Transform Classrooms from the Inside Out: Effective Interventions to De-Escalate Extreme Emotions & Disruptive Behaviors in Schools

CPD

Handouts

Faculty

Joanna Curry-Sartori, MS, LMFT Related seminars and products

Self-Leadership Collaborative, LLC

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Joanna Curry-Sartori, MS, LMFT, an innovative leader and creative pioneer in the field of social and emotional learning. For the last 20 years, Joanna has dedicated her career to the well-being of young people and the adults who surround them. Joanna has specialized in integrating mindfulness and Internal Family Systems (IFS) to transform school culture and climate and uplift the whole school community. Joanna presents and consults widely with schools and community organizations.

Now endorsed by the Foundation for Self-Leadership, the non-profit branch of IFS, Joanna is a leader in the global initiative to translate the empowering principles of IFS to the school setting. Joanna is directing the pioneering efforts to implement IFS systemically in three schools in Connecticut, an effort that is being studied by a leading research university. In 2019, she was a keynote speaker for the IFS annual conference. Joanna is a Level 2 IFS trained therapist.

Following many years as a “School Based Community Therapist” with a community agency, Joanna opened her clinical private practice, Self-Leadership Collaborative, LLC, in 2017, where she works with children, teens, families, and individual adults.

Whether she is consulting with superintendents and principals, presenting to parents and teachers, or hands on in classrooms with students, Joanna is passionate about working with people of all ages to discover simple ways to access their innate confidence, courage and compassion, to realize their potential and bring their best into each moment.

Speaker Disclosures:
Financial: Joanna Curry-Sartori is the founding director of Self-Leadership Collaborative, LLC. She receives a speaking honorarium and recording royalties from PESI, Inc. She has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.
Non-financial: Joanna Curry-Sartori has no relevant non-financial relationships.

Objectives

1. Determine how core concepts of Internal Family Systems (IFS) can be applied in a school setting. 
2. Develop proactive practices and strategies to reduce stress-related issues in the classroom.
3. Apply IFS with students whose education is interrupted by learning challenges such as impulsivity or difficulty focusing. 
4. Utilize IFS to help students build capacity for self-awareness, self-regulation, internal motivation and positive interactions with others.
5. Practice IFS-informed techniques to effectively address disruptive and defiant student behaviour.
6. Differentiate how to best apply IFS tools and techniques across the school system.

Outline

What is Internal Family Systems (IFS)?

If you’ve ever seen Disney Pixar’s film, Inside Out, you’ve got a head start on the IFS approach! In the movie, what Inside Out calls emotions (Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness), IFS calls parts. Each part of you has positive intentions, but sometimes they can be easily highjacked by other people’s behaviour. This program will show you how to weave these concepts into your life to better show up for your students and reduce your stress levels.

Apply IFS in Schools

Core Concepts of IFS & Evolution of the School Model

• Current state of students, educators and schools
• Student’s need for connection to self and to others
• Your vision for students & how IFS can help
• IFS Model & core concepts created by Richard Schwartz, PhD
• Development of parts, their positive intent and core needs
• Possibility for everyone to access their optional capacity to function & operate as best self

Apply IFS to You

Showing Up as Your BEST SELF for Students

• Understand our parts – different sides of us manifesting as emotions, perspectives, responses, etc.
• Relate to our parts, explore their source and needs
• Importance and benefits of adults practising self-care to support well-being in students

Practice:

• Techniques to help you stay out of power struggles
• What to do when your buttons are pushed
• Understand protective response strategies to our own stress (extreme parts of us)
• Techniques on how to respond to upset students
• Understand protective response strategies to stress in students (extreme parts of us)
• Practices to access and operate with greater self-leadership
• Practical solutions to show up as your best self
• Reflective practice for personal awareness, self-care and understanding

Apply IFS to Students

Transform Disruptive, Angry, Disrespectful, and Distracted Behaviors

• Application of model in acute/crisis moments as response tool
• Implications for student behaviour and learning capacity
• The effect of trauma and devaluing experiences to create extreme reactions
• How different parts/sides of us manifest as “bad”, disruptive/challenging behaviours in school
• Increase cooperation with teachers and their classmates
• Childhood attachment and the importance of relationships with school personnel

Practice:

• Implement pro-active, preventative practices: individually, relationally, in classes
• Increase awareness of different parts through mindfulness-based, “unblending” practices
• Experiential activities which build foundational skills to apply with students
• Small workgroups: applying the model with students

Target Audience

• Classroom Teachers
• Special Education Staff
• Behavioral Intervention Specialists
• Instructional Assistants
• Program Specialists
• School Improve Teams
• Disciple Committee Members
• Administrators Serving Grades K-12
• School Psychologists
• School Social Workers
• School Guidance Counselors
• School Occupational Therapists
• School Occupational Therapy Assistants
• School Speech-Language Pathologists
• Any school professional that works with children