I recently read John Hoffman's wonderful blog post about Thoughts On Parenting While Angry. I was really taken by this post, as I realized that it's not just parents that have these moments. Educators can also have them. I remember one of these moments for me last year. I walked [...]
The Future Lies in the Hands of Self-Reg Parents, Schools, and Communities I first started thinking about social justice and democracy when I was 16 years old. I had just attended a political rally where Pierre Elliot Trudeau talked about a Just Society: one in which “equality of opportunity is [...]
As a Kindergarten teacher, I understand the value of dramatic play. I know that students communicate much of their thinking and learning in this way. There are so many opportunities for oral language, including the development of new vocabulary, as part of dramatic play. But the truth is, I rarely like [...]
The Self-Reg educator or parent seeks to understand, rather than manage a child’s behaviour. In effect, what is being reframed here is what it means to see the Kindergarten teacher as a professional and not a glorified baby-sitter: someone who has been trained to ask the right kind of “Why” and has [...]
Kindergarten marks a major transition in children’s lives: from being coddled infants to being treated as responsible individuals. They are students now, and as such they have to meet certain expectations, as noted in an article published on education.com: “He can follow the lead of a teacher and will honor [...]
By: Alison Cass Ronald,* age five, is an empathetic and hard working child. His parents have taught him love, kindness and compassion. Each day he works harder than most children in my kindergarten class. Ronald comes to school with a smile on his face—and one of heaviest backpacks in our [...]
The more that you learn about Self-Reg, the more that it seems to govern your views of everything in your life. Sometimes I'm sure that Stuart Shanker's questions of, "Why?" and "Why now?" never leave my head. And yet, no matter how much we've learned about Self-Reg, sometimes we miss [...]
This was originally an article in the Self-Reg Parenting Magazine Vol 1 Issue 2. Take a look at this picture and tell me whether there’s something in the duck’s bill: Now take a look at this picture and tell me whether there is something in the rabbit’s mouth: This phenomenon [...]
Psychiatrist Jean Clinton has been an internationally renowned expert and advocate for children’s mental health for over 30 years. We were thrilled to have Dr. Clinton at our summer symposium once again last summer. In her keynote address, Dr. Clinton drew from her wealth of experience and knowledge to address [...]
By: Tiffany Goulet The first day of school... For some it’s exciting, for others terrifying. For some it’s long awaited, for others it arrived too soon. For some they feel ready, for others not at all. No matter how differently we all feel about this transition, we can surely agree [...]