By Kelsy Vasquez
Transitions can be difficult - especially after a six-month quarantine! As children are returning to school and getting back into their rhythm it can feel like a struggle getting out of the house in the morning. At school, children are navigating social roles with their classmates as they take turns, negotiate play ideas, and include others in their work. For all these moments, Conscious Discipline, a social emotional curriculum utilized in our preschool classrooms, provides a framework for both children and adults to be successful in life.
Conscious Discipline fosters the development of emotional intelligence through a comprehensive system backed by neuroscience and child development. It offers a shift from traditional punishments by empowering both adults and children strategies to handle their emotions. Perhaps the most fundamental, and simple, of these strategies is: BREATHE.
Sounds easy, right? Actually, it can be harder than you might think. Your oldest just logged on to their remote schooling and the internet is acting up; meanwhile your preschooler is having a hard time getting dressed for school because he wanted to wear his favorite shirt which is currently in the hamper and your spouse is trying to work from home and probably hiding in the back of the house desperately searching for some quiet. Can you feel the adrenaline kick in? The sense of urgency that slowly morphs into frustration? Often, we begin to take in less oxygen as our stress increases.
Our lives are busy and small frustrations have a way of creeping in: you’re running late in the morning and the car is out of gas, you park at the grocery store and realize you forgot your mask, or another car cuts you off on the road. Or maybe it’s the bigger things: you long for life to return to normal and miss dear friends you’ve been unable to see for months or you’re feeling anxious about the upcoming election. All of these things, and countless others, signal to our brain that we are under stress. The brain instinctively responds by deploying adrenaline, increasing our heart rate, and decreasing our breathing.
Children behave similarly when they are placed in emotionally challenging situations- a toy has been taken away, they are not able to have something they wanted, or they are having a difficult time waiting. Taking a breath is like pushing the pause button so that you can consciously respond instead of unconsciously react. When you take deep breaths, you are shutting down your “flight or fight” system, slowly subsiding your adrenaline, and restoring calm.
Deep breathing, or “belly breathing,” signals your brain to calm down by sending a message for your body to relax. Your heart rate begins to slow, and your blood pressure returns to normal. By contrast, shallow breathing or “chest breathing” limits the diaphragm’s range of motion and limits the amount of oxygenated air in the lowest parts of the lungs which can lead to shortness of breath and anxiety.
But children also have a superpower many adults have forgotten: PLAY. Play is enjoyable, fun, and allows an outlet for us to work through many subconscious struggles. Play is active- it engages all of our senses and gets our bodies moving. When we are engaged in fun and playful ways, we experience a decrease in our levels of cortisol, or stress. So play with your pet, take up painting, join a music class, or dust off your dancing shoes and bring some childish joy back to your life. There is no age limit on play.
When life gets hectic and you feel the stress begin to kick-in, take a deep breath and remind yourself that you’ve got this –it might be the only way to make it through the rest of 2020!
