Mental Health!
I wanted to write this post in May for Mental Health Awareness Month, but clearly time has gotten away from me (yet again). Here is a post Gabby managed to write in a more timely fashion for Mental Health Awareness Month in the past! As we look toward the next school year with lots of uncertainty and anxiety inducing unknowns looming for most kids and teachers, here are some ways to support kids in managing their disappointment or anxiety about our unknown future. Please keep in mind that these are strategies to deal with uncertainty and anxiety, but NOT ways to handle grief or trauma.
Some things I tried that seemed to support my students this year:
Talk about what you miss or would have done in more typical circumstances periodically. It’s okay to acknowledge disappointment and important to model expressing and thinking through emotions to students. Indulging in fantasy about what we might/could have done in other circumstances can make students feel better and help them get their feelings out. This isn’t something to do every single day, but periodically or around important milestones or holidays. (For example, I talked to my students about how I was disappointed about all of the restrictions during my son’s first Halloween, but I was looking forward to having him wear his costume during our party over Zoom).
Make up an alternate version of things as much as you can! Our Halloween party over Zoom was actually a huge success and a lot of fun. We also built “tents” in our homes and shared photos of them as an alternative to outdoor education/a camping trip. Try to continue traditions as much as you can, even if it means giving students and families the option to do things at home or on their own and share photos or stories.
Try new ways to connect if you are getting tired of video chats or distanced, masked interactions. Ask students to write letters or design and write postcards. Or give students the option of sharing something about themselves in a creative way - they’ll come up with all kinds of ideas we would never think of!
Sending photos or making videos when meeting in person isn’t an option. It is always a pick me up. My students were very motivated and cheered by videos or photos of my baby, and my co-teacher and I sent students a photo postcard so they could see our faces before school started since our traditional meet the teachers/see your classroom open house was cancelled.
Give students an opportunity to be creative! There is so much you can do with limited materials. We’ve used sheets of foil to make team or partner sculptures, or had partner creations (for example, someone draws and someone writes captions) that could be done in person/distanced or online.
As always, find new ways to bring joy into class! Share something that made you smile and tie it into a sign in, response, greeting or something else. We used this “It’s an avocado, thanks!” video to talk about gratitude in the past, and my students also liked writing to my baby or writing a narrative to go along with a video of my baby.
And of course, powerful read alouds work for so many purposes! We read Hello Universe by Erin Entrada Kelly aloud to our class this year and students really responded to one of the characters being trapped, another character feeling unheard and misunderstood, and more. Using characters as a conduit is a great way to talk about our feelings. Other read alouds that I love in general, but also for talking about emotions are:
Front Desk by Kelly Yang: strong connections for students to learn about taking action when feeling powerless, fear, missing family, racism, discrimination, inequality, and more. This is another long chapter book read aloud, but definitely worth the time!
Saturday by Oge Mora is a gorgeous picture book and I’ve used it to talk to kids about managing disappointment
Carmela Full of Wishes by Matt de la Peña is another gorgeous picture book and deals with hope and loss, sibling relations, immigrant rights.
Big Red Lollipop by Rukhsana Khan. This lovely picture book caused intense reactions from my students and led to some powerful discussions, as well as being a great mentor text for descriptive writing. We also touched on managing disappointment, things being “unfair,” frustration with siblings, making kind choices, and different religions and family traditions.
Malaika’s Costume by Irene Luxbacher and Nadia L. Hohn is another beautiful picture book. Students connected with Malaika missing her mother, feeling disappointed, having money troubles, and eventually being creative and finding a solution that made everyone feel good. It could also inspire some costume making or other creativity!