Bedlam
I’m worried about teachers.
Because I’ve heard and read that so many are as exhausted right now as they normally are by Thanksgiving.
They are managing stressed-out students while they themselves are stressed out. And no one, a teacher told me recently, is doing for them what they are expected to do for their students.
That is,
hold them.
I’m not sure why it is (well — I can guess), but a lot of people are uncontained right now. Uncontained: meaning unable to manage their emotions — their stress, anxiety, anger, frustration. Meaning acting out. Meaning discharging their emotions in ways that require other people to contain them, to hold them, to help regulate them.
I maintain, and a lot of teachers do too, that it is teachers’ jobs to hold their students when those students are uncontained. Because there’s always a good reason for any acting out, and teachers (and ultimately the students) benefit from guessing what those reasons are and acting compassionately on those good guesses.
But effectively holding someone who is uncontained is
much less likely to happen
when the holders are uncontained themselves.
So. Hear me.
They need to feel heard, seen, valued. They need sensible rules to be established and enforced consistently. They need an administration that is not reactive but is thoughtful, deliberate, engaged, present.
They need to know everything is OK.
Just as their students do.
Which means school leaders need to be contained, too. So they can hold their teachers, so the teachers can hold the students.
Hierarchy of care. The antidote to bedlam.
Mantra: Get held. Meaning get psycho-coaching. Containment is mandatory.