Connecting with the Social Context of Schooling

Mental Health and the C.A.R.E. Program at Samuel W. Shaw

School
Amanda Shoults
I chose to investigate and connect with the mental health
initiative going on at Samuel W. Shaw because it is something that I
believe is extremely important and near to my heart. I truly believe
that if students dont feel safe at school, and their mental wellbeing is
suffering, that intellectual wellbeing is much harder to achieve. In
order to help improve the mental health of students, Samuel W. Shaw
hired a Wellness Specialist, to initiate the C.A.R.E. program. The
purpose of this program is to create a safe, positive, inclusive
environment that allows all students to succeed and thrive at school. I
believe that mental health is extremely important, especially at the
middle school age, where they are going through so many changes and
struggles. I remember how hard middle school was for me, and I would
do anything to help improve my future students experiences in middle
school. This is why I chose to address this issue in my PSII practicum
school.
Mental health not only affects the students, but it also affects
parents, teachers, administration and community members. When a
student is having struggles at home, it may lead to disruptive or
inappropriate behaviour at school, which may affect another student,
changing the dynamic of the teachers class, and possibly leading to
involvement of administration. Mental health issues affect everyone,

and thus all members of the school community should be a part of

finding a solution, or improving the problem. This includes myself, as a
student teacher. Multi-tiered systems of supports like this program are
proven to be more effective, and include prevention, identification,
early intervention for those at risk, and more serious intervention for
students with ongoing problems (Rossen & Cowan, 2014). It also
allows mental health and wellness to be addressed at every stage, and
at every level of the school community.
The C.A.R.E. program stands for Citizenship, Acceptance,
Respect/Responsibility, Everyone belongs. There are C.A.R.E. advisors
for each grade that contact students within 24 hours of when a C.A.R.E.
form is filled out. The C.A.R.E. forms are there to be filled out when
incidents occur. It includes information about if you are a victim or a
bystander, a summary of the incident, and the students
name/homeroom if they choose to do so. To resolve the situation, the
grades C.A.R.E. advisor, the Wellness Specialist, and the students
involved will meet up to talk about what happened, and solve it in a
case specific way. This program will help create safe and caring
learning environments by fostering healthy relationships, promoting
positive mental health, respecting and celebrating diversity, providing
support, and creating positive social-emotional skills, all of which are
key priorities for Alberta Education (Alberta Education, 2016).

To personally engage in and address this issue, I decided to take

a few of my prep periods to sit in on a few of the in-class C.A.R.E.
presentations that were run by the schools Wellness Specialist. In the
first session she talked to the students about strategies to use when
dealing with tough situations, whether that be with friends, family, or
within our individual selves. She gave resources where students can
get help if they need it, including several suicide hotlines and websites
where they could get information. In this first session she stressed the
importance of asking for help from trusted adults, and emphasized that
there are these types of adults at their disposal all of the time within
the school environment. She tied this back to the C.A.R.E. program
and forms to remind students that their voices will always be heard.
From what I can see this program is creating a much greater sense of
trust between the students, staff and administration which is key to
creating positive, safe and caring environments. Having everyone
work together and trust each other is also contributing to the multitiered approach for promoting positive mental health in schools
(Rossen & Cowan, 2014).
The second session that I sat in on was focused on attitude,
gratefulness and happiness. The Wellness Specialist talked about
some ideas and perspectives that I connect with very closely, and feel
very passionately about. The first being that attitude is a choice. I
believe that we cant choose what happens to us, we can only choose

how we react to what happens to us. This is something that I have

only recently truly learned, and I wish somebody had emphasized this
to me sooner. I see it as a part of my duty as an educator to share this
with my students as early as possible, and help them to maintain
positive attitudes every day. I want to have my students be successful
learners, but I also want them to be happy people, and I will take any
steps I can to help that happen. The next thing that was emphasized
was gratefulness. Which again, is something that I am very passionate
about, and I chose to share my story with the class. I told them how at
the beginning of this year I felt very stressed and overwhelmed, so to
help myself I began to take a picture every day of something that I was
grateful for. Doing this has caused me to have a much more positive
outlook in my daily life, and has increased my overall happiness
immensely. The students seemed to really appreciate this idea, and I
suggested that they try it themselves.
After this session I started looking more into gratefulness and its
relevance to education, and I came across an article that linked the
importance of gratefulness to education. The following quote really
stood out to me: To take the kind of brave and urgent action our earth
and humanity require, we need to be deeply moved by a force that
connects us with each other, our environment, and perhaps to
something greater than ourselves. If we allow gratitude to come out of
hiding, and live in our hearts in an authentic and contemporary way, it

can offer that bridge to community connection and action. I love this
because to me, it stresses the importance of gratitude and
appreciation in creating a safe community. We cant possibly expect
our students to learn if they do not feel safe in their learning
environment. It is true that students orient themselves to where they
can feel valued and where there is trust (Howells, 2012). Creating this
space through adopting an attitude of gratitude is a way that I believe
we can create a space where students feel safe enough to be present,
and to learn.
In order to bring the concept of gratitude into my own grade 7
class, I shared with them the same story of how I started my Grateful
Photo album. I shared with them a few of the pictures, and the stories
that went along with them, which I could tell that they appreciated.
After this, we talked about what gratefulness really means, and some
things that they are grateful for. We then took a whole period to draw
pictures, and express things that we were grateful for and why. All of
the students participated. Immediately I noticed a shift in the mood of
my class. There were a few more smiles, more laughs, and more
engagement between students who wouldnt normally interact as
much. The students who I often have behavioural problems with
blended in with the rest of the class, stayed calm and collected, and
seemed to enjoy the activity. I noticed a greater feeling of community
within my class, which was so amazing to see. I saw things in my

students I hadnt seen before. I found out that one of my students had
gotten up early to make another student lunch because he sometimes
didnt have one at school. As my students began to express
gratefulness within themselves and with each other, my heart began to
fill with even more gratefulness for them as my students.
This experience sitting in on the C.A.R.E. sessions, and practicing
gratefulness with my own students definitely made me realize the
importance of overall health and wellness in education. As a future
teacher I must create a classroom where my students feel safe,
respected and cared about before I can expect them to get to a place
where they are able to learn. One way I will do this, is by personally
practicing gratefulness, encouraging my students to do the same, and
sharing principles of the C.A.R.E. program with my future students,
colleagues and administrators. I believe that this programs practices
and goals would be a positive addition to the social context of any of
the future schools that I teach in, and I am so happy that I was
exposed to it during my PSII practicum at Samuel. W. Shaw.

References
Alberta Education. Safe and caring schools. Retrieved April 10, 2016,
from https://education.alberta.ca/safe-and-caring-schools/

Howells, K. (2012). Gratitude in education: A radical view. Retrieved

April 10, 2016, from http://www.gratefulness.org/resource/gratitude-ineducation/
Rossen, E., & Cowan, K. C. (2014). Improving mental health in schools.
Phi Delta Kappan, 96(4), 813.