Cat Magielnicki:
They see us come and they then can take that calm and like say, okay, right now I can be okay. But if they see us also practicing caring for ourselves, giving ourselves empathy, giving ourselves grace, they’re also going to model that too. Right? That’s going to make them a stronger human at the end of the day as well.

Alec Patton:
This is High Tech High Unboxed. I’m Alec Patton. That voice you just heard is Cat Magielnicki. Cat’s been a school psychologist at campuses across the High Tech High community. She’s just started her own company, Compass Ed, which is all about bringing wellness into schools.

On March 26, 2020, one week after California went into statewide lockdown, Cat came out of this podcast to talk about how to show up for your students when you’re all stuck at home. Today, she’s back to talk about how to support your students as you and many of them come back into the school building. She’s got an acronym for you. Here’s Cat to explain.

Cat Magielnicki:
I’m a real sucker for acronyms. Really, the reason for that is that when we’re stressed, it’s incredibly hard to pull any information out of our brains. Right? Our cortisol is pumping and it’s essentially blocking our think area. So if I can just remember one word that can then help me trigger, okay, what are the things that like I need to do in this moment? That’s a starting place. Right?

So I’ve come up with an acronym and it’s CARE & SAFE. If you can remember CARE & SAFE, you’re going to be a-okay. CARE is calm, aware, routine, and empathy. Then SAFE is safety, adjust, fun, and empty?. You ready to dive in?

Alec Patton:
Let’s dive in.

Cat Magielnicki:
Really the key is being calm. So the C. Students and kids, they look towards adults to know how we feel and how we react to different events so that they know how to feel and how to react. We want to be able to model, as the adults, a sense of calm for them. Now, how do you act calm? Because you probably don’t feel very calm right now. I know everyone’s preaching self-care, wellness. Right? You got to take care of yourself. That can feel hard at the end of the day. Are there ways you can build it in with your students? Being able to just build and movement breaks with your students, stretch breaks, water breaks, joy breaks, time to be silly. That can help refill that cup and also help you be able to activate that calm space when you’re talking to kids or being present with kids.

Alec Patton:
First of all, I think that insight about build in your self care time with your students is really powerful. I think there’s a tendency to feel guilty about doing that as a teacher and don’t.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah, no, totally don’t. Because, right. We’re talking about they see us come and they then can take that calm and say, “Okay, right now I can be okay”. But if they see us also practicing caring for ourselves, giving ourselves empathy, giving ourselves grace, they’re also going to model that too. Right? That’s going to make them a stronger human at the end of the day as well.

Alec Patton:
There’s one that I started doing. I’ve only done it with adults, is my disclaimer. I had a little slide that showed a still of Lisa Simpson meditating. I just put on a one minute timer and I just said, “We’re all just going to breathe and you can shut your eyes or keep your eyes open, whatever you want. But we’re just going to take one moment to breathe”. I would shut my eyes, and I know shutting your eyes for a full minute, as a teacher, is a risky move. Particularly, depending on what age group you’ve got. Apply to your context.

Cat Magielnicki:
One eye open. Yeah.

Alec Patton:
A certain number of teachers are going to be going, “Boy, you’ve been out of the classroom. You’re insane”. A hundred percent take that on board. But, I think a one-minute calming thing. I did it because I felt so much better doing it. It was always a reminder to me of like, “Oh wow. That really made me grounded and really made me feel like I could be better in this space and feel better in myself and better in my body”. So I think trying that, just saying, “Hey, we’re just going to take one quiet minute”. It’s not prescriptive. You’re not saying count your breaths. You’re just creating that space. I think it’s really powerful.

The other thing that I used to do, and this really only works if you have two hour classes, but I would read for 15 minutes with my students every class. Sometimes I’d be going around and checking in with kids. But I would really try to actually get out a book and read with the kids at the same time. I just found that it made such a difference to me and because… Then class always started from silence. It was always me saying, “Okay guys. Let’s put our books away. We’re going to start class”. It just changed the feeling of the return so much.

Alec Patton:
Those are my two thoughts of ways to build that in. I’m wondering what else you’ve seen, as far as ways of doing your self care with your kids.

Cat Magielnicki:
This one actually came from a friend who recently I had shared like, “Oh, let’s analyze like how much are we actually drinking in the day as educators? Because we know that if my water intake is appropriate, then my anxiety level actually decreases”. So she actually in-person with her kids, she just structured in, “Okay, everyone. Let’s take a sip of our water”. Just doing that pause of saying, “This is our time to everyone just have some water”. They were fifth graders, so older kids. She said it just made a huge difference within their week. Now she does it all of the time.

There can also be pauses where it’s like, okay, “I’m going to teach a self care moment”. Maybe in my schedule, it’s at 10:15 every day we just do a five minute self-care thing. But then you can transition to kids leading the self care and it’s acknowledging, “Hey, we’re going to try a few different things. This strategy might not work for you. That’s okay”. Then welcoming kids to start sharing, “Well, what’s the strategy that works for you”? Maybe it’s a doodle break. Right? Maybe it’s a dance break. Maybe just stretching in your chairs because I know that probably moving is going to feel a little bit more difficult in school, but there are stretches you can do purely with your chair. Right? Like holding the back of the chair and twisting your body from side to side.

Those are just some really simple and easy ways that you can incorporate self-care that’s not necessarily just deep breathing. I think that’s a great segue to the A in calm, which is aware. Being aware of your needs, being aware of your students’ needs, and being aware of students’ situations. Just knowing as much as possible. What are they bringing with them as they come back into the school building? This might be connecting with families, whether that’s through surveys, or through phone, or through video. Right? Finding out what are students carrying with them as they enter back into this really new environment in a lot of ways. Right? How are students feeling about coming back or what if you have a student who has to stay remote? How are they feeling as they might be seeing some kids going into the hybrid learning?

So being able to just be aware of all of your kids’ situations as much as possible, so that you can be aware of what they need. That’s also being aware of what’s going on with COVID so that if students are feeling anxious, if students have questions, you can give some answers. Right? You’re not going to know everything. That’s totally fine. That’s totally normal. It’s just important to say, “You know what? I don’t have that answer. Let’s see if we can figure that out together”. Or you could even say, “I don’t have the answer, but I’ll look into it”. It’s so much better to say, “I don’t know”, instead of just lying and trying to find a way to comfort students but teaching them, hey, this is how we can become more aware or learn about this topic as well.

Alec Patton:
Okay. On that A of aware, something that immediately strikes me is that extensive parent communication and keeping your full cup don’t always go hand in hand. I’m curious about if you have any ideas about strategies for doing that that don’t completely overwhelm your life.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah. That’s a really, really great and valid point. I think this answer to this question really depends on you as a person and what feels manageable. It could just be, maybe I’m going to send out a survey to parents and there is a Likert scale where they’re answering questions. I know if I see parents answering a four to some questions, that means I need to do a phone call. Right? If you’re not into making surveys like that, you could just even send an email being like, “If you need to connect before we go in person, let me know”. That might open a lot of doors. That might only open one door. I don’t think this just falls on teachers. I think it really falls on school leaders too, and being aware of their community. How can we pull in the support of our leaders? Leaders, how can you go in and support your teachers too during this time?

Alec Patton:
I think that’s a great point that you’re not checking in with all the parents all the time. You’re coming up with the structures that allow you to pinpoint who to really connect with.

Cat Magielnicki:
That also makes me think of boundaries. Making these phone calls, making these connections, they’re happening during the school day. But then by 5:00 PM, by 4:00 PM, whatever your work day is, it off. I’m not answering phone calls unless there are outliers to the situation. But I’m not answering phone calls and not answering my email. I’m knowing what boundaries I need so that I can care for myself too.

Alec Patton:
Right. So we’re at A here. We’re calm, we’re aware.

Cat Magielnicki:
Now we’re getting into routine. What we know from students, what we know about humans, is that we thrive when there’s predictability. This is so key to create some sense of normalcy and by creating some sense of predictability during this time of unpredictability, really, we’re allowing students to just be able to access their best selves in a lot of ways. How can we do this? It’s just having a schedule.

So kids know every day they come into the classroom and maybe, like you said, 15 minutes to start the day to read. They know like, “I can rely at that. That’s what happens at the start of my day”. I think we do this pretty naturally as teachers. There’s a schedule and students are following it. I do think there is an element that’s really important to this that’s visual. Being able to post the schedule somewhere. I’m talking about for high schoolers too, for them to like visually see how does my schedule look. Kids and really everyone, we’re all thinking a lot these days. So being able to just take one demand of thinking away. Not having to think about what’s happening at 11. Hey, I have it right in front of me. I don’t need to draw it from my memory. It’s taking a demand away from the kids right now because there’s a lot of demands pulling on them.

That’s a piece of the how, of just having the schedule and having a visual. But now unpredictable happen, right? We’re in an unpredictable moment right now. So whenever possible, if we can give some warning or a heads up to that unpredictable, that could be really beneficial. It’s as simple as just saying like, “Hey guys, today things are shifting a little bit and this is how it’s going to shift”. Showing them that visual, explaining why it’s happening, and then remaining calm. We’re drawing back on the things that we just reiterated, which is being aware of the situation, and having the facts, and also delivering the message calmly. This can just make the routine as smooth as possible, even if it is a little bit different.

Alec Patton:
Yeah. I mean, this is one of those areas where elementary school teachers are so far ahead of the curve.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yes. I often pull from elementary foundations of how do we support kids? Because they’ve got the roots of it all.

Alec Patton:
Yeah.

Cat Magielnicki:
Really, I think high schoolers crave some of those things too. They crave the little bit of silliness and the structure. We put so many demands on our adolescents that they’re oftentimes like biologically not ready for.

The last part of the care is empathy. Really, it’s acknowledging, validating, and listening as much as we can. I can’t emphasize this one enough. We need to really just make room for our students to express their feelings. To share what’s on their minds. This is really empowering too. It connects kids. They feel valued. They also learn how to articulate their feelings, which I think is hard for a lot of humans.

How do we build empathy? It’s taking the time to have connections in class. Maybe you do some kind of morning meeting. Here we go again with elementary. But a morning way to start our day. Maybe you just have a question that you pose. It can be a silly question. It doesn’t always need to be serious. You could have scheduled check-ins with your students so you know that on a rotating schedule, you check in with certain kids. You can also do some empowering exercises. Have kids share the one thing that they like to say to themselves when they’re feeling like they’re having a hard day. Have them put it on a post-it note and put it on their binder or on their desk, or whatever space that they have so they have that thing that they can rely on. But this is just a way to connect, listen to each other, validate each other, and really make room for all of the feelings that we’re bringing.

Alec Patton:
This reminds me of, the pick of the week is my favorite go-to icebreaker. All it is, is you just share something that’s bringing you joy that week. It could be a TV show. It could be a recipe. It could be a person. I remember once a teacher shared a stretch that they remembered that was really nice, and we all just did the stretch, and it felt great. It brought me joy too. So what I like about that is that you’re not sharing anything that feels uncomfortable to share, but you really learn about each other.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah. I have actually read an article recently that was sharing some connection activities. I’m trialing this one in a grad course that I’m teaching right now. It’s dedicating your learning for the day to someone. So we’ve been going through each week. Someone takes that week and they dedicate our learning or that class to someone or something. It’s been a great way for all of us to connect in a different way and to learn about each other in another way, too.

Alec Patton:
So one person does it for each week?

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah. It’s been empowering and I think a different way, virtually too, for everyone to connect and get to know each other. Because they’ve been in a cohort together for almost a year now, but they haven’t met in person, which is pretty wild. So this is just another way to build connections.

Alec Patton:
Who might you dedicate your learning to?

Cat Magielnicki:
I dedicated my learning to my best friend, who is someone who’s gone through a lot of challenges physically and continues to persevere and continues to help. I just feel like he is the person that inspires me to keep doing the work that I do. I started off the dedications and he was the person that I dedicated our costume, and I was able to show a picture and tell our story.

Alec Patton:
Oh, that’s cool.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah.

Alec Patton:
All right. We’re onto our second word.

Cat Magielnicki:
We are. Yes. So, safe. And S stands for safety. We want to make sure that everyone feels safe and we create safety by, you’ll catch on, being calm, being aware, or being able to provide facts, providing a routine, and having connection. They’re all building off of each other, right? Those are pieces of safety. When we have those things, we start to create a safe environment. Now with COVID, I know safety also means other things too. There’s also new guidelines for health reasons. Wearing a mask, washing your hands, and keeping distance. There are ways that we can do this that don’t necessarily need to feel scary. We can do songs or cheers. Cheers actually work really well with high schoolers and middle schoolers. Like, “All right. This is the time of the day where everyone washes their hands and we’re going to cheer each person on”. It’s super corny, but it’s fun, and it’s silly, and it brings back the joy, right?

Alec Patton:
Uh-huh (affirmative).

Cat Magielnicki:
You can also do for the masks, with little ones. I really love this idea that a teacher shared. “All right, everyone’s going to check that their superhero mask is on properly”. Then you can go into reminding them, why are they superheroes? “Well, we’re superheroes because we’re wearing masks to protect one another. That is our duty. That is our job”. So it’s also empowering kids. Then the social distance piece, you can do visuals where there are marks on the floor. You can show arm spans. That’s really helpful. If you have preschoolers, having ropes with knots when you’re walking in the hallway. Then for middle schoolers and high schoolers, have them join in. Let them collaborate. How can they know that they’re creating enough space? What are their signals that they know, “All right. I am giving this person the space that they need to keep each other safe”.

Alec Patton:
So A.

Cat Magielnicki:
A. Yes. Adjust. We already mentioned that things are unpredictable, right?

Alec Patton:
Uh-huh (affirmative).

Cat Magielnicki:
We need to be able to be prepared on the spot. Here’s the thing, I promised that you all are already pros at this. I mean, you’re teachers. You’re always thinking on your toes. You have a lesson and some days it just goes out the window, and you’re thinking on your toes to be able to adjust the lesson. We often think of unpredictables as things fire drills, or today we have a guest speaker. I think we also need to be more prepared to adjust when our students aren’t ready to be in the space to learn. Thinking about their emotional health. Maybe you just need to change the day to be about connections, or having fun, or having the joy, or practicing social interactions now, which leads us to our next letter, which is fun.

The importance of just having joy, and it’s okay to have fun in this environment. It’s also okay to be, OK right now. I think a lot of people are walking into situations where they’re like, someone asks them how they are and they feel like they need to have the pandemic okay. Right? But some people are thriving right now and that’s okay. It’s okay to be happy. It’s okay to be smiling and to embrace it and to just build room to bring back the joy.

So you ready for the last letter?

Alec Patton:
I’m ready.

Cat Magielnicki:
Okay. Now, this last letter is purely for the educators. It’s asking yourself, “Am I running on empty”? So E is empty question mark. This question, am I empty? You need to ask it to yourself. But, if you’re a leader in a school building, not only do you need to ask that of yourself, but you need to ask that of your staff. Is my staff empty? We need to check in with each other now more than ever. This idea of self care, just being on your own back and your own responsibility, isn’t true. Self care and wellness comes from our community, and the support of our community, and believing that you need to be able to take care of yourself and we need to be able to take care of each other. That includes, and I’ll emphasize this through and through, the healthy support of our leaders and the healthy support of our community.

Now, what makes good self-care? What makes good wellness? That’s community. That’s connection, hydration, nutrition, movement, routine, sense of calm, but calm could be pausing in your day or just engaging in something that brings you a sense of identity. Then boundaries. Being able to know when enough is enough or when to stop and just check in with yourself.

I learned this one tip from a PD, from Learning For Justice, which is formerly known as Teaching Tolerance. They asked us to all write nine things down on nine separate post-it notes. These nine things are the things that you can engage in when your cup is empty or when you’re feeling like you need to just put a little bit more back in. So you’ll end up with nine separate things and nine separate post-it notes, and then you’ll put them where you can easily access them. For me, it was just on my iPad cover. Then you’re like, “Okay, I look at that often and when I flip it over, I can see all of my nine. When I’m running on empty, I can take one of those post-it notes and put a star next to it. Okay. That’s the one I’m going to do”.

That takes away the demand of having to think. Right? Because when we’re on empty, it is hard to think of that thing. What am I going to do for myself? So it takes away that, but it also has this list of like, “Okay, what are the things that I want to do? What are the things that bring me joy? What are the frequency of which I’m engaging in those things”? So you can physically see, if I put a star on that post-it, “Hey, I like to really go for walks when I’m feeling well. How can I incorporate that more into my day”? So that’ll just kind of give you the kick of what you need to take care of yourself, and maybe even to take care of your colleagues, and to take care of your students.

Alec Patton:
Okay. So let’s go through them one more time then. So it is CARE & SAFE.

Cat Magielnicki:
Correct.

Alec Patton:
Calm.

Cat Magielnicki:
Got it.

Alec Patton:
Aware.

Cat Magielnicki:
Uh-huh (affirmative).

Alec Patton:
Routine. Empathy. And is just an ampersand.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yes. Yes.

Alec Patton:
Then safety.

Cat Magielnicki:
It’s just safe.

Alec Patton:
Safe for the first. The S of safe is safety.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yes. Yes.

Alec Patton:
Adjusting.

Cat Magielnicki:
Uh-huh (affirmative).

Alec Patton:
Fun. And empty, question mark?

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah. You got it.

Alec Patton:
I love it. Cat Magielnicki. Thank you so much.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah. Of course. I hope you find this helpful. I hope someone finds this helpful as we enter into a new phase.

Alec Patton:
And speaking of new phases, you are starting a business.

Cat Magielnicki:
Uh-huh (affirmative).

Alec Patton:
Tell us a little bit about that before you go.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah. So it’s Compass Ed, and really it’s focusing on bringing wellness into schools. Bringing wellness into schools, not only for students, but for educators and how do we create healthy spaces within schools? So we look at teacher burnout and ways to prevent it. We have teacher circles, where teachers can come together and connect and learn from each other. Then we also have spaces for kids and SEL, or social emotional learning, too. Then spaces for parents because that’s also really, really important right now.

A piece of all of the profits goes back to educators. Whenever you signed up for a professional development or even a product, a book that’s going to be coming out soon too, within the next month or two, a piece of all the proceeds goes back to supporting educators. It might be, if you have a Donors Choose page, we put some money towards a project. It’s really all about giving back to our community and being able to support each other.

Alec Patton:
Awesome. Earlier you said to me, you have a website in the works coming soon. In the meantime, how should people reach you if they want to know more?

Cat Magielnicki:
Email is the best way to reach me. We’ll put that in the show notes because my email is pretty long. I have a long name. Then I also have an Instagram page where a lot of people reach out.

Alec Patton:
That’ll all be in the show notes.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah.

Alec Patton:
Cat, thank you so much. It’s been awesome.

Cat Magielnicki:
Thank.

Alec Patton:
Great to chat with you again.

Cat Magielnicki:
I love connecting.

Alec Patton:
All right.

Cat Magielnicki:
Yeah. Thanks, Alec.

Alec Patton:
High Tech High Unboxed is hosted and produced by me, Alec Patton. Our theme music is by Brother Hershel. You can find Cat Magielnicki’s email address and her Instagram account in our show notes. Thanks for listening.