Miranda Chapman

Webinar 4-3-2-1
February 15, 2018

Teaching to Strengths: Supporting Students Living with Trauma, Violence, and Chronic Stress

1. 4 takeaways that will guide your classroom decision making (include timestamps or screenshots
from webinar)

Relationships are the biggest takeaway that will guide my classroom decision making. In order to
have this guide classroom teaching I need to be sure that I am meeting each one of these pillars. From
this webinar and discussion with my cooperating teacher the biggest takeaway from this is how
important creating relationships is. I think in order to do this and allow it to guide classroom decision
making I can be sure that students in my classroom feel like they are safe, valued, competent, and that
they belong.
Miranda Chapman
Webinar 4-3-2-1
February 15, 2018

Discussed further down, another takeaway from this webinar is the importance of the physical
environment for students who have experienced trauma. There are many different ways that I can allow
what I have learned from this webinar guide what my classroom will look like. Again this will be
something that depends on the students in my classroom.

Another takeaway from this webinar is the importance of the mind/mental shift for teachers.
From this I will attempt remove any beliefs I have of what is impossible for my students to what is
actually happening in their learning and what is possible for them to achieve. I think this is a very large
part of the strength based learning. Once I as a teacher am able to switch this mind/mental thought it
will become easier for students to believe in themselves as well.

Finally, another takeaway from this webinar is the importance of finding student strengths under
adversity. This is something that I can use in my classroom currently. There are a few students who have
been harder for me to build relationships with, in turn making it harder for me to find strengths and
assets in them. In order to help these students succeed and stay motivated in the classroom, I want to
make it a point to try and peel back that layer and uncover some strengths, and for students having an
“off” day, remembering that they may be going through something outside of the classroom.
Miranda Chapman
Webinar 4-3-2-1
February 15, 2018

2. 3 ways that CT added to ST knowledge base about topic during discussion

After watching the Webinar on Teaching to Strengths: Supporting Students Living with Trauma,
Violence, and Chronic Stress, and discussing with my cooperating teacher, my knowledge base in this
area has grown. Three areas in which my knowledge has grown are understanding the difficulty of
strength based learning, the importance of “checking” preconceived notions, and different ways to
make a welcoming environment for students. This whole webinar was focused on using strength based
teaching in the classroom and building student’s knowledge on their strengths rather than their
weaknesses. While discussing with my cooperating teacher, I learned that this is something that is
harder than it appears, and sometimes as teachers, we forget to build on those strengths.
Another topic in which my knowledge base has grown is the importance of “checking”
preconceived notions we may have of students and parents/guardians. Working in the Audubon School
has really opened my eyes to this, but actually hearing this in the webinar and discussing it with Ms.
Vogts made me realize just how important this is. Student behavior is something that we deal with on a
day to day basis, ranging from students shutting down, to students having “temper tantrums”. After
witnessing these in the classroom, we soon came to realize something at home was going on, hence why
the students were acting the ways we were. While talking with Ms. Vogts I also learned how important it
is to give parents a chance rather than judge them on their past life choices.
Finally, the webinar discussed the importance of a welcoming environment for students. Talking
with Ms. Vogts I realized just how different this environment can look in other classrooms. The walls in
our classroom are not completely covered with decorations or colors, the reason being this can be
overstimulating for students. Another part of our classroom environment is the use of music. Often
times we have music playing in the background of our classroom. At first I found this surprising due to
the fact of the room having the potential of becoming very loud. After discussion I learned that the
reason for the music is that most student’s home environments are loud and have a lot going on, so they
are not able to focus as well with no noise.

3. 2 questions that emerged about the topic that you will investigate this semester
One initial question that I have after watching this webinar is about relationships. How do you build
relationships with parents/guardians who may not have a large interest in their child’s education? One
way in which I will work to answer this question is discussing with Ms. Vogts the strategies she uses to
reach out to parents/guardians, and how she goes about parents who may not have that interest.
Another question that emerged from this topic is What are the best strategies to uncover/unpeel
those hidden values that students have? While this may be something that seems so simple, I do think it
is something that can be a challenge for teachers as well. In order to learn more about strategies in
finding positive student values I will continue to build relationships with students and working closely
with them to understand them better.

4. 1 implementation idea for immediate classroom application

One implementation I want to begin using in our classroom immediately is recognizing something
that a student does well and point that out to the class. Ms. Vogts and I talked about the importance of
letting students know that they can accomplish tasks as long as they believe in themselves. Since I have
built relationships with students and have been in the classroom a lot, I want to begin helping students
“create that file” in their brains to help them have more positive attitudes towards learning.