Dear Parents,
The stats and figures for adolescent anxiety and depression across our continent are on the rise and they have been long before COVID restrictions came onto the scene. As we shift more and more of our focus on the mental well-being of society and our students, we are starting to uncover some of the factors that are contributing to this unfortunate increase. This year, we have formed a collective of Squamish Principals, to come together to get the most salient research and literature out to the parents of our community. It is our hope that this information will help our whole community develop resiliency in our children and help them best prepare for life in a rapidly changing world.
Over the course of this school year we will be sending out monthly blasts of content from the world’s top researchers our youth and brain development. With this we will post discussion questions or things to consider when watching the video clips or reading the content. We will also be weaving in guest speakers during this time to help deliver the message and create more community awareness around these topics, and will able to loan out some of the literature to families to dive deeper into the content. It is our hope that working together we can create the culture and environment to best support our kids. You will see our first edition to this series posted here:
https://sites.google.com/sd48.bc.ca/thrivesquamish/home
This month, in honour of our First National Indigenous Day, we have chosen to focus our attention on Monique Gray Smith’s work titled “The ripple Effect Of Resiliency”. Monique Gray Smith’s work around the 4 Blankets of Resilience is a framework for our district in helping all of our students generate their sense of identity: Identifying our layers of support and deriving strength from knowing our self, family, community, land and culture is at the core of the social-emotional learning linked to the 4 Blankets of Resilience.
- Who am I? What are my strengths and gifts?
- Who is my family? Who provides me with support and guidance?
- Who is in my community? What joys come from engaging in and contributing to my community? What communities do I belong to?
- What are my connections to land and culture and language?
We hope you enjoy this post, and look forward to further dialog.