The Zenith Schools Podcast

This week I am interviewing for two principalships, which warrants a shorter episode, yet some good ideas and info.

1) A recommended podcast

2) A nightime routine idea

3) An idea for summer

Could this be a more manageable, easier to listen to format?

I am sick.  Sore throat, and more! 

Listen to this great repost of a conversation with a friend and former roommate who is an established herbal medicine healer.  He has a lot to offer the world of education.

In this second interview with Restorative Justice Resource Teacher Omar Mercado, we discuss resilience and how to cultivate resilience as an educator and as an act of self-care.  Hands-on strategies for social and emotional growth, and good talk among friends about how educators can take care of themselves while still having a high impact on kids.

After 20 episodes of the Zenith Schools Podcast, I have synthesized some of the ideas in these three take-aways.  After listening to this episode, you can get more details around these take-aways by listening to previous episodes.  One take-away is that everyone uses different types of self-care.  The second is that fulfillment is key for self-care.  And finally, that we can use systems to care for ourselves.

Social and emotional learning (SEL) and restorative practices are somewhat abstract concepts for many educators.  Learning about these practices, however, can impacteducator stress, reduce burnout and create positive school and classroom culture and climate.  In this episode, I examine Oakland Unified School District's signature practices for SEL, and examine how they can work beyond the classroom, into the hallways and offices.  This short episode will help with a simple structure for a healthy educator experience.

The big talk of the town in "Social and Emotional Learning".  My concern is how this applies to us, as educators, practicing self-care.  I usher in adult SEL through the lens of "CASEL" or casel.org's framework for social and emotional learning.  This episode is a launchpad for future interviews that will focus on adult SEL and how it relates to self-care.

While often we educators shy away from terms like "outcomes", "systems" and "efficacy", there are processes that will provide us with the feedback we need to avoid burnout.  This short lecture gives a 4-step approach to creating a system in the class or school-wide in order to maintain our own engagement in the educational community.

Teacher Joel Rodriguez gives this episode a charming, realistic view of both teacher belief of student potential as well as how to stay in a fruitful relationship as an educator.  This episode offers some key insights from a highly successful teacher, thinker, and husband.

Our values, if not respected, can cause us to become triggered.  Likewise, we trigger others emotionally when we don't attend to their values.  This leads to educator burnout because the emotional conflicts caused by values and triggers is often what disengages students, and disenchants well-meaning educators.  Also, with colleagues, while we may value similar things, we may express values differently.  Listen to this exploration of the topic of Values and Triggers and how they reinforce our self-care as educators.  Teachers and administrators will benefit from this talk.