Mindfulness is the action of bringing awareness to your thoughts, emotions, body sensations, and actions in the present moment. It involves non-judgmental acceptance of these feelings and experiences. Mindfulness and relaxation skills can be used to help students cope with various emotional and behavioral problems and general life stressors. These tools can help students gain awareness of their mind-body connection by helping them notice feelings and emotions and how they affect their body. When faced with situations that evoke strong emotions, mindfulness strategies can be used to bring awareness to emotions and body sensations. When implementing a mindfulness intervention, it is important to model the intervention, practice it with the student, and then allow the student to practice it in their everyday life. Once they practice it on their own, you can give them feedback and try the same strategy again or try a different relaxation strategy. Mindfulness and relaxation strategies can also be used in combination with many more specific, targeted interventions.
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Organization training is designed to teach students systems and strategies for managing their time, materials, and assignments effectively. When using this intervention, you and student collaboratively design an organization checklist with goals relevant to the student's needs, and this checklist is reviewed regularly (e.g., at least twice per week) over several months until the skills are mastered. When goals are not met, students are asked to address the unmet goal immediately, as this provides the opportunity to practice and further develop the specific organization skill. Reinforcement plans can be used to promote the use of the skills but are not a necessary component of the intervention for many students.
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Problem-solving skills training is an intervention that teaches students to apply decision-making skills to analyze and solve a variety of problems. Many students with emotional and behavioral problems often respond to challenging situations with an impulsive approach. Their responses to problems can be ineffective and sometimes counterproductive because the responses have not been carefully considered. Problem-solving skills can help students effectively navigate a variety of challenges including interpersonal conflict with peers and teachers, academic-related challenges, and intra-personal challenges (e.g., coping with disappointment, frustration, anger). Problem-solving skills training can be conducted in an individual or group setting and involves presenting the 5-step problem-solving process, practicing it in a controlled setting, and then practice in real-life settings. It is important to provide feedback and coaching outside of the group or individual sessions to facilitate skill development. Repeated practice with frequent feedback over an extended period of time is the key to success with this intervention.
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Social skills training interventions are designed to teach students prosocial skills for effective interpersonal interactions. This intervention may be provided in an individual or group format. When using this intervention, the school mental health professional (SMHP) presents a social skill, teaches the student about the skill, demonstrates it, and then provides opportunities for the student to practice the skill individually and in group settings. SMHPs should give positive and constructive feedback about the skill application as well as prompt and encourage the application of the skill when appropriate. Often times, social skills training interventions present a social skill of the week, but you may want to spend multiple weeks on a particular skill as needed. There are many manualized social skills training programs that already exist, or you may develop your own program based on the needs of your students.
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Supportive counseling is when a school mental health professional (SMHP) uses empathy, unconditional positive regard, and warmth to help build rapport with the student and give them space to talk about their problems. Some students benefit from having a supportive adult listen to their experiences or struggles. Others may need time and space to warm up to a SMHP before beginning any other more specific interventions.
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Systematic desensitization involves two activities. The first is helping students learn how to relax their mind and body when in an anxiety provoking situation. The second involves practicing being in the anxiety provoking situation and using the relaxation techniques to help them reduce their anxiety. Technically, this approach is grounded in a concept called reciprocal inhibition, which means that our body cannot have two conflicting physiological responses (i.e., fear and calm) at the same time. The feared or anxiety provoking situations can be external (e.g., feared activities or objects) or internal (e.g., physical sensations). The goal of this intervention is to reduce your student’s fearful reaction to the situation by teaching relaxation exercises (deep breathing, visualization), creating a hierarchy of feared stimuli (e.g., situations, objects.), and taking small steps towards overcoming the anxiety by pairing the feared stimulus with exercises that produce relaxation, until the feared stimulus produces the relaxation response. Overtime, the stimuli will become associated with calmness rather than fear. The goal of this intervention is to reduce your student’s anticipatory worry and fearful reaction to situations by creating a hierarchy of feared stimuli (e.g., situations, objects) and taking small steps towards overcoming anxiety.
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