Child Psych Podcast Episode #131

[Tammy Schamuhn] Hello everyone, and welcome to the Institute of Child Psychology’s 2025 Spring Child Parenting and Children’s Mental Health Summit. My name is Tammy Schamuhn, and I’m a child psychologist, co-founder of the Institute of Child Psychology, and co-host of the Child Psych Podcast—which, by the way, this session will also be featured on. So if you’re listening through the podcast, you’re in the right place too. Today, I’m joined by Jen Alexander, who is truly one of my favorite trauma-informed educators. Jen is a school counselor and the author of one of my all-time favorite books for teachers on trauma, Building Trauma-Sensitive Schools. For those of you watching on YouTube, I’m holding it up now—this is my bible when it comes to working with teachers. She also recently released an online course and a companion workbook called Becoming a Trauma-Sensitive Educator, which I actually just completed today—so I’m especially excited to talk about that as well. Jen is a licensed special education teacher, professional school counselor, trauma expert, author, and a leader in the movement to create trauma-sensitive schools. She has more than 20 years of experience supporting young people and the educators who serve them. In her current role as a consultant and professional development facilitator, “Miss Jen” shows educators what works—and why—when it comes to building trauma-sensitive learning environments. She holds degrees in psychology and special education, as well as a master’s degree in professional school counseling from the University of Northern Iowa. She is a nationally certified counselor and a registered school-based play therapist. When she’s not writing, Zooming, or traveling to work with educators, she enjoys reading, gardening, swimming, and spending time with her loved ones and her cocker spaniel, Macy. We are kindred spirits—just add my three kids and a few horses into the mix.

[Jen Alexander] Well, thank you so much for having me here, Tammy. I love what you and your organization do to support educators, family members, parents, caregivers, and mental health professionals, too. It’s exciting to get to talk with you today.

[Tammy] Yeah, and for anyone listening—this is valuable for parents as well. We’ll talk about trauma and what it means, and we’ll define it, but honestly, considering the current state of the world, this is just as important for educators, preschool workers, daycare workers—really anyone in a childcare or educational setting. This isn’t just about school teachers. We’re talking about any environment where there are groups of kids and you’re responsible for caring for them. That’s really the focus here. And I’m telling you, I’ve read so many books on trauma in schools, and honestly, yours is the only one I recommend people actually buy. Building Trauma-Sensitive Schools is hands down the most practical resource out there. I used to be a teacher, and it’s one of the few books that gave me things I could take into my classroom and start using right away. Same with your workbook—it’s fantastic. And it comes with an online course, which makes it even better.

[Ms. Jen] Thank you for that feedback. Your perspective really matters to me because I respect your expertise as a professional. It’s always been important to me to make sure that anything I create for and with others includes not just information, but also strategies and tools they can immediately apply in their practice.

[Tammy] And I think it’s funny—I’ve included your book in so many of my slides now. I first read it, what, four or five years ago? I think it was actually pre-COVID. I remember being in a hotel room reading it, and I was like, “We’re done recommending anything else—this is it.” This is now my go-to. I still use your quote in all of my trauma courses. I tend to teach trauma more from a parent and mental health provider perspective, not as much for teachers—although lots of teachers take it. But I always tell them, “Take Jen’s course next.” That quote of yours, “Consider what happened to you instead of what’s wrong with you”—that’s the very first slide I show teachers. That’s where we start. And then Oprah went and wrote a book with Bruce Perry, and that ended up being the main theme, and I was like, “I’m pretty sure Jen said that first!” [laughs] Maybe you got it from Bruce Perry, but I definitely took it from your book.

[Ms. Jen] Well, I’m definitely not the first person to ever say that, but I might be one of the first to bring that perspective into the education world. I learned it from other experts too, but I’m glad it resonated and stuck with you.

[Tammy] Okay, I know Bruce Perry—and Oprah—talk about that line a lot, which is a great reframe. So for all of our educators tuning into this course in particular, for our summit, this master class, and for those listening to the podcast, I think many of them are probably thinking, “Well, I’m not a therapist. I’m a teacher.” And I think you say that very clearly: you’re not supposed to be. That’s not your job. You’re not a therapist. But the reality is, we’re still holding these stories of trauma in the classroom—whether we’re trained therapists or not. So maybe we can start really micro and talk about how you would explain trauma to the teachers and educators who are listening. Then we’ll dive into the nervous system, and finally break it down into your model for schools. Does that work?

[Ms. Jen] Sounds like a great plan. When I think about how to talk with folks—no matter what their role may be—as someone who cares about kids, it’s important to understand that we all experience stress. We all face difficulties, challenges in life that create a build-up of energy—tension—that grows in response, and that affects not just how we feel inside, but also what we do in terms of our actions. Trauma is one type of stress—but it’s overwhelming stress. It’s when that stress becomes so big that it overwhelms a person’s ability to cope in a healthy way. And it doesn’t just affect the experience at the time—it has lasting effects on how someone functions going forward as well.

[Tammy] Right. And in your book—the original one, not the workbook—you talk a lot about ACEs. When I talk to educators or in corporate training, I usually start there, too, because it’s a really simple and clear framework. Now, of course, there are many things that can traumatize kids outside of the family system, but ACEs is one way to understand trauma within that system. Could you touch on that a bit—just explain ACEs?

[Ms. Jen] You bet, you bet. ACEs stands for Adverse Childhood Experiences. The original ACEs study came from work done by Kaiser Permanente and CDC researchers. They were actually looking into obesity and related health outcomes—trying to understand what could be done from a medical perspective. As part of the research, over 17,000 participants were asked to complete a questionnaire about their childhood experiences. Even though the researchers started with a focus on obesity, what they discovered from that data was a significant relationship between early adversity and health outcomes—not just obesity, but many other physical and mental health issues as well. That connection was incredibly powerful. There’s been a lot of research since then that supports the importance of understanding trauma and its effects. ACEs is one framework many people are familiar with, and it includes several forms of adversity—but it doesn’t capture everything. For example, the original study didn’t include experiences like racism or collective traumas that affect whole communities or groups of people.

[Tammy] Right—like COVID, political division between countries and even within countries, all the stress that comes with that. And school lockdowns too, things like that.

[Ms. Jen] Absolutely. And when you mention school lockdowns, that brings us to another important point. Often, when we start talking about trauma—especially with educators—we immediately think of trauma that happens outside of school. But we have to recognize that even if something doesn’t appear on the ACEs questionnaire, trauma can happen at school, too. That’s something we need to learn about, understand, and then take action to address. When we’re working with people in a school setting, that’s where we actually have the power to make change. Of course, community members, families, caregivers, and other stakeholders all play a role—but the school environment itself is something we can directly influence for the better.

Understanding ACEs and the Power of Resilience

[Tammy] Yeah. So what are our ACEs? We’ve got divorce and separation, parental neglect, sexual abuse, emotional abuse. What else do we have? Parental incarceration.

[Ms. Jen] Physical abuse, incarceration, mental health conditions that may affect a caregiver. There are several more, but again, there are so many experiences that aren’t even on that list.

[Tammy] I know! I’m like, everybody Google ACEs. There are actually quizzes you can take online to find out your ACE score. The higher your ACE score, the more likely you are to have negative health outcomes, which is why trauma is not just a mental health issue—it’s a global health epidemic.

[Ms. Jen] Absolutely. But one thing to keep in mind if folks are going to take that questionnaire is that the results are based on group effects. When a large group of people take that questionnaire, we start to see trends: the more instances of adversity in childhood, the more likely negative health effects become. But it doesn’t mean each individual will experience them. What’s often missing in that research is the role of protective factors—things that help people navigate major stress without developing negative outcomes. And of course, many people who experience trauma also go on to have positive outcomes. Post-traumatic growth is a very real phenomenon.

[Tammy] That’s my third question—we’re going to come back to post-traumatic growth because I think it’s really, really important to address. So no one panics if they take the ACE questionnaire. My ACE score is six or seven, and I’m doing pretty well so far. You can have a high ACE score and not experience diabetes, heart attacks, suicide, or the many other things that tend to be associated with high ACEs. Again, it’s about the protective factors they don’t talk about. That’s the focus of resilience research—what makes kids resilient. And just because you have trauma doesn’t mean that it’s…

[Ms. Jen] Right, right. And that’s why the work we do is so important. We believe—and know from the research—that when we intervene and build community and relationships where people feel supported and experience safety day in and day out, whether at home, in school, or in other community settings, it truly makes a difference in helping people recover from the stress we all experience.

[Tammy] Yeah, so I know one thing from talking to teachers a lot—and again, we’re really clear here that teachers aren’t therapists. You’re not doing EMDR with kids; you’re not doing desensitization work. But to be clear, you’re holding the stories that are unfolding, because kids do these reenactments in the classroom. So, when it comes to the traumatized student, I always tell teachers: your job isn’t to be an investigator. That’s not what we’re doing. Of course, if we know something, we report it—we’re mandated reporters. But then educators are often just like, “How do I identify if a child has trauma? I’m trying to be more sensitive.” Could you talk about the different faces of that in the classroom—what that might look like?

[Ms. Jen] You bet—and I love how you explained that. It’s not our role to figure out who has experienced trauma and who hasn’t, but rather to approach everyone as if they have, because trauma-informed and sensitive practices are really good for all of us. To better understand what the effects are like, we can talk a little bit about how trauma affects people. So, Bessel van der Kolk, a psychiatrist and researcher who’s done a lot of work around trauma, has a quote that goes: “Trauma often comes back as a reaction, not a memory.” So, when you’re talking about stories and how we interact with one another’s stories—we absolutely do. But we have to get beyond thinking of that story as a narrative or a memory we carry, and more as a pattern of reactions we carry in our nervous systems. These affect us as individuals and in our relationships—nervous system to nervous system. Those nervous system changes can affect how we respond in the moment, particularly if something reminds our system of a past overwhelming stress. We might then have biological and physiological reactions that make us feel as if it’s happening again. And sometimes we don’t even realize this is a past thing being triggered—it just feels like it’s happening now. That can show up as big emotions or intense feelings. And when I talk about feelings, I mean not just emotions, but also the physical sensations in our body—like our heart racing, a knot in the stomach, flushed cheeks, and so on. Other folks might have a different kind of stress reaction—rather than getting worked up, their system shuts down. So, they might feel far away, numb, withdrawn from relationships, or even disconnected from themselves. All of these things exist on a continuum—someone might feel them a little or a lot. It’s as if the body can either push on the gas pedal or the brake—or sometimes both at once. These physiological reactions then influence our emotions, behaviors, cognition, executive functioning, and the patterns we follow in relationships.

[Tammy] In your course, which I mentioned I finished this morning, I like how you frame it as energy. When you’ve got a kid where the gas pedal is stuck—that’s the sympathetic nervous system—that’s hyperarousal. You see that as aggression, hyperactivity, inability to sit still or focus. And then everyone says ADHD, ADHD, but I always say: rule out trauma first. Because that can look like ADHD. A hyperactive kid might just be stuck in a trauma response. That’s too much energy—too much sympathetic activation. And then there’s the opposite—not enough energy—which to me is hypoarousal. That dissociative, shut-down trauma response we see. But we can also move along that continuum: too much energy, and eventually we crash. That can look like depression. Cutting hides here. Kids checking out hides here. Anything else you’d add to that? There are the depressed, checked-out kids, and the hyperactive or aggressive, erratic kids.

[Ms. Jen] I think perfectionism.

[Tammy] I was just going to say that!

[Ms. Jen] And then we have kids who don’t show either pattern outwardly, because it’s all happening inside. They look like they’re doing well, but might be perfectionistic and hold this belief that “If I just do everything right, follow all the rules, and never get in trouble, nothing bad will happen.” In schools, educators can unintentionally encourage that pattern by saying things like, “I love how you follow the rules,” or “I love how you never get in trouble.” And really what that says to the kid is, “Please keep doing what you’re doing,”—even though what they’re doing comes from a high-anxiety state inside. The energy is big inside, even though we don’t see the effects outwardly in the way we might expect.

[Tammy] That was me as a kid. I have a really high ACE score, right? And none of my teachers knew what was going on at home. But I was a straight-A student—super hypervigilant about achieving and pleasing. A lot of that appeasement behavior—we now call that the fawn response. I had a very high fawn response. No teacher would have ever guessed what was going on at home. You would never know. I showed up, I always did the assignments. So, I think that’s one that teachers miss. Some kids are perfectionists just because they’re a little anxious by nature or type A. But that can be a trauma response—is that what you’re saying?

[Ms. Jen] Yes. And I’m so sorry that you experienced that as a kid. But I understand how you carried it—and that was how you coped with what you were dealing with. And it probably gave you some advantages along the way, too—in terms of your learning and your relationships.

The Role of Educators in Fostering Post-Traumatic Growth

[Tammy] Post-traumatic growth, yeah. And this is something I really want educators to understand. Jen talks about it so much in her book—so definitely read her book. I experienced that growth because teachers were my safe place. They were the ones doing all the work my parents couldn’t do at that point. My parents loved me, but at that moment, they just couldn’t show up in the way I needed. It was the teachers who—while perhaps encouraging some perfectionism—also created the consistency, predictability, and structure that I needed for post-traumatic growth. Teachers can play a huge role in that process. They were a major protective factor for me. I think it’s a big reason I turned out okay—lots of therapy, yes—but I had teachers the whole time who provided stability.

[Ms. Jen] And in everything you’re describing, you’re not saying the teachers were acting as your therapists or that you were unloading everything onto them. Rather, they gave you a place that felt safe and structured—where you knew what to expect. It was a space where you could use your gifts, learn, grow, be creative, and feel heard and understood. I think there’s a narrative that gets put out there sometimes—that if kids have experienced trauma, they’re too dysregulated to learn. And I always push back against that. We’re all learning every day, and many youth and adults in schools are learning and teaching effectively—even while carrying a lot of stress. We are all capable of learning. But there are things we can do—together, in community—to make that learning easier and more sustainable for everyone: for learners, for educators, and for families.

[Tammy] So, maybe we can funnel this into a conversation about post-traumatic growth. You say in your course that it’s when people come together to make meaning out of something—that’s when adversity can be transformed into something different. How would you describe that? I know this is kind of your jam—post-traumatic growth. How do we create that kind of environment? And then we can go into your tenets, because I think that’s where a lot of the answers are.

[Ms. Jen] Sure. I think history is one of the places where we can really see examples of post-traumatic growth. We can look at difficult events—whether they’re beyond human control, like a natural disaster or a pandemic, or whether they’re caused by human actions—and we can see how people came through those experiences carrying pain and suffering. That trauma is real. But we can also look at how groups responded—how they took what happened and learned from it. They spoke the truth about what occurred, in their own time and in their own way. They allowed themselves to feel the emotions, even just a little at a time, over time. They processed those feelings and came together in a relationship to create change—so that the harm wouldn’t be repeated, and others might be protected. Those are beautiful examples of what post-traumatic growth can look like on a group level. Of course, it can happen on an individual level, too. Many people who have fought for justice, or helped change laws and policies—whether for disability rights or protections for people going through specific hardships—often do so because of what they’ve experienced themselves. And that, to me, is a powerful example of post-traumatic growth turning personal pain into collective progress.

[Tammy] Yeah, correct me if you think I’m wrong, but as a mental health professional, I’ve always looked at it this way: if we view kids solely as victims, it disables them. I’m really big on focusing on their strengths during trauma healing—finding their village, their gifts. Yes, they might need to process what’s happened, but kids don’t process trauma the same way adults do. It’s often done through play and art; we sort of work around the edges anyway. So for me, it’s important not to look at them only as victims. That perspective puts them at a disadvantage in terms of their healing. It also affects how we set boundaries. Sometimes, because we feel bad for them, we don’t enforce appropriate limits, and that lack of structure can take away their sense of safety. Kids still need that container—they need boundaries from their leaders and teachers to feel safe. So yes, they were victimized, but don’t see them as just victims. Look at their potential for post-traumatic growth. Look at their strengths and what they’re capable of becoming.

Empowering Students Through Trauma-Informed Teaching

[Ms. Jen] Absolutely. I really appreciate how you framed that—when we’re not caught in a savior complex, we actually come from a place of believing in them. And when we believe in them, we can set clearer boundaries. That’s what helps them grow. That’s where we can nurture and challenge them—when we set those clear limits within relationships, honor them, and repair them when harm occurs. Even as you’re talking about strengths, I would take it a step further—look for the strength even in the behavior you’re most concerned about. For example, if a child is labeled as oppositional or defiant—which I really dislike as a label—what if that child is actually someone whose boundaries have been violated? Maybe they’ve had their power taken from them and now they’re saying, “No more. I’m taking charge.” That resistance could actually be a form of healing. There’s power in that. There’s potential in that. If we honor it and work with them rather than against them, we can help them grow in a really meaningful way.

[Tammy] Exactly. I was just talking to some parents and teachers about this in a consult today. When you have those strong-willed or so-called ODD kids, I really love Ross Greene’s work on collaborative problem solving. I don’t know if you’re familiar with his model—I’m sure you are—but I love it. We actually did a podcast with Ross about this. I always say teachers should learn that model because there’s no point in getting into a power struggle with these kids. They should be allowed to be strong-willed. If they’re finding their voice after not having one, that’s a good thing. The real question is—how do we help them wield that voice in a productive way? How do we work with it instead of against it?

So let’s shift gears a bit. In your original book, you talked about the Four Rs, but when I was looking through your workbook, there was a slightly different set—the four essentials: feel safe, be connected, get regulated, and learn. I might be shortening those a little. And then there are also the Four Rs: Realize, Recognize, Respond, and Retry, along with the idea of avoiding re-traumatization. I really like the workbook. The way it walks through those four essentials is so thoughtful. Maybe we can go there next, since we’re talking about building the pillars of a trauma-sensitive classroom. So let’s dive in—are we good to go with those four?

[Ms. Jen] Let’s do it! I think of these as a compass—I call them the four essentials of trauma-sensitive schools or trauma-sensitive learning environments. They help guide our direction, and the order really matters. Safety comes first, because when we are safe—and feel safe—we’re better able to connect, regulate, and ultimately learn. When we have that sense of safety, we also expand our window of tolerance and our capacity for growth and resilience. So safety is first for a reason. There are preventive things we can do in the environment to build safety: supervision, teaching clear expectations, setting and maintaining boundaries, and repairing harm when it happens. But we also need to teach about safety explicitly—helping students understand what it feels like, what it looks like, and how to ask for it. Safety can be lost at any moment—due to internal stressors, past trauma, or interpersonal conflict. And when that happens, we need to start by repairing that sense of safety before moving on to connection.

Each of these essentials—safety, connection, regulation, and learning—can be approached in three ways:

1. Preventively, through how we structure environments and relationships.
2. Curricularly, by teaching concepts like emotional literacy and boundary-setting.
3. Responsively, by knowing how to respond when those needs arise in real time.

Connection means healthy relationships—setting boundaries, communicating needs, and working through conflict. Kids often can’t figure that out on their own. They need adults to guide them through repairing ruptures and reconnecting in healthy ways. We’re also teaching them how to build and maintain those relationships long-term.

[Tammy] OK. So can you give me a couple of examples—like really concrete ones? Let’s get micro here. How can educators create that sense of safety in the classroom? What does that look like? What are one or two really good examples you would give?

[Ms. Jen] For children—and really for all of us as humans—safety comes through relationships. So any time we’re connecting with kids by saying good morning, meeting them on their level, speaking with compassion, and saying things like, “I’m so glad you’re here. I want to know about you today,” that builds safety. Or if we remember something from yesterday, like, “You were reading that book—let’s talk about it!” or “I can’t wait to do science again today because you were so curious yesterday,” those moments matter. Even extending that care to their families—like, “You told me yesterday your mom wasn’t feeling well. How’s she doing today?”—all of that creates emotional and psychological safety. As mammals, we depend on relationships for survival. We’re not built to survive on our own—we survive in community. So thinking about felt safety in terms of relational safety is really important. And then of course, we can also link it to our expectations, like not hurting each other and learning to solve problems in safe, respectful ways.

[Tammy] Yeah, and I think it’s also about understanding that kids may come from homes where things are volatile. It’s about being mindful of our language—avoiding shame, yelling, or getting in kids’ faces. I think we know this cognitively, but sometimes we fall back into old-school patterns of teaching where the teacher is yelling or putting a kid down in front of their peers. It’s worth repeating.

[Ms. Jen] Absolutely. And it’s not just about avoiding raising your voice with one child because of what they might’ve experienced—it’s also about everyone else observing it. That kind of behavior can be very activating to someone’s past trauma, even if they’re just witnessing it.

[Tammy] Yeah. I’m thinking back to when I was a kindergarten teacher. I had a lot of kids from hard places—an inner-city school—and many of them weren’t receiving much love at home. There was a lot of adversity. Parents were distracted or struggling. One way I carved out safety was by having a poster in my room that said: High five, hug, handshake, or none. When kids entered or left the classroom, they could choose one. It always had to be with consent. If they didn’t want to be touched, that was okay. It grounded them coming in and going out. Now, I wouldn’t necessarily do that with seventh graders, but for littles, it was such a great tool.

[Ms. Jen] Absolutely, yes. That’s a daily practice of saying: Your boundaries matter to me in this relationship. That promotes safety.

[Tammy] OK, so what about being connected? You talk a lot about school climate, right?

[Ms. Jen] It’s all about relationships. To be connected, we have to know each other—really know each other as humans. What are your quirks? What are you interested in? What gets on your nerves? What brings you joy? What drains you? And we create experiences where we share joy together. That’s where attachment and healthy connection come from—shared joy. So how are we doing that, both spontaneously and intentionally? How are we ensuring that our learning environments promote fun—not just for the sake of fun, but because it’s good for our nervous systems and our relationships?

[Tammy] Yeah, that makes me think of the school climate. We spoke with Jessica Joelle Alexander, who talked about how the Danish schools do this really well. They have very low rates of bullying because they focus on a collective mindset. It’s about we—as a school and a classroom—not you as an individual needing to follow the rules. It’s about creating that safety through community, rather than showing up and being told to do X, Y, and Z in a very individualistic way. So how do we create that kind of “we culture”? Because I feel like kids do so much better when they feel like part of a community. How do we make that happen in schools?

[Ms. Jen] Yes, I think my favorite way to encourage folks to begin that process is, when setting up your expectations and agreements for the new school year, to put up the words: “Being safe and feeling safe help us learn and grow.” And then, just making a list of what things in the classroom might lead us, as a group, to potentially feel or be unsafe. Then, what are the kinds of actions that help us be and feel safe too? That second list becomes how we create agreements together around how we want this community to operate—because it’s ours, and so we create it together. And when those boundaries aren’t honored, then it’s about how we work through that together as a community—not to banish someone, not to shame them—but to say, “Hey, we’ve got to have some repair here. We want you to be part of this group. You being here matters. How are we going to work through this together so that we can stay connected or reconnect because there was a break that occurred?”

[Tammy] Okay. And then the third tenet is regulation. I always think of it like—it’s a big phrase right now: self-regulation, self-regulation. We’ve known it in the psychology community for a long time. But frankly, a lot of these kids can’t. The problem is—they can’t self-regulate. That’s one of the issues with the traumatized brain. They need co-regulation, and we’ve got to understand that.

[Ms. Jen] We have a lot of educators right now who are struggling to regulate too. It’s not just kids.

[Tammy] It’s not just kids. I mean, that doesn’t help when we have adults who aren’t regulated, because then it’s like the blind leading the blind. Kids are taking their nervous system cues from ours. What do you think we need to do to promote regulation in the classroom?

[Ms. Jen] One of the first things I encourage educators to do—and family members can do this too—is to, anytime we want to label a behavior we’re noticing as disobedient (which we often think of with younger children) or disrespectful (which we tend to say with older kids), challenge ourselves to change that word to “dysregulated” instead. So instead of saying, “They’re so disobedient” or “They’re so disrespectful,” say, “They’re dysregulated.” That helps us shift to thinking about what might be driving that behavior—because likely, it’s dysregulation at some level. Once we understand that, we can recognize that nervous system changes are propelling the behavior. Then, we can attend to the needs driving the response. That not only helps the behavior (though that’s not necessarily our primary goal), but it supports healthier regulation for everyone. The more time we can spend in a regulated state—within our window of tolerance—the healthier we’ll be, because it conserves energy. Otherwise, we’re spending huge amounts of energy operating outside that window.

[Tammy] Yeah, I always look at it this way—if I were back in the classroom—I think of energy levels. Some kids are way up here, others are way down there. Kids fall into categories, and some are in a blended state. I always think classrooms need a mixture of strategies to either bring energy down or up. This is why I wish every school had a sensory room—a calm-down room. I’m not talking about an isolation chamber, but a room with low lighting and sensory activities to help bring kids back to baseline. A quiet space where they can read, wear noise-canceling headphones—whatever helps them calm down. And then, there are times we need to get them back into their bodies because they’re dissociating. That’s where movement breaks, yoga, and breathwork come in. Every teacher should learn some simple yoga or somatic practices. Getting outside, moving their bodies—don’t take recess away! If the body is dysregulated, we can’t learn. The lower brain just isn’t ready.

[Ms. Jen] At the very least, it makes learning harder. It takes more energy and doesn’t work as well. But we can build these regulatory experiences into the day so we’re not always just reacting to dysregulation. Of course, we’ll need to respond when it happens, but we can also prevent it by embedding these activities throughout the day. We can provide choices so that kids learn, “When I feel like this, here’s what helps.” They begin to make those choices for themselves. It’s not just about the teacher figuring it out and directing everyone—it’s about teaching kids to listen to their own bodies and respond accordingly. That’s the beauty of regulation: it’s an inside job.

The Power of Relationships in Promoting Regulation and Learning

[Tammy] Beautiful. And I always say it starts with the relationship with the educator first. We can’t take kids to a state of regulation unless attachment is the precursor. That kid has to feel like you like them, or nothing else works. Like, nothing. I’m like, you’re done if you don’t find something you like about this kid. They have to feel that. Only then can you work on regulation and learning. Until that point, it’s pretty hard to do that.

[Ms. Jen] And they’ve got to feel and experience that you’re on their side, that you’re not against them—even if you don’t like some action that’s happening. And that’s okay to not like it. As adults, we don’t have to be calm all the time. We can ride the energy changes of our own nervous system and feel our feelings. We do need to be regulated. We need to not be out of control or take it out on kids in whatever way that might look for different folks. But we can still be on that kid’s side and say, “Hey, I’m here for you.” Sometimes, that’s as simple as saying, “Let’s just slow this down. Let’s take a minute. You’re stirred up, I’m stirred up, but I’m still for you. Let’s just slow down so we can tend to how we feel first. Then you and I can deal with the problem in a little bit.”

[Tammy] Yeah, okay, I’m here. It’s just putting the human first, right? Their humanity comes first. The learning, to me, almost has to be secondary. We may spend, I always tell teachers this, the whole year just teaching that child about healthy relationships. They may not be ready to learn anything that year, but because you’re the adult who showed up for them and spent that whole year getting them to learn that it’s okay—adults can be trusted, and I’m loved and respected—when you hand them off to the next teacher, in the next grade, they’ll be ready to learn. They’ll be ready for academics because we’ve healed that part of the brain that was very, very damaged. They didn’t trust me. They didn’t know how to lean into relationships. And to me, you’ve set them up for the rest of their life. But we just spend so much time focused on academic outcomes and test scores, and we don’t realize that if the brain can’t trust, love, and lean into connection and vulnerability, it won’t learn. It’s not in the right state. That’s why it comes first.

[Ms. Jen] I do want educators, though, not to set academics aside because that does happen sometimes. People say, “Oh, they went through so much. Let’s not put those expectations out there. Let’s not push them.” I think we can do both. I really think we can do both. We can say, “I’m here for you. I’m going to create safety for you and with you. We’re going to put relationships first. I’m going to center your regulatory needs, and I’m going to nurture and challenge your growth because I care way too much about you to not.” I hope you grow as a reader, a writer, a mathematician, and a science thinker and a social studies thinker this year because we need you in this world making a difference. We need every kid to make a difference. I think we can hold both of those at the same time.

[Tammy] Otherwise, yeah, maybe it goes down towards the whole victim piece if we don’t still have those limits, boundaries, and expectations.

[Ms. Jen] And there’s some research showing that there are many positive outcomes that come from trauma-informed professional development for educators, especially as it relates to behavioral improvement, improved regulation, a sense of belonging, and community. There are also academic gains and attendance gains that come with it. But there are some vulnerabilities that we have to pay attention to in the research. One of them is the savior complex and the tendency some teachers may have to lower expectations. This can harm kids too, so we can’t do that.

[Tammy] Yeah, and I guess that fourth tenet kind of comes into play once the other three tenets have been honored. So when kids feel safe, they feel connected, and they’re regulated, then that upstairs brain is ready to do its job. That’s the idea. I always say the brain knows what to do given the right environment. It will naturally move toward a place of healing and neuroplasticity if we set the right conditions for the healing to happen. This is always about physical safety (the brain stem), rhythm, predictability, and then the limbic system, which is all about attachment, relationship, empathy, and compassion. Then, the upstairs brain is free to do the cool things like math, social reasoning, complex problem solving, and all of those things. Is that kind of the idea behind that fourth tenet, especially for you?

[Ms. Jen] Absolutely. We’re creating the conditions that foster learning, so we are there as quickly as we can and push kids to nurture and challenge their growth. Now, that’s not to say that if we provide those conditions, everyone will have all they need to learn. We know that we have neurodiversity in people’s nervous systems, and also in terms of learning needs. We also know that trauma can play a role in disabilities. That’s not to say that everyone who has experienced trauma has a disability, nor that all disabilities are caused by trauma. But we do know that there are some youth who’ve experienced severe traumatization, especially in their earliest years, and that this has played a role in some of the disabilities they have, particularly in the upstairs brain. This can affect functions like attention, memory, language processing, understanding cause and effect, and other executive functions that can really get in the way of learning if we don’t understand their needs around that. I was in a classroom doing some observations earlier this week and, of course, I’ll change some pieces of what I saw here to illustrate what I’m talking about. There was a student who wasn’t doing the work, even though they were better regulated, the work still wasn’t getting done. I engaged with the educator, as I do with many others, to talk about what might be getting in the way of getting started. Often, we’re taught as educators that maybe the student just wants attention, or maybe they just don’t want to do the work, or there’s something else they prefer instead. I encourage folks to go deeper: Why might they not be getting started? Is it because they can’t remember what the first step is? Or do they see the whole task and feel overwhelmed, causing their regulation to falter? Or is it that they don’t have that skill yet? Once we can narrow down what’s getting in the way of getting started, we can provide support around that, which will also promote better regulation, as they won’t be overwhelmed by the stressor of the academic task.

[Tammy] Yeah, and it kind of comes down to what part of this problem is hard. Like, what part is challenging? Often, it’s something as simple as, “I just can’t remember to start.” I know how to read a certain amount of words, but without some pictures or guidance, I have a hard time making sense of the context or getting the comprehension. But just asking them can help. Maybe we need to do some problem-solving together, but I doubt it’s the whole thing. There’s still something they can do, and figuring out where the crutch is while still acknowledging their strengths is key. We just have to fix that part.

[Ms. Jen] Yeah, and as you mentioned, Ross Green says that rarely is the reason, “I just don’t want to.” That’s seldom the real reason. We think that’s the reason, but that doesn’t mean our guess is correct.

Supporting Children in Crisis: Balancing Trauma-Informed Care with Classroom Safety

[Tammy] Yeah, like I have yet to meet a child who doesn’t want to feel success, who doesn’t want to feel love. They want to be successful; they don’t want to fail. No kid wants to fail, they just might be in a state of learned helplessness, where they feel like nothing works, so why try? To me, that’s the child who says, “I’ve done this, I’ve tried, it doesn’t work, so it’s just easier not to care.” They haven’t had any success so far, and it hurts too much to keep feeling failure. So they just armor up and say, “I don’t care,” but truly, kids want to feel seen, they want to feel successful, they want to do well. Yeah.

[Ms. Jen] I think that’s true of adults too. I work with parents, family caregivers, and educators day in and day out. We see these responses in adults sometimes, where they give up, maybe because they’re too overwhelmed to try something new. But even when they’re better regulated, if there’s reluctance, is it that they’re afraid to try? They’re afraid to risk again? They don’t have the skills yet to be successful, and it just feels safer not to try. Once we understand that, we can work through it together.

[Tammy] Yeah, one of the things that comes up a lot, and I know you work with teachers all the time, so maybe there are a few questions we can talk about. In your course, I love it—teachers ask so many questions, and that comes up a lot. I was looking at all of them, and I’m like, yes, these are things that teachers want to know. So go to the course, she answers all of them. But this one comes up for me a lot, and it came up for me when I used to work as a substitute teacher in some behavior classrooms. We had kids throwing desks, having very violent temper tantrums and dysregulation, and getting very physical. Every teacher says this: “I’ve got 20-something other kids in the classroom. How do I honor the fact that I know this kid’s had a tough life, how do I honor their trauma and everything they’re going through, but also keep the rest of my kids safe? I can’t put all of their needs below his or hers.” So, I’m sure you hear this too. That’s probably one of the biggest questions I hear. How would you respond to that?

[Ms. Jen] Yes, I hear this every day, and it’s an important question. It’s a valid question. So, my first response to that is always, I understand why you’re wrestling with it. You care about the student who is experiencing big dysregulation, maybe has gone through some really tough experiences, and maybe is still going through them. You care about meeting their needs, and you also care about the safety, well-being, and learning needs of all your students. We’re required to hold both of these responsibilities. It’s hard to hold both. It’s so hard to hold both. And then we also need to consider our needs as adults in these communities. No wonder it gets messy—it’s messy. I really encourage folks to think of this in a couple of different ways. We’re going to create a plan around the needs of the student who is having that big, threatening behavior. Because if what we’re seeing is big behavior, followed by repair, and then we just start all over again and again, chances are we haven’t structured things well enough, we haven’t supported them enough, and we’re not deep enough in the work yet where we’re preventing those episodes from occurring. So that’s one aspect of the work. But I understand you’re asking about the other side too—what to do after an incident happens to support the needs of all the other students. So, at the same time that we’re thinking about how to meet that individual learner’s needs, we need to be prepared to address the needs of the whole group that will arise. I like to think about this in four steps, which I encourage educators to follow. The first step, when there’s an episode like that in your classroom community, is to go back to the four essentials. First, you’re going to pay attention to safety. So, you’ll attend to the safety needs and lean into the protocols and steps that your district, school, or board has in place to make everything safer. Once it’s safer, we’ll focus on connection and regulation before we focus on learning. To me, that often looks like saying to kids, “That was a lot. That came on fast. I have some stirred-up feelings or shut-down feelings in my own body. You may too. Let’s circle up a minute.” We’ll acknowledge what happened by saying, “That was a lot,” and we’ll put ourselves in the role of a nurturing protector, a wise leader who knows what to do. You can say to the kids, “We have some folks helping that student. I’m going to help you, and I know how to help you right now.” Your confidence, your wisdom, and your regulation in these moments are key because that’s where children will experience felt safety. You are their leader. They can look to you to help take care of them at this moment. One way to do that is to acknowledge feelings and needs. Invite everyone to share one feeling and one need they have. They can share it with a partner, or you can do a round robin around the circle. You could have everyone write one on a sticky note and show it to someone if they want to, or not if they don’t want to. You can model that for them as well, saying, “You know what? I feel a little stirred up inside. I need a moment to let it settle, or I need to let some of that out.” And then, you can let them share what they feel and what they need, if they’d like to. And sometimes we don’t know what we need, so you can even say to the kids, “It’s okay to say, ‘I’m not sure what I need,’ or ‘I need help knowing what I need,’ or ‘I need time to think about what I need.’” From there, we can transition back into whatever comes next. We can do that in a regulating way. I like to encourage folks to use trauma-sensitive movement at this point. You mentioned yoga earlier. We know yoga can be regulated, and I wrote a quick guide with Tracy Ludwig about trauma-sensitive movement for the classroom, which brings in more choice than typical yoga usually does, so that it can be trauma-informed in nature. This means people are listening to their own bodies and making decisions in these simple, gentle movements to help themselves. So, you can use one of those strategies in that moment to transition from that classroom discussion about feelings and needs right into what’s next because we know that rhythm and routine are so important for kids to feel safe. We don’t want to sit and talk about those feelings for two hours and move into a type of therapy.

[Tammy] No, because that’s a therapy session, and I always think it’s just the kids feeling seen in their feelings. Just saying, “I see this; I see that this is hard.” The teacher’s job isn’t to fix it—it’s the same for parents too. You don’t have to fix it. The kids just need to be seen. They need to know that you can handle their feelings about the situation, and that you’re here and you’re not going anywhere. That’s the key to parenting too. I always say, you can’t fix it. I don’t want to fix it. Teachers definitely want to fix it. They’re doers; they’re planners.

[Ms. Jen] It’s so hard for us as adults to do that. We want to fix things. I was working as a kindergarten teacher a couple of years ago, and we were in the school, and she was working on this skill, you know, Dan Siegel’s concept of “name it to tame it,” just sitting with the kid and their feelings, mirroring them. She was practicing it with me, and then she went back into the classroom. A couple of hours later, she came back and said, “This stuff works! I can’t believe it!” A kindergartener came in from recess. He’s someone who tends to get dysregulated and has big behavior. He felt something was unfair during recess, so I said, “It seems like you think that was unfair,” and he just looked at me and said, “Thank you.” I then asked, “Do you need anything else?” and he said, “No, I really don’t.” And they both had this moment of, “I just needed to be seen.” He just needed to be seen.

[Tammy] Just need to be seen. I know! I think of my son and daughter. They had a big blowout the other night, and, you know, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter—they’re blowing up for reasons that had nothing to do with that particular moment anyway. Usually, it has nothing to do with the moment, but something that happened earlier that day. And just sitting there and being like, “It’s really hard when your sister, you know, hits you. I think she hit you. It’s hard when you don’t feel loved there.” And then, that’s it. There’s no fixing. At that moment, there’s no repairing. They’re both worked up, but just sitting there and saying, “Yeah, that’s hard.” Sometimes even with those kids, I think we have to do the repair with the kid who did blow up in the room too. And then, that teacher making sure they make that repair with that kid and being able to say, “That was a really hard moment. I just want to sit here. Is it okay if I sit with you for a second? We really missed you in the classroom.” And just being able to say that, without fixing it, without lecturing, without saying, “You should have made a different choice.” The kid knows. It was embarrassing for him or her. It’s embarrassing to lose it like that in front of all your peers. They knew it wasn’t okay. And just being able to say, “This is really hard. I’m still here.”

[Ms. Jen] Yeah, and I think it’s key for the kid, obviously. I mean, that’s who we’re focused on when we’re thinking about this. But it’s also helpful to the educator because I think we put, and this is true for parents too, we put so much pressure on ourselves to figure it out, to do the work, to come up with a plan, to teach it—all the things. There’s a little bit of relief in just being able to say to a kid, “This is a really hard moment, isn’t it?” and just be there together. Stop talking. That’s why I do this, just like, “Shh, hold on. Just sit there with them.” But actually, imagine that responsibility of fixing it being washed away or being taken off your shoulders. I think that’s big for the stress that educators and family caregivers are carrying too.

[Tammy] Yeah, I think teachers think with all this talk of mental health, they’re expected to be therapists. And I love that you kept highlighting in your course, that’s not your job. That’s not your job. We’re not asking you to process trauma or investigate trauma. It is not your job to go into this, take trauma therapy, and do this in your class. That isn’t your job. Your job is to hold their story, meaning they’re recreating their story in your classroom. You’re holding that. And really, by just giving them what you’re talking about—safety, connection, and co-regulation. When you say regulation, first it’s co-regulation, and then they learn to regulate. Honestly, you’ve already given them a different ending to their story. That’s the thing I think teachers don’t get. They’ve felt disconnection, often at home. They’ve felt unseen, unheard, unloved. And when you can just give them that in the classroom, you’ve created a new ending to their narrative. How amazing is that? I always think—you have so much power. But that just means you’re showing up, being predictable, being loving, and being firm. You talk about how to set boundaries in your course, which is why we don’t have a lot of time to go into it, but take the course—you’ll learn how to set boundaries more effectively with kids because they need that. But I always think, you’re giving them a new ending. You don’t need to know the story. Any kid who’s had trauma has the experience of not being understood, not loved, not safe, not heard, and not seen.

[Ms. Jen] I think we should view it as anytime we can help each other and our nervous systems return to that “just right” zone, that window of tolerance. We’re all going to experience stress in this world, and the systems we’re operating in are harming us all. And if some of us, because of the group we’re in—thinking of myself as a white woman, middle class—aren’t experiencing the same stressors that some of my fellow humans are, the way these systems are going, at least in the US at the moment, it’s only going to get worse, and they’re coming for us all. So, we’re all going to experience this stress. But the more we can create safe spaces on the “game board” for one another, wherever we are, where we help each other experience regulation and connection, that’s good for our nervous systems. Even if it’s just giving us a break from the system of harm we’re encountering, because it’s all around us.

[Tammy] Yeah. I do have to ask before we end this: can you just quickly explain the “yes if” boundary? I want to give them one example from your course about boundaries because I think these kids need containment, they need expectations, they need someone to say, “This is a hard limit. I’m setting a boundary, not a door, but a wall. This is not okay.” You can still be compassionate in that moment. So, could you explain the “yes if”?

[Ms. Jen] We often think of a boundary as a wall, as a “no,” and sometimes that’s what it needs to be—sometimes it needs to be a hard “no,” and we’re done. But what often happens is we don’t set smaller boundaries along the way, and then we become so dysregulated and overwhelmed by what’s happening that we shut the relationship out entirely. And sometimes that’s absolutely what’s needed, especially when we’re talking about abuse or injustice in a relationship. Sometimes we need that “no,” if it’s safe for us to do so. But we can also think about smaller boundaries as ways to keep saying “yes” to the relationship, if we want to. We can say “yes if.” For example, I can say “yes” to this job, if a part of it isn’t so overwhelming. Or I can say “yes” to meeting this kid’s needs, if I have support with a specific piece of it because I don’t have that support myself yet. The “yes if” helps us stay connected and engaged, keeping the relationship a “yes” when we want it to be, as long as we’re clear on the conditions that will help us be our best in that relationship.

[Tammy] Do you use “yes if” with students directly? For example, if my kids want to watch TV or something, but they have chores to do first, I’d say, “Yes, absolutely, we can have a family movie, if you finish your chores first.” So, I’m not saying “no” to TV, I’m just saying there’s a condition to it. I have a “yes” in me under these conditions.

[Ms. Jen] Yes, and when we hear the word “yes,” we naturally lean in. It feels good. When any of us hear the word “no,” it’s a disconnect, it’s a break. And for kids who’ve experienced trauma, a “no” can be really hard to process. So, if we can say “yes if” or “yes when,” it’s a win-win for everyone.

[Tammy] Beautiful. Okay, everyone. I’m just going to recap here. I brought my books, and we’ll have these linked below. If you’re at our summit, the links will appear under this video. You’ll see links to Jen’s book, her course with the workbook, and then the book Building Trauma-Sensitive Schools—which was the first one I bought. What year did you release that? I was trying to remember the first time I read it, and I thought, this is so good. That was right before COVID, right. And then this is the follow-up, which comes with a course—and I thought, yes, that’s brilliant. Now, Jen is also available to work with schools, so I’ll get the link to your website. We’ll include it so principals and administrators can reach out to you for team trainings. I highly, highly recommend it if they’re planning to teach this model in schools. Honestly, it should be taught in all schools. So, we’ll provide all the resources—your course, the workbook, and your training sessions. Is there anything else I’m missing?

[Ms. Jen] I’m going to send you the link to the quick guide so you can check out the Trauma-Sensitive Movement Quick Guide. I think you’ll like it too.

[Tammy] Yes, please! That will be a great resource to share as well. Thank you, thank you, thank you for doing this—for our audience, for the podcast, for our summit. Teachers are really struggling right now. They want to show up for their students and be trauma-informed, but many aren’t quite sure what their role is or what’s truly helpful for these kids—without crossing into the territory of being a therapist. Because that’s not their job—and we don’t want it to be. It’s too much. With the tools Jen is providing, that’s enough. These are enough. You can stop there and refer out to other professionals if needed. What I love about your work is that it doesn’t ask teachers to learn a hundred different emotion regulation strategies. Instead, it offers a framework for being supportive and inclusive, and for simply understanding that trauma is happening in our classrooms. You wrote in your book that 35 million children—50% of kids—will experience some form of trauma. That was a 2016 stat. I can’t even imagine what it is now. I’m sure it’s higher, especially if we include COVID. Basically, all of us—yay! But seriously, thank you for being a thought leader in this space and for providing such sound reasoning and a framework that I really believe is manageable for teachers. They need to feel it’s manageable in order to put it into action.

[Ms. Jen] Yes, yes. Thank you for your feedback. Thank you for having me. I always love connecting and talking with you. I’m here to support folks in whatever way works for them. There are free resources on my website, and they can also follow along online. For anyone interested in going deeper, I’m available for that too. Thanks so much for having me—and I hope everyone takes good care.

[Tammy] Thanks, Jen.