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RETHINK ED

Supporting Parents


 

Rethink Ed continues to be committed to a healthy and positive culture of learning for schools, students, and families. We provide a variety of resources for parents to use that support their children's well-being as well as their own. These resources include help with managing behavior and building independence, providing structure and routine, and keeping learning interesting and fun in the home environment.

Fear and anxiety about the COVID-19 outbreak have led to increased stress levels in both children and adults. School closures, abrupt changes in routine, and a heightened sense of uncertainty have a detrimental effect on the social, emotional, and mental well-being of us all. Additionally, increased time spent away from the school environment can disrupt learning for children and teens. Experiencing loneliness and sadness due to isolation from peers and lack of participation in school or community activities are also common.

Rethink Ed is working diligently to improve access to our resources for families and to provide strategies and supports to help caregivers and students continue to have productivity, safety, and well-being during this difficult period.

While this is a stressful time, we must continue to focus on our physical, mental, and social emotional health. Learning new ways to continue being productive and finding opportunities for growth will be key to our success. Together we will work on strategies for helping ourselves and others build resilience and community support. We are strongest together, and we will get through this as a team. Rethink Ed is here to support children, teens, and everyone that plays a part in their education.

OUR SOLUTION

We have assembled on this page a collection of Rethink Ed Toolkit resources for parents. This includes webinars, videos, guides, blog posts, and other resources that will work to support you during this time of distance learning.


SEL ToolKit

Social Emotional Learning (SEL) is the foundation for managing emotions, having healthy relationships, understanding and empathizing with others, being responsible and safe, and learning to cope with difficult situations. Rethink Ed is offering videos and other resources to help caregivers and students through this difficult time. This toolkit will include resources to help with managing stress, dealing with emotions, anxiety, and fear during this unprecedented situation.

Videos:

Talking to Kids About Social Injustice & How to Use Empathy as a Tool for Social Change
This video provides the tools you need to discuss social injustices with children and how empathy plays a role in social change. (7 minutes)

Secondary Students Self Awareness Series: Empathy & Social Change 
Concerning issues surrounding diversity, ongoing conversations that raise awareness resulting from genuine self reflection can catalyze change. Learn more about using empathy as a tool for social change. (6 minutes)

Early Elementary Self Awareness Series: Cultures Around the World
Let's learn about the different cultures in our world and then talk about what makes us all the same.  (6 minutes)

Self-Compassion for Parents
Let's talk about self-compassion and how it can help us get through periods of elevated stress and negative self-talk. (6 minutes)

Self-Efficacy: You Can Do It!
We all know the frustration of not know how to do something. By working hard, practicing, and asking for help when we need to, we can accomplish everything we want to learn to do. (4 minutes)

Dealing with the Emotional Stress of the Corona Virus Pandemic
Healthy coping mechanisms and anxiety reduction techniques. (10 minutes)

Developing Optimism During COVID-19
Optimism is the viewpoint or belief that good things will happen. Through awareness and practice, we can all make the choice to be optimistic every day. (7 minutes)

Strategies to Improve Motivation and Focus for Kids
This video contains strategies to make activities more fun for children through interactivity, motivation-tactics, and providing choice. (8 minutes)

Tips and Strategies for Mindfulness
This video contains tips, strategies, and recommendations for incorporating mindful moments into your everyday life. (10 minutes)

Dealing with Stress and Anxiety During Uncertain Times
Practical self-assessments, strategies, and problem-solving tips for understanding and reducing your stress. (21 minutes)

Fostering Resilience
This video provides strategies for helping children develop confidence and resilience during COVID-19. (5 minutes)

Staying in Touch With Family & Friends
This video shares strategies for keeping in touch with family and friends through different forms of technology that are interactive and engaging while safely practicing social distancing. (4 minutes)

Hocus Pocus Focus! for Early Elementary Students
To improve our focus we need to put effort into paying attention when we need to, and use strategies that help us block out distractions. If we practice focusing a little bit every day, our focus will grow stronger over time! (4 minutes)

Improving Focus for Late Elementary Students
To improve our focus we need to put effort into paying attention when we need to, and use strategies that help us block out distractions. If we practice focusing a little bit every day, our focus will grow stronger over time! (4 minutes)

Focus For Studying for Middle School Students
Strategies such as identifying your common distractions, properly preparing to study, and breaking tasks into more manageable pieces are great ways to improve your focus. (5 minutes)

Overcoming Distractions for High School Students
Strategies such as remembering to check in on how you feel, avoiding the temptation to multi-task, and identifying distractions in your surroundings can help you improve your focus. (5 minutes)

Webinars:

A Recipe For Resilience: SEL, Social Action, Civility and Youth Purpose
Focusing on helping students articulate their Laws of Life and sense of purpose and learning how to use their SEL skills to take action around issues, problems, and causes they care about. (57 minutes)

The Power of Educators and Families: Joining Forces for Children's Social and Emotional Learning
How educators can use current structures and supports for social and emotional learning in school to allow parents a voice, choice, and significant role in contributing to their child's learning. (48 minutes)

What Every Educator Needs to Know about Social and Emotional Learning
This webinar defines SEL and its competencies, identifies who benefits most from SEL, and explores how to best address students' instructional needs. (31 minutes)

 What's Love Got to Do With It?
Cultivating a loving culture can contribute to the development of Social Emotional skills. Love can also positively impact all other organizational improvement efforts. (44 minutes)

Succeeding at School with Social Emotional Learning
Useful intervention strategies to decrease challenging behavior in educational settings and research on social emotional learning and positive behavior supports. (55 minutes)

Stress Management and Self Care
A look at the different stress factors that impact our lives, how to deal with them, and how to best care for ourselves while doing so. (30 minutes)

SEL & Mental Health: A New Prevention Paradigm
Explains Social and Emotional Learning as a foundation to strengthen psychological health, resiliency during times of duress, and limit the extremes of regression that cause more serious mental health problems. (1 hour)

Blog Posts:

Year-round Thankfulness Strategies to Help All Students Thrive
Strategies for working with learners and conveying your thankfulness when they participate and engage in positive and appropriate behavior. 

Writing for Resilience: The Impact of the Positive Purpose Essay on Students
A guide for helping a learner write a positive purpose essay as a strategy to build social awareness, as well as provide direction and energy for learning. 

10 SEL Skills to Prepare Children for the Future
Highlighting the overlap between the skills that SEL focuses on developing, and the skills that the World Economic Forum says will be crucial for workers in the next decade. 

Put "You" Back on Your To-do list: SEL Informed Self-Care for Educators
A list of stress-reducing suggestions for people who work under conditions riddled with high stress and continuously evolving demands.

Social and Emotional Learning to Address Behavioral Deficits: 6 strategies for a systematic approach to teaching SEL
Simple steps for effectively teaching an SEL lesson. This resource was intended for educators, but many of the strategies recommended can be used at home, as well as for other subjects.

Creating a Morning Routine: What Do Values Have To Do With It?
A guide to creating a morning routine for yourself that focuses on the goals you want to achieve in your day, and the values that drive those goals.

Do What You Think Like
An explanation of why thinking before we act can be so hard to do, and some suggestions for strengthening that ability in your everyday life.