children’s well-being that’s concerning. Recent research demonstrates that the well-being of both students and teachers go hand-in-hand. In particular, increased teacher well-being leads to more supportive teacher-student relationships. Despite this evidence, a Canadian Teachers’ Federation survey shows that 85% of teachers find that poor work-life balance is affecting their ability to teach the way they would like to teach.
Teachers who have a positive sense of how they feel, think, and act generally have a sense of relatedness (i.e. connectedness) with fellow staff, believe their strengths and skills are valued, and have autonomy to collaborate and provide feedback.
School staff who persist, bounce forward, and thrive in the face of adversity usually demonstrate strong relationship practices and professionalism, positive attitudes, emotional intelligence, and adaptation skills.
EMBODY POSITIVE LEADERSHIP:
Administrators who are committed to helping teachers achieve their highest potential and succeed show compassion and gratitude, know the strengths/interests of their staff, clarify roles and expectations, and provide opportunities for growth.
The factors that promote student well-being are, in many ways, the same as the factors that promote teacher well-being. A positive school climate leads to reduced teacher absenteeism, fewer teachers leaving the profession, stronger teacher-student relationships, and improved student achievement. Targeted training for school teams and leaders on mental fitness and resiliency practices that foster teachers’ sense of relatedness, competency, and autonomy represent an important first step in improving school climate, reducing teacher stress, and enhancing student achievement.
Work-Life Balance and the Canadian Teaching Profession by Bernie Froese-Germain via Canadian Teachers’ Federation Three key conditions to create a healthy workplace by Bill Morrison via The Globe and Mail Infographic: The Positive Workplace Framework (PWF) via Well at Work by EdCan
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION RESOURCES
Burke, R., Greenglass, E., & Schwarzer, R. (1996). Predicting teacher burnout over time: Effects of work stress, social support, and self-doubts on burnout and its consequences. Anxiety, Stress & Coping: An International Journal, 9(3), 261-275. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/10615809608249406 Briner, R., & Dewberry, C. (2007). Staff well-being is key to school success. London: Worklife Support Ltd/Hamilton House. Darr, W., and Johns, G., (2008). Work strain, health, and absenteeism: A meta-analysis. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology,13(4), 293-318. doi: https://doi.org/10.1037/a0012639 Hoglund, W. L., Klingle, K. E., & Hosan, N. E. (2015). Classroom risks and resources: Teacher burnout, classroom quality and children’s adjustment in high needs elementary schools. Journal of School Psychology, 53(5), 337-357. doi: 10.1016/j.jsp.2015.06.002 Jennings, P.A., Brown, J. L., Frank, J. L., Doyle, S., Oh, Y., Davis, R., DeMauro, A. A. & Greenberg, M. T. (2017). Impacts of the CARE for teachers program on teachers’ social and emotional competence and classroom interactions. Journal of Educational Psychology, 109(7), 1010–1028. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/edu0000187 Laurie, R. (2019, December). Measuring school well-being: The mental fitness and resiliency inventory and the School Happiness Index (SHI). Education Canada Magazine, 59(4). Retrieved from: https://www.edcan.ca/articles/measuring-school-well-being Laurie, R., Morrison, B. & Peterson, P. (2019, December). The Positive Workplace Framework (PWF): A strengths-based approach for thriving schools. Education Canada Magazine, 59(4). Retrieved from: https://www.edcan.ca/articles/the-positive-workplace-framework/ McLean, L., & Connor, C. M. (2015). Depressive symptoms in third‐grade teachers: Relations to classroom quality and student achievement. Child Development, 86(3), 945-954. doi: 10.1111/cdev.12344 Miller, R. (2012). Teacher absence as a leading indicator of student achievement: New national data offer opportunity to examine cost of teacher absence relative to learning loss. Washington, DC: Center for American Progress. Miller, R., Murnane, R., & Willett, J. (2008). Do teacher absences impact student achievement? Longitudinal evidence from one urban school district. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 30(2), 181-200. doi: https://doi.org/10.3102/0162373708318019 Molero Jurado, M. D. M., Pérez-Fuentes, M. D. C., Atria, L., Oropesa Ruiz, N. F., & Gázquez Linares, J. J. (2019). Burnout, perceived efficacy, and job satisfaction: Perception of the educational context in high school teachers. BioMed research international, 2019. doi: 10.1155/2019/1021408 Núñez, J. L., Fernández, C., León, J., & Grijalvo, F. (2015). The relationship between teacher’s autonomy support and students’ autonomy and vitality. Teachers and Teaching: Theory and Practice, 21(2), 191-202. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13540602.2014.928127 Oberle, E., & Schonert-Reichl, K. A. (2016). Stress contagion in the classroom? The link between classroom teacher burnout and morning cortisol in elementary school students. Social Science & Medicine, 159, 30-37. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2016.04.031 Roffey, S. (2012). Pupil Wellbeing – Teacher Wellbeing: Two sides of the same coin. Educational & Child Psychology, 29(4), 8-17. Retrieved from: https://www.sueroffey.com/wp-content/uploads/import/32-Roffey%20ECP29-4.pdf Ronfeldt, M., Loeb, S., & Wyckoff, J. (2013). How teacher turnover harms student achievement. American Educational Research Journal, 50(1), 4-36. doi: https://doi.org/10.3102%2F0002831212463813 Statistics Canada. (2020). Work absence of full-time employees by industry, annual. Retrieved from: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1410019101
REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING
While a breadth of empirical evidence has been published on ways to increase student well-being, there has been little empirical research on how to address whole school well-being.
Based on this gap in the literature, The Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) has created two organizational approaches to school well-being in Canada that are currently being tested in numerous K-12 schools.
In this hour-long webinar first broadcasted on April 30th, Emily Larson explains the two approaches including tips for leveraging them during COVID-19, which include:
Watch the full webinar below:
Want to watch upcoming webinars as they are released? Visit our webinar series to sign up today!
MESSAGE FROM BIT – SHARE YOUR STORY!
As part of our efforts to support school wellbeing during these times of uncertainty, we would love to hear from you on how you are coping. While you cannot be together, sharing stories with other teachers in Canada is a powerful way to connect and support one another. We are collecting stories, which we may use in some of our messages to teachers, principals, and support staff over the next few weeks. If you are willing to share your story (which will be used anonymously) please email wellbeing@bi.team. These stories may be on the struggles you are facing right now, how you have managed to find meaning while working from home or how you are trying to maintain a work-life balance – there are no right answers! We thank you for everything you are doing to support your students – and remember to take care of yourself!
This recent blog by the CCUNESCO offers an update on the global context in education during COVID-19, and shares online resources, including their recently-launched Teacher’s Toolkit for the UNESCO Schools Network in Canada, which contains ideas and resources that all teachers and parents can use. This toolkit draws on a variety of resources to give educators a range of activities and best practices to support students of all ages to learn about human rights and global citizenship, sustainable development, climate action, and reconciliation with Indigenous peoples.