Building a Trauma Informed System of Care Toolkit

Building a Trauma Informed System of Care Aim High to Reach All

Educator Training

After dozens of educators attended the four-hour SAMHSA training, “Trauma Informed Care, Key Principles and Assumptions” in Johnson City, questions surfaced from them about how they should create a trauma responsive classroom or if there were known ways they could reshape school culture. We developed an educator training that helps teachers recognize that a traumatized brain has a more highly developed stress response system than a non- traumatized brain – and this will affect the child’s behavior. Students who are experiencing ongoing toxic stress display behaviors that may be seen as problem behaviors, but are likely driven by an underdeveloped executive control system and overdeveloped “fight or flight” system. For many students, the classroom is the only environment where there is predictability and stability, which has been shown to reduce problem behavior and help students to feel safer. Along with teaching science, history, and math, classrooms need to model emotion regulation for students who have not grown up in an environment with nurturing, supportive caregivers in order to learn this. To address this, a two-hour “Educators Training” was developed.

Learning objectives for this course are: • What is Trauma • How to Identify Trauma •

How Trauma Effects Brain Development

• • • • • •

Understanding and Using ACEs

Prevalence of Trauma

Chad’s Story 1 – survivor story video

Creating a Trauma Responsive Classroom/School Examples of Trauma Responsive Practices

Menu of Classroom Interventions

1 Changing Minds: “Chad”; Length 5:29; Available from Futures Without Violence https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFH6GR0ASKg

30