Connecting with Mrs. Cohen
April 11, 2021
Good Evening,
This week we have a short, 3 day week. We seem to sometimes be overwhelmed on the short weeks--both adults and students. Sometimes a good strategy for a short week is to treat it like a "regular" week. Sticking to our routine and structures for the 3 days we are in session will help all of our kiddos be more successful learners in the compact week. We often spend a lot of time thinking about and talking about our own kids. This week, we will still think about them, but we will also be thinking about others. We will explore how our kids interact with others and think about them through the lens of social awareness.
Last week I began a review about our SEL learning. I shared a video about SEL (there is another video this week) and wrote about self-awareness, one of the 5 CASEL core competencies. This week we will look closer at Social Awareness. As a reminder, the five competencies are:
- Self-Awareness
- Social Awareness
- Self-Management
- Relationship Skills
- Responsible Decision Making
This past Friday night our Robinson PTO Cares Food Pantry was open. Our entire counseling team is so grateful to our PTO for the wonderful partnership in this work. We are especially grateful to the Robinson PTO Cares Committee co-chairs Kristi Conroy and Shannon Ross. They, and their amazing committee members as well as the entire PTO board, have been so committed to helping our families over the course of this past, unprecedented year of need, but also for many years prior.
If you would like to learn more about our Robinson PTO Cares work, please join the last PTO meeting of the year in MAY. We will do a short presentation about our Robinson PTO Cares work. We hope to see many of you there!
As always, our counseling team information is listed at the end of this message. Please reach out to any of us if we can be helpful to your child.
Take care and have a great week,
Julie
Self-awareness
Self-management
Social awareness
Responsible decision-making
Relationship skills
FREE PARENT TRAINING
https://genmindful.com/pages/free-parent-training-make-it-stick?rfsn=5262722.8f6f9e
Did you miss the FREE screening of RESLIENCE last month?
This documentary is https://www.eventbrite.com/e/resilience-documentary-screening-panel-discussion-tickets-146600797933?aff=erelexpmlt
LET'S TALK ABOUT SOCIAL AWARENESS
We often have students who are unable to show empathy or "put themselves in another's shoes." These students begin to stand out from their peers and, in some cases, they do not have reciprocal or healthy friendships. Skills like social awareness and perspective-taking are a key ingredient in helping kids form strong friendships and relationships. These skills also help kids understand their own strengths and weaknesses. Children who show empathy are less likely to tease or bully their classmates. It is much easier for kids to feel empathy for those who are similar to them or in close proximity to us--like a shared classroom setting or at home. We need to also support kids so they understand the perspectives of those others who look and act differently from them or have a different culture, or have a different lived-experienced at home.
Things to support your child's social awareness:
- Read books with your kids and talk about how the characters are feeling and reacting. Identify the emotions and then talk about why the character feels that way or how you know.
- Talk about your own emotions with your kids. Label your feelings explain what made you feel that way. If you have negative emotions, talk about what would help you to feel better.
- If a conflict arises, ask your child to think about how the other person might be feeling. For example, if your child takes a toy away from their sibling, ask “how would you feel if your sibling took your favorite toy away from you?”
- If a neighbor or friend of the family is going through a difficult time you can think of ways you might be able to help. For example, pick up groceries for an elderly neighbor or write a letter to a friend who is living alone and might be feeling isolated.
- For older children, talk about reading body language and using perspective-taking to determine if someone is hiding their real feelings. Explain how sarcasm and figurative language are ways the people may say one thing but mean something else.
AN OFFERING FROM OUR PARENT EQUITY GROUP:
BRIDGING THE GAP
SUPPORT GROUP
A safe space for Robinson’s Families of Color. Come speak your mind while also learning about self-care topics such as: mindfulness strategies, positive coping mechanisms, and sleep hygiene. This is an 8-week support group designed just for you. See you there!
WEDNESDAY’S 7-8:30PM
April 28th - June 16th
VIA Zoom
Please go to: https://webster.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_57MewU9HEcsp8ou
A collaboration between the Robinson Equity Group and Webster University
ROBINSON'S COUNSELING TEAM
Indria Harris
School Counselor, preK-2nd grade
Indria.harris@kirkwoodschools.org
314-213-6100, ext. 4061
School Counselor, 3rd-5th grade
julie.cohen@kirkwoodschools.org
314-213-6100, ext. 4040
Tonya Ampey-Elong
Social Worker, KSD
tonya.ampey@kirkwoodschools.org
314-213-6100, ext. 8060
Ana Shields
Educational Support Counselor
ana.shields@kirkwoodschools.org
314-437-2106