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.

In this 14th full episode, I interview teacher Irene Leivas Howard, who not only works in continuing education for the highest risk students, but she is also raising 3 adolescents with her educator husband, and just as adeptly raising a child with autism.  This interview hits multiple examples of advice for all sorts of educator self-care needs from raising a student with different abilities, managing day to day family life, and working with students of high risk.

In this episode I interview my friend and a known traditional healing expert, Brian Hornbeck.  Brian has a lot to offer our profession, especially in his experience with families, humans and education.  Brian explores concepts that cross-over professional fields, and he emphasizes traditional advice for common day stress and struggles.  He is also an herbal medicine expert, and recommends some herbs with the educator in mind,

In this full episode, high school teacher and new teacher mentor Anna Savino gives clear and concrete examples of how self-awareness leads to educator well-being.  She also touches on how consistent self-reflection is one of her key practices to avoiding educator burnout.  In this full episode expect more practical and inspiring advice for new and veteran teachers on staying mentally well, staying motivated, and impacting our students through our own self-care.

In this episode, I interview a district resource teacher on adult social and emotional learning (SEL) and its impact on student achievement and well-being.  Ms. Chigas goes deep into the conversation without holding back on the true urgency of SEL and its ipotential impact on keeping students out of prison,  and how adult SEL offers support for suicidal and mentally ill students.

This full espisode examines the book "Onward" by Elena Aguilar and examines some key principals on educator self-care and resilience.  Connections are made to online personalities that serve students and educators.  

In this episode, my former principal talks about how he took care of staff to impact school culture and students.   Mr. Lee Romero also discusses highlighting staff who make strong relationships with students to emphasize school priorities and impact school results.  He also gives me a bit of advice on my own path.  Super honored, and very proud to have worked with this leader. Self-care comes from our own journey, but being supported makes that a bigger reality. 

I decided to start a Twitter hashtag: #BreatheSmileTeach, where I would collect 100k educator self-care ideas for the year.

In this episode, I review four tweets from different people that I retweeted with the hashtag, and I explain how they relate to educator self-care.  

After you listen to this episode, I encourage you to tag your own ideas on Twitter: #BreatheSmileTeach.

In this 4th full episode, I interview 4th year teacher Cruz Rodriguez.  He gives a fresh look at staying engaged, continuously learning and working with students in an engaging and low-stress way.  As an experienced educator, he reminded me of my commitment early-on to not become jaded, and always seek new challenges.  He is also a practitioner of meditation and other self-care methods, including participation in extra-curricular activities.

In this first full episode of the Zenith Schools Podcast, high school teacher Cyndi Roncoroni talks about setting students up with systems for task accomplishment so that she can have a bigger impact in the classroom and for extra-curricular activities.  

Cyndi teaches us that for her, self-care means creating efficient systems that support student involvement and academic success.

Happy New Year!  This is the official podcast launch for The Zenith Schools Podcast, the podcast of "The Biggest Educator Self-Care Project in the World," Zenith Schools.  It is also the preview for the month of January 2019.

We preview four teachers who have a high impact on students and still maintain their sense of self, health and positivity.