Module 5

With the reading this week chapter 12 the one thing that jumped out was the Emotions and Anxiety. The reason being is I struggled with Depression and Anxiety starting in my late teens.I do see many of the students I work with having anxiety for simple reasons. For instance I had a student about two years ago were he felt nervous speaking with a person he did not know. They were asking him about emotional responses like they did the whole class, I noticed before he walked out and went with him. I allowed him to play with my hair and “translated” for him. He did not really need translation but he did feel more comfortable speaking with me. \

Currently in the school we are doing a Christmas program. Many of the students are nervous before coming on stage. You can see them talking to each other and holding on to each other, even jumping right before they perform. I remember one year a student threw up right before stage. It was his anxiety on going up to perform. We never made him go on stage after that. 

As I got older I was able to manage my anxiety to a certain point, but I still feel anxious from time to time. I believe that when I have my own classroom, I am able to recognize many of the signs of when a student is feeling anxious. I would be able to modify for the students who may have test anxiety or speaking publicly. An idea that I love that my daughter’s teacher, Ms. Flamini,  does is allow them to chew gum or eat mints while testing. She allows students to bring a blanket ,pillow or stuffy and allow students to sit in a “comfy” spot. Her room is a quiet room, so most of the time students are whispering or talking quietly. She plays music in the background and plays a fireplace on the smart board. Most of the time the classroom lights are dimmed. I know this helps a lot because my daughter, who is 9, said she feels so much more comfortable in her quite class, she states she feels very peaceful. It relieves a lot of her anxiety.