Trauma Module 2: A Sense of Safety

Summary

This module on trauma-informed schools focuses on the importance of safety for students who have experienced trauma. It explains how trauma disrupts a child's sense of safety and impacts their ability to learn and function in school. The video illustrates the physiological and emotional responses children may have to fear, comparing it to a baby bear chased by a cougar. It highlights how trauma affects a child’s worldview and behavior, leading to hypervigilance, aggression, or dissociation. The module concludes by offering strategies to create a safer environment for traumatized students to support their emotional and academic well-being.

Takeaways

• 😀 Trauma is the result of overwhelming distress that leaves individuals feeling helpless, vulnerable, and fearful, damaging their sense of safety.
• 😀 Safety is a basic need—physical, emotional, and social safety are essential for individuals to function and learn.
• 😀 When individuals feel unsafe, the brain shifts into survival mode, preventing access to learning and higher-level thinking processes.
• 😀 The video of the baby bear chased by a cougar serves as a metaphor for the intense fear experienced during trauma.
• 😀 Individuals’ responses to traumatic events can vary greatly, affecting their bodies, thoughts, and emotions.
• 😀 Grounding activities help individuals self-regulate, calm down, and bring them back to the present moment.
• 😀 Students experiencing trauma may have difficulty focusing, concentrating, and engaging in typical school activities due to their emotional and psychological states.
• 😀 Sensory triggers, like sounds or smells, can remind trauma survivors of their experiences, leading to physical reactions even in a safe environment.
• 😀 Children who grow up without a sense of safety may struggle to imagine a world where they feel safe, affecting their ability to learn and interact with others.
• 😀 Hypervigilance, or constant scanning for danger, is a common response in trauma survivors, and their behavior may appear irrational but is rooted in survival instincts.
• 😀 Traumatized children may display unpredictable emotional shifts, such as aggression, defiance, or withdrawal, which hinder their ability to function in school settings.

Q & A

What is the main focus of this module in the trauma-informed schools series?

This module focuses on safety, specifically how trauma can affect an individual's sense of safety and how that impacts their ability to learn and function. It highlights physical, emotional, and social safety as essential needs for well-being.

How does trauma affect a person's ability to cope and feel safe?

Trauma results from situations where an individual's ability to cope is overwhelmed, leaving them feeling helpless, vulnerable, and fearful. Their sense of safety is damaged, which makes it difficult to focus on other needs.

What happens in the brain when a person feels unsafe?

When a person feels unsafe, the survival parts of the brain take over, which reduces access to the parts of the brain responsible for learning and higher-level thinking.

How can watching the video of the baby bear chased by a cougar help in understanding trauma?

The video helps illustrate how fear and distress can affect the body, mind, and emotions. It prompts viewers to reflect on their own reactions and offers a visual representation of how trauma can impact an individual’s behavior and mental state.

What grounding activity is introduced to help manage strong emotions?

A simple grounding activity is introduced where participants focus on their body, noticing tension, and then using deep breathing to release that tension into the ground. This helps self-regulate emotions and calm the body.

How does the baby bear's encounter with the cougar relate to a child's worldview?

The encounter demonstrates how a traumatic experience can alter an individual’s perception of the world. Similarly, children who experience violence, mental illness in the family, or substance abuse may develop a distorted worldview based on fear and a sense of danger.

What role do sensory reactions play in trauma?

Trauma often leads to intense sensory reactions that can be re-triggered by reminders of the trauma, even in a safe environment. Common triggers include smells, sounds, or physical sensations that remind the brain of the traumatic experience.

What challenges do children who feel unsafe face in a school environment?

Children who feel unsafe may have difficulty focusing, listening, or completing tasks. They may experience heightened vigilance, misinterpret situations as threats, and display behaviors like defiance, aggression, or disassociation as survival mechanisms.

How does hypervigilance affect children's behavior?

Hypervigilance causes children to constantly scan their environment for danger, leading to behaviors such as perceiving threats where none exist. This behavior is survival-based and may appear irrational, but it is a response to their perceived need for safety.

What is the impact of trauma on a child's emotional state in the classroom?

Trauma can cause children to shift unpredictably between emotional states, such as aggression, disassociation, or becoming overly compliant. These shifts make it challenging for the child to function in a school setting and interact with peers and teachers.