3rd July, 2023
I Love You Rituals.
These rituals provide the four elements of connection and the power of 'Joy Juice'.
They give ourselves and our children "joy juice," or feel-good chemicals like dopamine, oxytocin and endorphins. Now, more than ever, that's something we could all use.
To get this we need:
- Eye contact
- Touch
- Being present in a playful situation
Our educators have been introducing this into our program and the reactions from the children is so amazing. You really need to try it to believe it. The smile, gives you this surprise intense eye contact and usually ask for you to do it again. Watch the videos to see them in action.
Breathing as a Tool to Calm and Support Emotional Regulation
Slow deep breathing allows us to calm ourselves in stressful situations. Its 3 main effects are:
It allows us to calm ourselves. Once calm we can pause before we react to a stimulus. This gives us the ability to engage/respond with conscious intent rather than just react.
Deep breathing shuts off the stress response in the body and can help you to remain calm enough to respond consciously to a child's behaviour.
It helps the child to self-regulate. It works like yawning - when one person yawns other people subconsciously follow. Breathing slowly and with intent has the same effect on the people around you, especially if you have close contact.
All behaviour is a form of communication. Our job is to understand what the child is trying to communicate to us.
The educators of our service are about to engage in a 10 month professional development training program to learn and develop the skills of conscious discipline. This will extend educators' skills in supporting children to learn the social-emotional and communication skills necessary to manage themselves, resolve conflict, prevent bullying and develop pro-social behaviours.
There are 7 skills of discipline that can be transformed into teaching moments. These are composure, encouragement, assertiveness, choices, empathy, positive intent and consequences.
