Poverty- It’s growing

Let’s Do Better in serving those in Poverty

If we look at the current data, we know poverty is increasing. “The monthly child poverty rate increased from 12.1 percent in December 2021 to 17 percent in January 2022.” “The 4.9 percentage point (41 percent) increase in poverty represents 3.7 million more children in poverty.”

There are ways we can help students living in poverty succeed. This week we will focus on what we can do, are, and have done.

Emotional regulation, inappropriate social-emotional responses, and misunderstanding of students displaying inappropriate behaviors are all possibilities of children growing up in environments of poverty. When children come from a bit of background, it is possible for them not to know how to interact.

Emotions are something everyone talks about. There is emotional intelligence, emotional leadership, emotional support, and social-emotional learning. Emotions play a big part in our daily lives. When students are faced with poverty,

Helping students build their abilities with positive interactions by providing:

  • Getting to know you activities
    • Try doing a prompt each week. Ask students to answer the prompt each Monday- “More about Me!”
      • What is your favorite color?
      • Tell us one one object you have that is important to you.
      • What is something you think people should know about you?
      • What is your favorite food?
  • Have students work in different groups and partners. This helps students get to know each student.
  • Have a system to help track the positives provided to students.
  • Provide families with opportunities with events they can participate in together to get to know each other and to experience positive interactions.
  • Giving parents ideas of ways to provide support at home.
  • Model appropriate responses for social interactions.

We have more work we can do to continue to help support all students, but especially those facing barriers like poverty. A continued look, more resources, and ideas to help will be provided each week.

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