What Teachers Should Know
Teachers are faced with an enormous amount of pressure these days. They not only have to help students make specific achievement benchmarks in large classroom settings, but also manage students who many times come to school with a myriad of personal challenges.
The resources listed below can help you, as a teacher, serve all those purposes without adding "one more thing" to your already full plate.
Included below are books, articles, and websites. Some of the websites contain video examples and lesson plan samples. Please feel to visit the Resource Library for more information or contact us.
Eliminating Barriers for Learning
Eliminating Barriers for Learning is a continuing education program for secondary school teachers and staff that focuses on mental health issues in the classroom. Developed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), its goals are to inform teachers about adolescent social-emotional wellness and provide specific skill-based techniques for classroom use.
Eliminating Barriers for Learning
Teaching Kids With Mental Health and Learning Disorders in the Regular Classroom: How to Recognize, Understand, and Help Challenged (And Challenging) Students Succeed, by Dr. Myles Cooley, may be ordered online through his website.
The Research and Training Center of Portland State University is a great resource, as is their Focal Point periodical, which is free to download!
The Minnesota's Association of Children's Mental Health provides publication resources, mental health fact sheets for teachers, as well as a book, An Educators Guide to Children's Mental Health.
The Teacher's Resource Room at EXSEL (Excellence in Social and Emtional Learning) in the City of New York has lesson plans and 8 videos modeling Social Emotional Learning in the classroom.
The National Association of School Psychologists has an article entitled Children's Mental Health; Strategies for Educators,, a handout for families and educators.
How to Address Stigma Around Mental Health in Schools
Suggestions for a safe, stigma-free classroom
More Resources
Making the Case
