A sense of belonging within a school community is perhaps our most powerful tool to promote not only student well being and resilience but to enhance student academic engagement. A sense of belonging is associated with higher academic achievement, better attendance, improved behavior, and reductions in mental health problems, among many other benefits. Unfortunately, there is a crisis of belonging in our schools. Drawing upon research from brain science, social sciences, education and 30 years of practice within schools, this session will help participants uncover the positive impact of a belonging community on students and staff, discuss factors that threaten a student's sense of belonging and provide strategies that can be implemented immediately to create a belonging community in our classrooms and in our schools.
Are you looking for strategies to improve student focus, supplement class instruction, and boost test scores? This session offers instructional tips for incorporating physical activity into the classroom. Learn how to integrate brain breaks and energize your classroom.
This presentation will review how education and our society has moved from a “we” ideology to a “me” focus. From tracing the words, we use, actions of schools, and historical antidotes the audience will gain a sense of how far from community we have come. By using my journey as a first-year principal in the COVID era and being candid about grief, depression, anxiety, imposter syndrome, humor, love, embracing the chaos, contact tracing, trauma, building student self-esteem, and the triumph of students, the audience will learn how to build a school based “we” that fosters finding peace within themselves and how that builds a better school and fosters community. The audience will leave with the understanding that they too can foster their own “we” by looking deep into their “me”. If someone in the audience has considered their “why” from a perspective of anxiety, stress, or even contemplated leaving the field, but retains the resolve to remain in education – this presentation will provide them with the insight and tools to sustain their energy and mental health to do the work, and to share what they have learned with others. So that our “we” can support and retain “me”.
