Author: Jaime Krastel

Hello Friends!

For my final post sharing about “Stress in the Classroom”, I thought it would make the most sense to talk about how to help students and reduce their stress. These is a lot of ways to do it in the classroom setting, but unfortunately there are things that only the parents can do. This can be a good or bad thing because the parent may not be as involved as they should be in their child’s well-being. In the link below there is tips for teachers, parents, and students to help students relieve stress. However, because we are focusing on what we can do I am going to be sharing some things that I believe are important for us to do as teachers.

Some of the ideas that I agree with the most are:

• “Keep kids moving- No matter how old students are they can benefit from moving around the room, working at “stations,” taking stretching breaks, etc.
• Play music- Studies show music helps people relax and focus. Classical music is great for the classroom and can serve as a model for students when they study at home.
• Listen- Talking about issues bothering students doesn’t have to take up a lot of instructional time. Even five minutes going over concerns, writing them on the board and addressing them later can help students put them aside.”

After that it shows three activities that teachers can facilitate to help students relieve stress:

1. Brush It Off!
2. Leave it at the door
3. Me the tree

In my opinion I really like “Leave it at the door” because it gives the students a good visual of riding themselves of their stress. Even if it is just that, a visual.

I do recommend you guys read the whole article though to see what the parents could do as well as the students. To conclude, I really enjoyed learning and sharing about this topic and I hope that you all enjoyed and took something out of this you can take into your teaching profession.

 

Stress Management in School

Salut!

Of course I am going to talk about us. Teachers stress too and actually more than many other occupations. “Teachers are actually tied with nurses, with 46 percent of both groups reporting high daily stress. Such reports are comparable with other notoriously demanding occupations, such as physicians and business managers.” 46% of teachers say they have high daily stress. DAILY!? That is absolutely insane. In this post I am going to give some examples of what causes teachers to stress.

1. “Teachers are expected to perform these tasks effectively”. We are assumed to be the most fantastic of teachers all the time and that our lessons should be time after time amazing.
2. “If teachers already face high levels of occupational stress, it’s not hard to see how the recent spate of deadly school shootings”. This is terrible because it implies that teachers should maybe arm themselves or be ready for the worst.

I also like that they separate it into two groups:

1. Threats to Teacher’s Wellness

• Weakens immune system
• Reduces stamina
• Heart disease
• Chronic fatigue

2. Threats to Teachers Performance

• Calling in sick
• “High Teacher Turnover”

Finally, it talks about what can help reduce stress in teachers. The one that is most impactful is teachers taking care of themselves first, “Teachers also need to make sure they take care of themselves so that they can take care of others. Without actively caring for themselves, teachers lose the capacity to care for others.”. We need to take care of ourselves because if we are not in the right place mentally or physically the students will see that and act accordingly.

 

Next post I will be sharing about how to help students when they are stressed.

http://theconversation.com/the-hidden-threat-of-teacher-stress-92676

Hello All!

Last time I spoke about what types of stress there is and how it can affect students. This post is going to be about things that students stress about. I was reading this link and it was crazy to see some of these reasons students are stressing. Here are some of the factors that surprised me or shocked me the most:

“Changes to routine: A routine including dedicated homework time and a consistent sleep schedule helps guide students through their day. When changes to the usual routine start to happen, your child may find it more difficult to manage his or her time, leading to more stress.” I know that some students do not like change to routine, and I see that in the classroom setting; but I had no idea that they could stress due to home routine changes.

“Participating in class: For many children, the thought of getting called on in class and speaking in front of their classmates can be terrifying. This can be particularly true if your child struggles to keep up in a subject or area (common examples are math and reading).” Looking at my class this semester (grade 1), I can not see any of them not wanting to share in the discussion or wanting to try and read in front of the class. Even though I don’t hear them say they don’t want to, that does not mean that they want to. This really turned my head a new way.

 

To conclude, there is a lot of things I did not know that cause students to stress. My goal is to take this information into the classroom to help the students feel safe and happy in this environment. I hope that this helps you as well and maybe there is something you read here that you may not know.

Next post I will be sharing a different perspective of stress.

 

 

Common Causes of School Stress For Students