How To Identify and Address Bullying
Childhood bullying is a near universal experience with 1 in 5 children encountering it it at some point. To help our children navigate this, it is crucial to engage in candid discussions about various bullying types and effective coping strategies.Read More
Hope Notes: A Small Surprise to Boost Your Child’s Mental Health
With the school year in full swing, the child in your care may be experiencing a range of emotions and feelings, from excitement and normal nerves to anxiety and stress. What is something parents can do to support their mental health while they are at school each day? Send a little note of hope or inspiration with them to school – you can put the note in their backpack, lunch box, folder, or schoolbook as a comforting surprise to find during their day.Read More
Suicide Prevention
September is Suicide Prevention Month, an opportunity to focus on the prevalence of suicide in our communities and talk about steps we can all take to support mental health and suicide prevention. Learn more about the warning signs and what you can do to help.Read More
Supporting Your Student’s Mental Health in the Classroom
Teachers have a profound impact in the classroom, both in how they educate and in how they support their students’ growth. When a student is facing a mental health challenge, teachers often walk a fine line of providing support while being cautious to not overstep boundaries. So, what should teachers do if they observe a student struggling with a mental health issue?Read More
How You – and Your Employer – Can Tackle Caregiver Burnout
Over the past few years, individuals in the caregiving field have been experiencing an alarming increase in feelings of high stress and burnout. This increase can have multiple factors, including lack of staffing, increase in clients, not enough downtime, and poor coping skills and work life balance. What is burnout and how can employers help to prevent employee burnout?Read More
Talking to Your Teen
You heard this would happen. Your little snuggler, your helper, your “mini-me” has become a teen. Attempting to engage with them now may elicit a series of grunts and groans, or seemingly thoughtless one-word answers. Try these techniques to help you reconnect with your teen and keep the lines of communication open.Read More
Heat and Mental Health
While summer can be a busy, fun time of year, and a chance to get outside, we have all experienced the physical discomfort of a sweltering hot day. There are plenty of physical symptoms that can happen from prolonged exposure to extreme heat and sunlight, extreme heat can negatively impact your mental health as well.Read More
Cultivating Workplace Kindness
Everyone wants to be treated with kindness. And yet as adults, many people don’t experience kindness in their workplace. Kindness often comes with barriers that make it inconvenient. An easy way to identify your kindness skills is to see how your actions align with the three levels of kindness.Read More
Traumatic Stress in Children and PTSD
Trauma is pervasive and has a broad and diverse impact, and deeply affects how the youth we serve approach the services we provide. If done incorrectly, social services can re-traumatize or further harm those they are trying to help, which is why being trauma-informed is so crucial in every part of social services.Read More
Using the 5 Senses to Support Your Child’s Mental Health
There are many ways children tell us how they feel and it is not always through words. As we enter another school year, parents, caregivers, teachers, and others need to be aware of the different ways children communicate. One way to “hear” what a child is nonverbally communicating is by analyzing the five senses: sight, sound, taste, touch, and smell.Read More