School Name: Lac La Hache Elementary
School District: SD#27 Cariboo-Chilcotin
Inquiry Team Members:Kristy Davis: kristy.davis@sd27.bc.ca, Irena Sindelar-Babicky: irena.sindelarbabicky@sd27.bc.ca
Inquiry Team Contact Email: kristy.davis@sd27.bc.ca
Type of Inquiry: NOII (focus on core competencies, OECD learning principles, etc.)
Grade Levels: Primary (K-3), Intermediate (4-7)
Curricular Area(s): Not applicable
Focus Addressed: Social and emotional learning
In one sentence, what was your focus for the year? To what extent will fully implementing the Zones of Regulation program in our school positively impact social-emotional learning?
Scanning: The entire teaching staff and most of the support staff is new this year, so the importance of scanning was heightened. First PAC meeting indicated passionate support for school by parents (8 parents representing 18 students); literacy and numeracy assessments, observations, and conversations with students, staff, and parents: students are mostly meeting or approaching expectations; survey (four questions/7 Principles of learning) indicated no specific common emergent issues; social-emotional learning/ownership of learning could be emphasized (surveys indicate this is an area which could be developed).
Focus: We have met as a teaching staff many times to discuss our students and our direction. We decided that a focus on social-emotional learning (taking ownership of learning) would yield good results and provide a solid foundation for future growth. As a new principal/staff, exploring the vision of the school with the community is important as well and will occur concurrently.
Hunch: Although the Zones of Regulation program was started last year, it may not have been fully implemented in all classrooms.
New Professional Learning: Zones of Regulation program
Taking Action: This year we focused on improving the social emotional well-being of our students. We implemented the Zones of Regulation program school wide. In addition, we did a number of other things that positively impacted social-emotional learning. We went for daily morning walks with all staff and students which allowed us to connect and build relationships. Every Monday morning we enjoyed a hot breakfast prepared by members of our PAC. Students all ate together. All other days of the week, we had breakfast available and students were provided daily healthy snacks. On Thursdays students helped prepare lunch, serve food, and clean-up afterwards. Students participated in orange shirt day and pink shirt day. We had buddy reading once per week and students participated in a number of student council led events. Students participated in a variety of field trips throughout the year and all of our intermediate students participated in the fun mud run at Mountview.
Checking: Overall, we noticed that many students benefitted from the implementation of the Zones of Regulation program. Students were better able to acknowledge and describe how they were feeling and which zone they were in. Students became very comfortable with the program and would often do a “zone check in” in the morning without being prompted to do so. Many students would also move their name on the check-in bulletin throughout the day to reflect their changing zones. Students became better able to monitor their emotions and some students learned to recognize their need to use “tools” to help them return to the “green zone”. At the beginning of the year, we rated how well each student was able to self-regulate and we did this again at the end of the year. Overall, we noticed improved self-regulation in about ½ of our students. Most students whom we had little or no concern regarding their self-regulation at the beginning of the year, we continued to have little or no concern with at the end of the year. There were a few students who regulated less well at the end of the year than they did at the beginning of the year. Overall, however, we noticed that students benefited from the implementation of the Zones of Regulation Program.
Reflections/Advice: As a staff, we felt that the Zones of Regulation program was quite easy to implement and that it provided a common language between classes that would continue to be beneficial in coming years. Both classes were not able to get through the entire Zones of Regulation Program and have decided that it would be a good idea to review the program in the fall and then continue where they left off. We felt that it was unfortunate that the self-regulating “tools” are not taught until near the end of the Zones of Regulation program. We want to make sure that we cover this part of the program early next year so that students become aware of more strategies that can help them become even better self-regulators.