We did not sign up for this session, but ended up here because the “stress management for teachers” was overflowing. We randomly entered the next room, and were not initially thrilled with topic, as it is something the two of us have discussed at length already and we have both had emotionally charged reactions to.

From the discussion, we realized that our perspective has changed in that the conversation needs to move away from (or is shifting away from) gun control and mental health, but more on building safety issues: concrete, real world, reduction in casualties-type conversations. It seems to be the only thing people really agree on.

One thing we wanted to see applied is that in the event that a teacher is out of the classroom during a lockdown, we will need students to take charge. Some kids may volunteer for this role, or a blanket statement may be made to the entire classroom. This is something that hasn’t come up with administration before, but it will need to be addressed immediately.  

Ultimately to follow up, we need more training,a common language, and protocol as far as building safety and security are concerned. 

Our second session was on parent communication. Others in session left, but we stayed and discussed what issues we often face as teachers when trying to communicate with difficult or frustrated parents. 

Moving forward, we think that we will continue to use a script to focus the conversation if it goes off the rails; the script is found in a workbook Parents as Partners. We think that it would be helpful if this common script and additional common terms and language to talk about grades, effort, expectations, failures/successes, etc; was available and utilized district-wide, or at least that teachers are made aware of it, and could use it as their own discretion. In addition, role-playing these tough conversations would be helpful to practice this and it could easily be something done in rookie-school and refreshed maybe every 3 or 4 years.  

Further, it might help if parents were given some structure and guidance for how to get the most out of parent communication. We believe parents sometimes come to the table not sure what they want to discuss and this can lead to lengthy, counter-productive conversations.   

This session started out slowly, but Dana Bolduc took charge and led us in a good direction. We learned that many of our colleagues feel the same as we do when it comes to the fear and concern we have for how and when to have conversations about drugs and addiction. We think, moving forward, we will make more of an effort to stay current in our knowledge of trends, language and behavior. You can sometimes feel like you, “know everything,” but the fact is, thing are always changing and a truly vigilant educator needs to keep themselves sharp. Diane Dichara mentioned a workshop with breakout session that is happening during our next half-day in April, and it seems sound to attend it.