Trauma

Now is the time to update our school policies and practices With exclusion rates soaring in recent years, we can no longer overlook everything that has been learnt about the impact of what are known as Adverse Childhood Experiences (Felitti & Anda 2010) on children s minds and bodies, and how the nervous system functions best. We know that relationships are essential for recovery and for settling to learn: but our UK educational practices are still geared to withdrawing relationship when times get tough, leading to escalation of challenging behaviour and further rejection for already traumatised children and young people. This has to stop. Many educators are now recognising how significant alternative ways of thinking in the classroom are for optimising engagement and learning. Louise explores how to facilitate quality moments of relationship with children and young people that genuinely reach them, where they are, recognising the impact of trauma on their emotional state, mental functioning and ability, or lack of it, to trust the adults. She helps identify the best way to work so that we can teach curriculum as well as healthy behaviours. Honouring biology by building on Perry s (2006) neuro -developmental sequence, Louise provides numerous creative ways of being and doing for those wanting to ensure school is as inclusive as it can be.

Oprah Winfrey and renowned brain development and trauma expert, Dr Bruce Perry, discuss the impact of trauma and adverse experiences – and how healing must begin with a shift to asking 'What happened to you?' rather than 'What’s wrong with you?'.

Through wide-ranging and often deeply personal conversation, Oprah Winfrey and Dr Perry explore how what happens to us in early childhood – both good and bad - influences the people we become.

A simple change in perspective can open up a new and hopeful understanding about why we do the things we do, why we are the way we are – and provide a road map for repairing relationships, overcoming what seems insurmountable, and ultimately living better and more fulfilling lives.

Many of us experience adversity and trauma during childhood that has lasting impact on our physical and emotional health. And as we’re beginning to understand, we are more sensitive to developmental trauma as children than we are as adults. ‘What happened to us’ in childhood is a powerful predictor of our risk for physical and mental health problems down the road, and offers scientific insights into the patterns of behaviours so many struggle to understand.

When the Body Says No draws on scientific research and clinical work to provide the answers to critical questions about the mind-body link - and illuminates the role that stress and our emotional makeup play in an array of common diseases and the physiological connection between life’s stresses and emotions and the body systems governing nerves, immunity development, and hormones.

Two-thirds of us have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience, from the likes of bereavement and divorce to abuse and neglect. In The Deepest Well, Dr Burke Harris reveals the science behind childhood adversity and offers a new way of understanding the adverse events that affect us throughout our lifetime.

You can hear Nadine Burke Harris talk about how childhood trauma affects health across a lifetime in this Motional Munchable.

Understand how adolescents experience loss and how to provide help and support.

Trauma can result not just from major disasters but also serious loss, sudden disruption and abuse of all kinds. Children and teenagers can experience the effects of trauma in many ways including wakefulness, vigilance, panic attacks and disillusion.

Contains practical techniques and ways of working with children and teenagers, including empowering methods to enable them to take charge of their own feelings. Provides a guide to theory and an outline of contrasting approaches to trauma work, with worksheets for both individual and group work.

The title underscores the book’s central idea: Exposure to abuse and violence fosters the development of a hyperactive alarm system and moulds a body that gets stuck in fight/flight and freeze.

Trauma interferes with the brain circuits that involve focusing, flexibility, and being able to stay in emotional control. A constant sense of danger and helplessness promotes the continuous secretion of stress hormones, which wreaks havoc with the immune system and the functioning of the body’s organs.

The book describes various therapeutic interventions, including trauma processing, neurofeedback, theatre, meditation, play, and yoga. However, it emphasises that each intervention must be tailored to the individual as one size never fits all.

This useful book is packed full of practical information for teachers and those working more broadly with children and young people. It is very easy to read and you can ‘dip’ into it rather than read it from the beginning to the end.

Part 1 details the reasons behind the difficulties we may see and helps us ‘climb into their world’.

Part 2 lists an A-Z of the most common issues. It is a comprehensive but easy read offering the practical ideas.