Week 6 + 7: A Mental Health Conversation

Hi!

During these weeks I learned a lot about students and teaching in general. On Friday, Ms. Nalipinski was not at school, so I had the experience of watching over 20 nine-year-olds for the day. As a result of a lack of their usual supervision, students were acting out and refused to listen to any teachers.

On Tuesday during their SEL learning period, I taught them about mindfulness and gratitude, their wellness theme of the month. We made a “Thankful Thoughts” box where each student wrote one thing that they were thankful for and received a surprising amount of admirable responses. Next, we showed them a video on mindfulness, during which many tried to meditate. After that we had them close their eyes and use the methods they learned in the video. Every student gladly participated except for two!

Lastly, they each wrote a journal on a time when they used a skill learned in their SEL lessons. Many responses described friendship problems and stressful times in their lives, and how they used deep breathing or journaling to help.

Today they are getting ready for a serious mental health discussion with Ms. Schickling. They were asked to answer the prompt “Has anyone ever talked to you about mental health? What did you learn/what do you know?” and “Do you know how to ask for help should you need it? What would you do?”. Many students have trouble understanding the severity of their jokes so a conversation is essential to their apprehension. Student responses were honestly very emotional. Some wrote about basic conversations with parents, but others talked about serious issues they’ve experienced as fourth graders and how they’ve coped with them.

I learned a lot from them this week and am excited to continue learning more!

See you next week!