As our nation seems continuously more divided, we need to bridge conflict among us and make belonging a part of our consciousness. This starts with our youth. Teaching Empathy Institute (TEI), designed a program that addresses this important issue. A School of Belonging teaches educators how to make belonging a part of the consciousness that pervades the school, and classroom settings by exploring what is needed to promote emotional safety, resilience, mindfulness, equity, empathy, and diversity.
TEI’s School of Belonging Micro-Courses for educators are designed to be taken individually or as a group, allowing maximum flexibility to fit educators busy schedules. A bundle of micro-learning courses can be configured to meet a school or district’s specific set of needs, or the entire program can be presented as a whole for a la carte selection.
The Program
School of Belonging offerings are presented in two formats:
- Virtual workshops: 60-minute workshops facilitated synchronously via the Zoom Platform.
- Accompanying asynchronous micro-learning courses which consist of readings, videos, podcasts, self-reflection exercises, integration practices, and music. Each course is an extension of the live workshops, providing a deeper learning and application experience for course participants. Participants receive 2 credit hours for each course. Pre-requisite for each course is the accompanying virtual workshop.
Target Audience:
k-12 classroom teachers, school leaders, and mental health professionals.
Participants Receive:
A workshop and course manual and reflective practice journal.
Participants who take all 5 workshops and courses receive copies of A Year of Belonging: Fifty-Two Practices and Reflections for Educators & TEI’s core resource, Field guide to A School of Belonging along with a School of Belonging Certification.
The Courses
1. Building a Classroom Community: In this workshop, we will explore how to build a “common-unity” for all students through the use of common language, ritual, and social culture building processes.
Accompanying micro-learning course:
Creating the Conditions for Emotional Safety: Utilizing the literature on meeting a child’s emotional needs, this course provides the “blueprint for emotional safety” and how to follow this blueprint to create the conditions for emotional safety and healthy relationships.
2. Teaching Self-Regulation: In this workshop, we will reflect on how to teach self-regulation to our students by refining our own co-regulation practices. Emotional intelligence as a self-improvement tool will also be explored.
Accompanying micro-learning course:
Self-Regulation, Mindfulness, and Focus: In this course, participants are introduced to the 3 areas of “Focus”-inner, other, and outer, and how we can teach mindfulness, mindful decision-making and goal-setting, within each of these focus areas, through co-regulation practices, empathic intention setting and perceptual diversity exercises.
3. Helping Students Manage Life’s Challenges: In this workshop, we will articulate what stressors impact students negatively and how we can intentionally empower our students toward resilience, by equipping them with the skills and strategies necessary to manage the multitude of stressors that exist inside and outside of the classroom.
Accompanying micro-learning course:
Resilience in Practice: This course focuses on how to establish rapport with young people as a mechanism for building an emotionally safe learning environment in the school and classroom setting that is inclusive, engaging and celebratory. Additionally, course participants will learn how to effectively teach pro-social skills (including conflict management and resolution) to their students.
4. Teaching Empathy: In this workshop, we will learn how to use three specific classroom/culture building tools: the listening wheel, the fishbowl and the community meeting. Conflict resolution, mediation, and empathy dialogue sessions will also be explored.
Accompanying micro-learning course:
Empathy, Equity and Inclusion: In this course, empathy is articulated as a bundle of 5 pro-social skills along with how to effectively teach these skills to one’s students. Equity is also explored as a core component of professional reflective practice as it relates to implicit bias, emotional imprinting and empathic teaching approaches in which diversity is embraced and celebrated.
5. Dialogues on Diversity: In this workshop, we will experience the concept of “point of view” as an entry point to diversity awareness.
Accompanying micro-learning course:
Naming the World of Learning and Self-Discovery: This course codifies the work of educator and social activist Paolo Freire who sought to teach people to appreciate what they already knew, to take control of their own knowledge and to create, with some assistance and encouragement, their own educations. The practices embedded into this course are inspired by Freire’s seminal quote: “That which is unnamed is invisible and teacher’s job is to name the world.”
Learn More
Please contact us to learn about our program options and pricing via email info(at)teachingempathyinstitute.org or phone (845) 687-6207