Sneak Peek: 2025 Seed Teacher Summit
0:00:00 Alyssa
You're listening to Voices of Your Village and today I'm so jazzed to share today's special episode with you. It's a sneak peek into our 2025 Seed Teacher Summit coming at you March 11th to the 13th. We're so grateful to have a brand new batch of incredible speakers this year and so many essential topics like Connecting with Kids who Challenge You, How to Handle Weapon Play at School, and Resilience for Educators. This is going to be a compilation episode with little snippets from a handful of the interviews just to give you a taste of what's to come and see if it's right for you. The Summit is free, F -R -E -E, to watch, so please share it with any educators, administrators, or fellow caregivers in your life who would benefit from learning more about supporting teachers and kids with the resources they need to thrive. We're all in this thing together, my friends, and it fills my cup to be able to hand over high -quality professional development and learning opportunities completely for free. Head on over to seedandsew.org/summit. That's seedandsew.org/summit to register. That's seedandsew.org/summit. All right, folks, let's dive in.
00:01:20 Alyssa
Hey there, I'm Alyssa Blask Campbell. I'm a mom with a master's degree in early childhood education and co -creator of the collaborative emotion processing method. I'm here to walk alongside you through the messy, vulnerable parts of being humans raising other humans with deep thoughts and actionable tips. Let's dive in together.
00:01:42 Alyssa
First, we are hearing from my dear friend, Eli Harwood. You may know her by her handle, Attachment Nerd, or from her best -selling book, Raising Securely Attached Kids. Eli and I got to chat about connecting with kids who challenge you. So we put topic questions out to our Seed cert teachers and this was one that came up a bunch. It was like, how do we connect with kids who challenge us the most? And all of us as teachers have had children like this where they show up and inside we're like, oh, my day is going to be harder today. And so like, whoo, okay. And so what does that look like? How do we foster a relationship with them and build that connection? So I'm jazzed to get to dive into that with you today.
00:02:28 Eli
I love this so much because even in the clinical world, we get a lot of training around those dysregulated moments. And I think that's true for teachers. People are coming in, people like me, people like you, and they're going, okay, so when the kid is screaming expletives at you, this is you make your body smaller, you make your voice softer. Here's what you do in this really tough moment. But very rarely are teachers getting training on the practical preventative things that we can be doing to help buffer those moments, to help decrease their intensity, not in the moment, but before the moment. And what we know is that when kids feel deeply connected and wanted, it is far easier for them to learn and to regulate and then to trust us in the moments when they've flipped their lids. So I really want today for everyone to have some real tools in their pocket that they can just be implementing automatically with all of your students, but especially with the ones that are harder to get in sync with.
00:03:31 Alyssa
Yeah, a hundred percent. Thank you. I love that the idea of like prevention as a huge avenue for this. So let's dive right into this bad boy. We have key takeaway number one, cultivate delight. What does that mean?
00:03:46 Eli
All right. So this might feel challenging for you if you're in the middle of a dynamic with a child where you're struggling, but I still want you to do it. What it looks like is we want to give kids the dog treatment. So when we walk into a room and our dogs, you know, have been separated from us and they notice that we're there, we come home, right? What they do for us, the reason dogs are our best friend is because they give uninhibited delight. They wag and they drool and they slobber and they roll up against us. And there is an obvious communication of, I want you here. I feel joy and delight in my body as a result of your presence. Our kids, especially our crusty, crispy kids, our kids that have a harder time showing up and following the rules and understanding what we're asking of them. Those kids more than our other kids need us to be fireworks when they come into the room. And at the younger ages, they're not going to smell BS on you. At the older ages, they might, and that might get a little trickier. So if you're working with teens in the classroom and you're trying to light up for a kid who knows that you don't like them, you're going to have to maybe do a little bit more work to find the thing you do like about them or the thing you're wanting to seed and sow in them. What are you wanting to plant in this child and how can you help cultivate that? And here's the thing, I have met some rough, rough kiddos, but I have never met a kid who couldn't in some way show me the possibility of where they could be in life. Like there's always a possibility in all of our kids. So it's our job to find the thing we can find delightful. And so that might be the way that they tied their shoes. Like what creative shoe tie you had? You know, that might be the way that they dress, the way that they think, the way that they use words, the way that they, you know, observe, like, find something, but find that light in every kid and then light up in response to it. So they come into your classroom and your response should be, Jonathan! Good morning! And Jonathan is not going to go, good morning, teacher, if he's a kid that's struggling with neurodivergence, with sensory processing, with trauma at home, you know, like that's not going to be a natural thing, but you will be highlighting safety and belonging. And if you do that over and over and over again, you will win that kid's heart over. I promise you, because we are all hardwired to be wanted. Show them they are wanted. You know, phrases like, I'm so glad you're here, or like, oh, I love that I get to have you in my class, kid.
00:06:50 Alyssa
Oh, it's so huge.
00:06:52 Eli
And you can show delight around the things that they are doing as well, but it's more powerful that you're offering that delight right off the gate because it's not something they did or didn't do. It's just their presence. And that's how we experience bonding.
00:07:06 Alyssa
Yeah, and there's nothing I could do that would make me love you more or less.
00:07:09 Eli
Yeah, it's like, I'm just glad you're here, just like you. But, and I think also lighting up when they light up is another key piece. So, you know, if they're in the corner and they've got a piece of goo, and even if they're not supposed to put goo on the carpet and they're putting goo on the carpet and you're having that moment because you're like, for the love of Pete, how many times do we have to go over this? But that you can go over and go, you love that goo. And they're like, I love that goo. And you're like, oh, I love that you love the goo. The problem with the goo on the carpet is it gets stuck. So we're going to need to, let's find a place to put that special goo where you can keep playing with it without anything getting stuck or without losing any of your goo, you know? But you're mirroring with them. I see you and I see what lights you up and I honor that and I'm lighting up in response to that. And that's, I mean, if you do that, if that is your primary disciplinary tool, you will be far more of the Pied Piper than any of your colleagues. Because when you can express that human desire to be bonded, kids trust you.
00:08:22 Alyssa
This next one is a gem. I loved this conversation with Anisha Angella, the early childhood coach, where we dove into teacher burnout, rediscovering what brought us to the field in the first place and how we can use that as fuel to support ourselves as teachers.
00:08:39 Anisha
I am so excited to be here, Alyssa. Honestly, such a great conversation. You guys are doing amazing things, by the way. So I am so excited to be a part of this project and this initiative and just getting educators to reclaim their why and what it looks like for them because let's be real, some of us have stepped away from that with the chaos of the world. So I'm excited to have this conversation with you.
00:09:03 Alyssa
Yeah, likewise, likewise. So let's dive right into it. For key takeaway number one, we have identify your why. Reflect on your reasons for becoming an educator. So what's that look like in practice?
00:09:20 Anisha
Yeah, you know what, it's one of my favorite conversations to have. Because every single person that works in early education, every single person that can hear my voice has a why in education. And that why I describe it as this special time in your career in the very beginning, where you said, you know what? Early education is where I need to be. This feels good for me. Every single person has had that moment. I always talk, whenever I do my keynotes and stuff like that, I always talk about my specific why. And mine was doing my first circle time in a preschool classroom and how nerve -wracking it is, you would think that you're going on the biggest stage of your life like Taylor Swift and, you know, doing all these songs and all this great stuff. But when I did my, you know, my little circle time and the children were cheering and they wanted me to go over and over again, there's just something about children that really motivates you. In that moment, I said to myself, you know what, this is where I need to be. And every single person has that moment in their journey. And I think the beauty of reflecting on your why and that whole process, it's strongly connected to your passion. It's almost like a core value in what you do and how you move throughout the industry. And your why will change every so often. You may discover something new, a new strength, a new opportunity or something that happens, but every single person has a why and that why usually energizes you and keeps you motivated when the times get really tough because we know it does.
00:10:59 Alyssa
Yep, those times are going to get tough. I love this and I think back to like my childhood and what led me to this space in the first place, you know, even before that like circle time moment for you, like how did you end up in circle time, right? Like what even brought you into the field? What attracted you? If someone would have said to me at certain points of my life before I even knew I was going to go into early ed, like a this or that quiz of like, you can be a preschool teacher or you can be a mechanic. You can do this or you can do that. It would have been a very easy for me like, I'm going to teach preschool. I have no desire to be a mechanic. And when I think about that deeper of like, well, why? Because there are a number of people who, given those options, would say, get me as far away from the tiny humans as possible. I want to be a mechanic. And when I look at that, that question for me is a no -brainer. And it just has me thinking deeper about why. What drives me here? What pulls me into this space? And I am now just reflecting on Like, what's my why? And you're right, it has shifted and changed, but my original why was respect for humans. Like, I very much, as long as I can remember, have had a respect for kids and as humans. And I was given the gift from my parents, largely my mother, of learning how to communicate with young children, especially before they can use verbal language with you, but that recognizing they're always telling you something, they're always communicating with you and valuing that, right? And as I was exposed to people not knowing how to communicate with young kids, it became clear to me that this was something that I was good at.
00:13:06 Anisha
Yes, yes. And, you know, hearing you talk about yours, I strongly think if there was some kind of test or something, it's in our DNA. To want to do this work has to be in our DNA because yes, you and I both spoke about it. It ain't in the money sometimes. It's in us, right? It's in us. And I think the bigger thing with it about it, Alyssa, is the fact that it's purpose work. It is purpose work when we work with children. And I know as I mentioned some of us we move far from our why sometimes because society gets hectic and you know, we spend a lot of our time proving to the world that we're important. We won't go through that Yeah, everybody knows I'm a big advocate on that part, right? But you know, we can get to a point where we forget what our why is. But really and truly our why is connected to our purpose work and the purpose work is the fact that we are the foundation for children. We are the foundation of society, specifically. In our whole work that we do, whether we're working in the classroom in a childcare center, or doing specifically what you do, we're creating a foundation that's gonna set children up to be incredible humans in our world, our leaders, our future teachers, you name it, the list of things that children wanna be these days. I think that's why there's that close connection and that passion and gets people to sit back and say, okay, my why is really important. So I'm really, really excited for conversations like this all the time.
00:14:36 Alyssa
Yeah. And I'm thinking of like the next time that like I dove deeper into that why was when I learned about the impact that we have in early ed, right? That like, that 80 % of the brain being developed by the time they're three and 90 % by the time they're five, and starting to understand like, oh, wow, what we're doing right now matters. And the more I understood that from data, really. Data spoke to me. And seeing the economic investment, like, oh, if we invest in early ed, here's how that pays out down the road. For me, it was just another example of what we're doing right now is so crucial and important and vital in a child's life and trajectory. And as I learned more about that, it for me strengthened my why. Not only do I feel like I was set up with some skills for this from how I was raised, but then also it is work that can change the future and the not too distant future. It doesn't have to be like in 75 years there will be change, but that you can change a child's trajectory from year to year.
00:15:48 Anisha
Yes.
00:15:49 Alyssa
And yeah, that for me like strengthened it.
00:15:54 Alyssa
Now we will be hearing from my friend, Dayna Abraham. Dana is the author of Calm the Chaos and her workshop is titled Supporting Neurodivergent Kids in a Classroom Setting.
00:16:06 Alyssa
All right, so then that brings us into key takeaway number two, identify underlying needs. Dayna, can we put it on a billboard?
00:16:15 Dayna
Yes.
00:16:16 Alyssa
Identify underlying needs, behavior is communication of a need, my friend. And if you can't tell me the need that's driving this behavior, you're not ready to respond to the behavior.
00:16:25 Dayna
Mm -hmm. Yeah. That's, yes, let's put that on a billboard. And so at this point, and because of your work and so many others, behavior is communication has become way more known than when I was in the classroom 12 years ago. That was like a foreign concept 12 years ago. And it was, they're doing it to seek something or to avoid something, and that is it. And I think everyone here knows that is not what is happening with behavior. There's so much more going on. And so, just from a high level.
00:16:55 Alyssa
And also, even if that's true, that's not a bad thing. Are they trying to avoid overstimulation? Great. Are they trying to seek regulation? Are they trying to seek connection? Great.
00:17:05 Dayna
Right, there's more to it. It's why are they trying to avoid it? Why are they trying to seek it? Right? So there is more to the picture than just seek and avoid. And so one of the things that I've done over the years with looking at all the different research and pulling things together is, okay, but it can feel like you're just guessing, like you're just throwing darts at the wall and hoping you're going to get something and be like, yes, it is their connection that they need. And so I started looking at it and I'm like, okay, how do we figure this out? And so I came up with something that is called a behavior funnel. And I think of it as like sifting for gold or sifting for diamonds. You kind of have to use different size sifters and first you sift out all the sand and then you start to get through some of the bigger rocks will come out and you get a different size sifter and you just keep going smaller and smaller. And so you start at the top and you're like, okay, I see this behavior. Let's take hitting for example. And we want to always start with basic needs. And so is this child hungry, tired? Do they need to go to the bathroom? My child would act so incredibly interesting when he needed to go to the bathroom. But beyond that, the most basic need for all of us is felt safety. And so if they do not feel safe in their environment, and that could be that you have created a beautifully safe environment for this kid, so this is not a judgment on you. It's that they are not perceiving that they are safe. And so you're going to see – you could see hitting for that. You could see all sorts of behaviors for that. And so we want to start there and just make sure, okay, are they feeling safe? Are they feeling judged? Are they feeling anxious? Are they feeling worried? Are they... Right? Let's start there. Once we move from there, now we can move down to connection. Because as a human, we all have the basic need to feel seen, heard, and valued for who we are. And when you're talking about littles, it is always my first question, I'll say, how verbal are they? How well are they able to communicate their thoughts and ideas, because a lot of times kids zero to five have really great receptive language. They understand everything you're saying, but they can't get their like really elaborate thoughts and ideas out of their mouth in a way that other people can understand. So that will come out as squeezing, pinching, hitting, pushing, grabbing, yelling, throwing themselves on the floor because they don't have the words to articulate what they're looking for. And so while that's a skill, it's still that a lot of times they're looking to feel seen and heard and they want to feel like, I am connected. I am safe here. This is my person. I am validated. These big feelings are totally right in this world. So then we just keep kind of going down the funnel and the next one is sensory and you already talked about that. So are they overstimulated? Are they understimulated? And again, the idea of the funnel is that you'll kind of catch things. If you're working on basic needs, you will have caught maybe even a sensory type thing that was related to them needing to go to the bathroom or to them being tired or them not feeling safe because when our body doesn't feel safe and our nervous system is dysregulated, our sensory system is all out of whack, and so we are going to be far more sensory sensitive. I tell people to imagine an internal sunburn, right? We've all had a sunburn. We all can imagine what it feels like to have a sunburn, and so the more unsafe we feel, the more isolated we feel, the more anxious we feel, the more our sensory system is just going to be on high alert or highly seeking because we need to find a way to regulate ourselves. And so a lot of my parents that I've worked with over the years, they're like, I can just go through those top three. I don't even have to go further a lot of times, especially in the moment. It's just like a quick little check. And then the next piece is skills, right? And when you're talking about zero to five, they're most likely lacking a skill. You're talking zero to 24, you're most likely talking about lacking a skill. But especially that zero to five age, there's still, I mean, there's so much to, you know, you've, I mean, one, this is what you do, but also just as watching in the last 11 months, the difference between your child and what she's been able to do from last month to this month. And then it's not, it's like exponential growth and development and change and the skills she's learning and the things that she's developing. And so those skills play a huge part in what they're able to do and how that behavior is going to play out. And then I always leave down at the bottom avoidance and desires because they still play a big part like you said, but if we start with avoidance and desires and we don't know why they're avoiding or why they're seeking something out, then we've just wasted a whole lot of time if we jump down there. And so avoidance is just we will go at all costs to avoid pain or frustration. So if we really don't like something, if we absolutely loathe something, we will do a a lot of things to avoid that. Our kids are the same way. And then the opposite is true for if we just really, really, really, really like something, then we will avoid all the things that tell us that this is not logical, this is not safe, this is not a good idea, and we will still have that piece of chocolate cake when we know that we shouldn't have that piece. So it's the same for our kids too. And obviously you don't need to remember all that in the moment, but it's a really good kind of just litmus test or like I said, like a ciphering system for looking at the behavior differently than they're being mean, they're being disrespectful, they're being hurtful, they are being disobedient, whatever those things are, they're not listening. It's always like, okay, but why? Why aren't they listening so that we can create the tools and the resources and the systems they need so they can get their needs met?
00:23:05 Alyssa
Stay tuned after this note from our sponsors.
00:23:08 Alyssa
Next up is a workshop that is such a hot button topic. I'm so glad to have been able to chat with Samuel Broaden about how to handle weapon play at school and dive into this important issue to share with you all at the summit.
00:23:24 Alyssa
I love this one is maybe my favorite of all the takeaways. Key takeaway number two is understand the difference between the children's experiences and your own, and the way children view the world in their play, and the way that you do. This is something I've learned so much from you and feel really grateful for. Can you dive more into this?
00:23:46 Samuel
Yeah, totally. This is such a huge thing, too. And it's so interesting, just this idea of constantly learning from the children and constantly learning from our work, right? Because again, these were things that a few years ago I would have been too afraid to dive into or or wasn't at the space to dive into but I think it's just so important to realize again that we're coming with so much adult baggage to our work with children and the things that we're seeing the children do can be triggering like you said right children can really trigger us with the way that they talk, the way that they play, the be- whatever it is, there's things that come up all the time. And we may look at those things through our adult experience and our adult lens and have a opinion or a viewpoint on it, like with weapon play. We can come to this and see them playing with weapons and our automatic thought, just like mine was for so many years, which I think has been kind of ingrained in us, is this idea that, Well, if they play that way, they're gonna be violent. If they play that way, they're gonna not be kind to each other. They're gonna grow up and think that guns are toys. They're gonna, you know, all of these things that we view as adults. But what's interesting is that the children don't think that way at all. And I discovered this through that conversation with that classroom of children. And when I just asked them, what is it? Why do you like to play this way? Like, what is it that you enjoy about this? Why do you do it? Their thoughts were so far removed from what mine were. They were saying it was it was fun. They like to pretend they like to be the good guy. And they like to be the bad guy. And they like to save the day. And they like, you know, all of these things that are normal and great and valid and and all of those things. And it was quite an eye opening experience for me to sit there and be like, oh, okay. So none of what I'm thinking is what's happening here. No one here is playing to be mean, right? That's one of the biggest things, right? We're always afraid that this type of play is mean, or the children are going to hurt each other on purpose, or that's what they're trying to do. And it's just so interesting if we actually sit and have real conversations with children where we actually ask them about why they're doing what they're doing, or what they enjoy, or what they don't enjoy. Then we see that so much of what we're bringing to the play is not what they're bringing to it. And this idea that they're going to be violent, they're going to be more mean, they're going to be unkind, they're going to be hurtful, all those things. I really found quite the opposite when we dove into weapon play, when I dove into this discomfort, when we agreed as a community to do this, I found that the children were actually more empathetic and they were able to advocate for themselves and for the children around them. It was a process, but it just kind of slapped me in the face a little bit about none of what I was bringing to this is what was happening, right? And so when we think about, you know, again, our experiences kind of inform the way that we think and the things that we bring to our work. And, you know, I think it's important for us to realize that the children don't have the same experience as us. They don't have the same thought process. They don't have the same, you know, lived kind of life as we do. And so they're really just wanting to play. So I think that by just having those conversations, we can realize that like so much of what we're bringing to this isn't for them. It's on us, it's on us.
00:27:49 Alyssa
I love that point. And I think like what comes up for me there is something I've learned so much from you and Kisa and from your work around the difference between weapon play in the moment and discussions about weapons and about violence and about kindness and about consent and about empathy. And that these are two separate things, that in the moment when they're playing is not the time to be like, which I, and I said this in our podcast interview, but it's so real, where like in the moment I remember teaching preschool at the beginning and somebody coming over and like shooting me with their pretend thing and I'm like, well, I'm dead, now I can't play. And like, like just totally shut down this opportunity to connect and play with this child because I was trying to teach a lesson, right, that like, guns kill people, and they're dangerous, and this is violent, and that I'm not going to participate in it. And what they just learned was, Alyssa is not going to play this game with me, I'll go play it with somebody else. And they're not going to stop playing it because I'm dead and not participating. They're gonna find somebody else to play with. What really I needed to do was separate the play from the conversation that in the play in the moment, you right. It wasn't mean. It wasn't looking to go into something deeper. They didn't have mindful context around guns. And then outside of that moment, I can have developmentally appropriate conversations about guns. We can talk about weapons and what are they used for? What are some ways that people use them that are not safe or are not kind? And what are ways that they're used outside of that? And really being able to provide more context, but that happens at like circle time. That happens when we're sitting around and having conversations at lunch. That happens not during the play. That's something I've tried to like, it is so hard for me because I'm like, I'm going to teach this lesson right now, right now while we're playing. It's not the time, Alyssa, back off Alyssa, but I have to like really override that in the moment. It's very, very hard for me.
00:30:04 Alyssa
Y 'all, I loved recording this next workshop with Jasmine Berger, all about The Power of Play. We dove into how to harness children's natural drive for play to support their emotional development.
00:30:17 Alyssa
Let's pull them right into key takeaway number two here. Key takeaway number two, use play to explore and process emotions.
00:30:28 Jasmine
Yeah, I love that. That's what I do all day. But I think play, I'm a big believer, it's kids' natural language. They don't always have the cognitive abilities or verbal abilities to express super verbally for us of what's going on with them. So I think play can be a really beautiful way for kids to
00:30:44 Jasmine
have the space to get things out. It's how they're understanding the world, right? A lot of that pretend play we see kids do is how they're understanding their haircut or that they got a shot. I know a lot of times in my office, I know when kids have a doctor's appointment coming up, because we do a lot of play about like shots hurting or it being a little scary. And I'm like, I wonder if someone's going to the doctor soon, right? That's how they are understanding the world. And so I think one the biggest things is just to highlight the importance of that free play, right? That unstructured play where kids are getting to do what they want and getting to process what they want or go where they need to go with it, because play can be really regulating for kids. It can allow them really interesting ways to problem solve. It can build self -esteem. Play in and of itself is just so healthy for kids to explore emotions and to build and develop emotional regulation. But even just that unstructured play, which I think sometimes people can feel like, oh, it's like, I feel like we're not doing anything or nothing's happening. It is happening. The play is like the thing, right? It's what's healing. It's what's helping. It's what's allowing kids to grow and explore themselves. So I am a big proponent of free play.
00:31:46 Alyssa
Yeah. Love this. And I have a question for you. I think one of the things we hear from our teachers a lot in our coaching calls and ongoing support is around when kids are are using play as a means for trying to process things that might be challenging. Like if they have an older sibling and they've been exposed to maybe gunplay or weapon play or risky play, or if they're looking for something to control for our kids who often are out of control in life, and then they are powering over other kids and really asserting control in those ways and in those spaces. How can we support kids with play in the classroom when we're seeing it in a way where we're like, ooh, this is affecting the kids around them in a way that might feel hurtful or harmful?
00:32:41 Jasmine
Yeah, for sure. So I think sometimes I love to like stay in the play and sometimes give voice to what's going on. I think that can be helpful. So if they're being really controlling and really powerful over another kid, I'm like, oh, I know that sometimes feels good to be in control, but I wonder, what do we think so -and -so's feeling? So helping them to practice some of that empathy while also validating that like, yeah, sometimes it does feel so good to be in control, but then maybe redirecting it a bit so it's not harming that other child and helping them to think about that other kid. Like, oh, wait, I see, oh, her face looks a little sad. She's got a little bit of a frown. I don't know if she likes that, but I know that might feel good. But man, I don't think she likes that right now. I wonder what else you guys can play together, right? So it's helping, again, grow that emotional literacy We're helping them build empathy of noticing what's going on with somebody else, what that other kid might be feeling, while also still validating that there is this real thing that they're clearly trying to work through, but this just might not be the place to do it. Right? My office, it's fine. But in a classroom with like 18 other kids, it's not always okay to play out these really big themes, especially like scary or traumatizing themes. Right? I would always recommend if a kid's doing something really, really scary, or it seems like they've maybe witnessed something, maybe referring them somewhere because they might need some assistance really processing that. And so for those kids, I would maybe redirect it because sometimes that traumatic play can be toxic depending on how kids are doing it. And we don't want them to re -traumatize themselves or the other kids in the classroom. So I might try and redirect it and maybe think about a referral if it's something you're continually seeing that they might be a little stuck and need some help.
00:34:12 Alyssa
Awesome. Yeah, thank you. I think it is so helpful in that even just the validation. I'll say to my tiny human, especially after he comes home from a day where he's been at school, where so much has been out of his control at school. And he'll come home and start telling us like, I want your body to be over here and sissy's body to be over here and we'll validate. Like, oh, you wish you could control all of our bodies. It feels so powerful to be in control of everybody's bodies. Yeah, buddy, I get that. And even that validation, and I think sometimes we think the words are too big for kids or they won't understand. It's true, they won't understand unless we talk to them. They're not going to learn these words and build the awareness unless we're bringing attention to it. They're not going to turn to us and say, I want to feel powerful or I want control over this. We can help them build awareness of like, I'm wondering if you're wanting to feel in control. If you're wanting to feel so powerful, let's figure out a way you can feel powerful that doesn't hurt anybody's body. I want that for you too, bud. And really being able to like highlight that so that they can start to even build awareness. And now my three -and -a -half -year -old after saying these words to him over and over and over so many times, he'll say like, I want to feel in control. And we'll say, okay, great. Let's find places or spaces you can be in control.
00:35:35 Alyssa
Stay tuned after this note from our sponsors.
00:35:38 Alyssa
Next, we have another hot topic, consent. I loved this workshop with Sarah Casper, creator of Comprehensive Consent. We talked about how the word consent is used as an umbrella term for a lot of different meanings and how we can support kids in building a consent practice. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this one.
00:35:59 Sarah
Yeah. All right. I'm on a soapbox on this one.
00:36:03 Alyssa
I love it. Have at it.
00:36:05 Sarah
Yeah. Yeah, there has been a shift towards more people in our sphere talking about getting consent and something that's complicated about that is that it is both talked about as such a high -stakes legal and often sexual thing and then it's also talked about like, oh you need consent before, you know, you take their toy, which is like pretty low stakes. We're using this one word to mean a lot of things. As I said before, it means wanted, but it also means permission, but it also means agreement. It also can be something internal feeling, or we can say it's an outward expression. And so I urge parents and teachers to move away from the word consent in general, and in their minds, think of it, okay, what are the skills underneath the umbrella of building a consent practice? Not is it just important to give and get consent? Because that is an important thing. But really, most of the time, what we mean is permission. You need to give and get permission.
00:37:08 Alyssa
Also, just to get a little nerdy with folks here, and if you're in the SEED community, this won't be new for you, that this involves self -control, giving or getting. And you can only access self -control if you're in a regulated state, and you can't regulate what you're not aware of. We talk about that so often. And so when we're asking kids to, even we talk about this with like, oh, if you have sensory support needs, you can ask for it in the classroom. Like if you need a fidget, or if you need a special seat to sit on, or if you need to take a break. That requires a level of regulation to access the language to communicate that. And often when you're in a space where, especially if they don't have the interoception, the self -awareness skills to even know like, Oh, I'm experiencing a feeling or some dysregulation, and then what tools do I have to regulate? How do I self -regulate? And then I can give or get, I can use language and other forms of communication here. And that is just like so far from where a lot of our kids are, that a lot of them are still working on the self -awareness, self -reg, and they don't have access to self -control, which is what's needed in those moments if we are saying it's giving or getting consent. So I love this of breaking it down to like, instead, what's required for building a consent practice? So I want to dive into that. What is required for building a consent practice?
00:38:40 Sarah
Yes. So you have, how do I notice what I want? How do I ask for what I want? And within all of these, it's, and what are the obstacles to doing so? Right.
00:38:49 Alyssa
So how do I notice what I want? How do I ask for what I want, and what are the obstacles for doing so?
00:38:56 Sarah
The list goes on, but that is included in all of those. Yeah. How do I incorporate body language into my understanding of their answer, right? How do I receive their answer? How do I handle a no? What do I do with a maybe or a hmm, right? There are so many ways to navigate that. What do I do when I mess up in consent? What is the experience of changing my mind? How do I react when someone changes their mind? These are all kind of different experiences. I recently, I wrote a curriculum of lesson plans, and it came out this summer. And I have 25 lessons and three of them are on saying no, and the difficulty of saying no and the different, you know, things that go into it. So all of those different elements are part of a consent practice. And I think if we focus just on the giving and getting, we miss the picture. I often use the you're familiar with The Giving Tree. I imagine.
00:39:52 Alyssa
Yeah, totally
00:39:53 Sarah
Yeah for those--
00:39:54 Alyssa
The worst book
00:39:55 Sarah
The worst book for those I guess you aren't familiar, right this boy in this tree are friends and they have a great relationship when the boy gets older he kind of takes all the trees resources. But in the book actually consent was done perfectly from a rote consent perspective.
00:40:16 Alyssa
The tree never said no.
00:40:18 Sarah
The boy asked, not just the tree never said no, the tree offered.
00:40:25 Alyssa
Sure.
00:40:25 Sarah
Why wouldn't the boy, if we're talking about just giving and getting everything well, and yet we all see that this is not okay. The tree is devastated because at the end she has nothing. And instead of it just being like, oh, did they get permission for the apples, which is to take the apples to take the branches, which is great. What if we said, well, what is the practice of consent and two people navigating their boundaries and desires alongside the boundaries and desires of someone else? So we know what the boy wants, but what if the boy said, hey, tree, what do you want? And yes, the tree is also responsible for taking care of herself. She could have set some boundaries.
00:41:04 Alyssa
And our final Summit Sneak Peek guest is an OT that I adore, Madeha Ayub, and she will be sharing some super practical, easy strategies for creating sensory -friendly classrooms that benefit all learners and the adults in the room, too.
00:41:23 Alyssa
What we are about to talk about today, this topic, is something that we talk about in probably every coaching call that we have where we end up diving into the sensory systems and the root of them in misbehaviors. And so I'm so excited to be able to serve our community with your brilliance and this information. I want to just like dive in because there's going to be so much that I think we're going to look to cover in such a short amount of time. So let's have at it. All right. Key takeaway number one, incorporate regular movement. Proprioceptive input is helpful for regulating all nervous system profiles. Break this down for us.
00:42:04 Madeha
Yes. So as you said, this helps all children, not just children who are on the spectrum or who have sensory processing issues. This can be for everyone. So I recommend that movement breaks are provided throughout the day. Now, sometimes you might not know how often does my child need a movement break. So I always say a rule of thumb, a child can attend to a task probably like two times their age in minutes. So for example, a four -year -old can probably attend to like eight minutes. So I would say roughly two to five times, like eight to twenty. So if they've been working for 30 minutes now, it's time to get up and move. And so incorporating deep pressure into those movement breaks are great. So jumping jacks, wall push -ups, tug -of -war, anything that incorporates movement. but also some deep pressure. And I always say that if you have a child who just needs that extra movement and that extra deep pressure, give that student classroom tasks that includes both movement and weight. So for example, have that student distribute the workbooks to every child. Have that student be the designated pencil sharpener or the door monitor. And what this does is that, number one, it's provided throughout the day because how many times do you have distribute supplies, how many times does a child need their pencil sharpened, how many times do you leave the classroom and then someone has to open the door. And then also that weight is provided throughout the day and now the teacher doesn't have to feel burnt out like oh my god did I give this child the movement that they need. And then also the student doesn't feel singled out and you know you don't want to be the only one that needs a weighted vest, you don't want to be the only one who needs like a chewy necklace. Some kids don't mind but a lot of kids do and so giving them those classroom tasks ensures that they get this all day long and they don't feel like they're singled out.
00:43:53 Alyssa
Sure yeah I love this and they we also have for folks if you're interested I'll link them with this workshop. We have some movement activity ideas for y 'all to take into the classroom and playful transition ideas that involve movement so we can build everyone in. And one of the things that I'm thinking about here is this little one that I had, who was probably 20 months, she needed a lot of movement. And so she was my helper for putting stuff away. And I would make things up like, oh, we just got new paint in. Can you help me carry these paint jugs over? And we would lift it or she would push it across the floor to get it over there. It's something that I think we start to talk about with older kids often but that we don't talk a lot about with younger kids. So really looking at like how do we build this in in a way that makes sense? We have some of those Ideas that we can will link here as handouts for folks to have.
00:45:00 Madeha
That would be great. I have an 18 month old who loves carrying weighted items. Sometimes we think like oh, they're so small like it's not good, And again, rule of thumb, 10%, 10 to 12 % of their weight is totally okay, let them carry it. I think that's, it's really helpful.
00:45:16 Alyssa
Yeah, love that. That's a great rule of thumb for folks too, is the like 10 to 12%. When we're looking at incorporating regular movement, we've talked about this as whole group, and we've talked about this now with individual kids that I give them a classroom job. And when we're looking at incorporating the regular movement, if we have our whole classroom of kids and we have like the one child who needs more, what are some things that you would want teachers to know about doing this like in whole group? Does everybody benefit from it? Is it that we're going to be revolving our day around one child? Like talk to us a little bit about that.
00:46:02 Madeha
So, I do think that all children can benefit from frequent movement breaks, but there are kids who need a lot more. And you know that because once after you're done with the movement breaks, this child is still fidgety. This child keeps getting up and that's okay. This is just how this child regulates. They need movement to feel calm and help them focus. So I would say, I mean, depending on the school's budget and movement, chairs are really helpful. So this can be a wobble stool. This can be a beanbag chair. And then I also recommend things to add to a standard chair if the school doesn't have the budget and sometimes movement chairs can be distracting. Sometimes every child wants that movement chair. So there are things you can add to their standard school chair to make it movement friendly, meaning adding a wobble cushion. So now they can like fidget as much as they want and usually those are textured so it feels really good. There's TheraBands that you can add to the legs of the chair. So now they get the feedback in their feet and their legs, things like that. And also giving that student the option to stand if they want to work in standing, lay down if they want to work. So it's not just flexible seating in the terms of that type of chair that they're using, but also the position that they're working in. And I have a lot of students that just love standing, and I think they just get more feedback in the legs by standing. And oftentimes I hear a teacher saying, sit down, sit down, sit down, but then it's this like, why did they need to sit down if they're doing their work perfectly we find and are super engaged. And so I think that requires a lot of flexibility just using adaptive seating.
00:47:33 Alyssa
Did you like what you heard today? Was it helpful to get these little sneak peeks into the Summit? I can't wait for you to hear the rest and share your favorite takeaways with us. Head over to seedandsew.org/summit, that's seedandsew.org/summit to register for our free Seed Teacher Summit and join us March 11th to the 13th for 18 incredible interviews, including full versions of what we shared today. Let's do this together, my friends.
00:48:23 Alyssa
Thanks for tuning in to Voices of Your Village. Check out the transcript at voicesofyourvillage.com. Did you know that we have a special community over on Instagram hanging out every day with more free content? Come join us at @seed.and.sew S -E -W. Take a screenshot of you tuning in, share it on the ‘Gram and tag @seed.and.sew to let me know your key takeaway. If you're digging this podcast, make sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode. We love collaborating with you to raise emotionally intelligent humans.
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