Welcome new and old Custer Cougar families!
My name is Ms. Wood and I am the School Counselor here at Custer Elementary. I would like to take this opportunity to introduce myself and tell you about the counseling program at Custer! As a School Counselor, my primary responsibility is to promote the academic, career, and social/emotional development of students. In order to do this, I meet with students individually and in small groups, conduct classroom counseling lessons, meet with parents, collaborate with teachers and staff, and consult with community organizations to benefit and meet the needs of Custer students. Here is more information on my services.
If you would like to discuss your student, or have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to reach me at (360) 383-9439 or [email protected]. Best, Kristen Wood (she, her, hers) Custer Elementary, School Counselor
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Hello Custer Cougar Families, Welcome back from spring break. Look below for updates from the Custer Counseling program. Interested in resources for a particular topic or need? Want to chat more about the supports provided to students through Challenger's School Counseling program? Let me know! Looking forward to hearing from you!
Perseverance Perseverance is the hard work you do after you get doing the hard work you already did. It is important because life can be hard and messy. Life may not go as we plan. If our children are prepared to handle these challenges in stride, they will be much more successful in life. See below for tips on identifying perseverance, as well as how to help foster a persistent mindset. What does perseverance looks like?
If your child struggles, you could try:
Breaking larger tasks into smaller, more manageable ones (and then celebrate their accomplishments). Practicing positive self-talk or remind them of times that they persisted. Ask, “How can I help you?” Resist the urge to “rescue” or give answers. Take a break and come back to it later. Hello Custer families!
I can’t believe it is already March and spring is just around the corner! Here are a few updates from the Custer School Counseling corner.
As always, I’m here to support the success of all students, so please let me know how I can help to support your child. Best, Ms. Wood Below are resources to support families with mental health and wellness including support for managing stress, anxiety, and routines.
Mental Health and Wellness
Custer Counselor Corner Greetings Parents/Guardians, The Custer community is excited to have everyone back from winter break. We hope that your family had the opportunity to recharge for the New Year. Here are a few updates from the counselor. Small GroupsMs. Wood is sending home a flyer with all students. This flyer explains the small social-emotional groups that will be offered in 2021. If you would like for your child to participate in one of these groups, fill out the form and return it to your child’s teacher. Reach OutPlease reach out to me if you need assistance with internet connection, community assistance, or social-emotional/behavior support. Also, if you would like to discuss your student, or have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to reach me at (360) 383-9439 or [email protected]. Your students can also request to see me by filling out my “Request to see the counselor” form online. Wednesday WEllness Lessons
Resolutions: For our first Wednesday Wellness lesson of the New Year, we focused on resolutions. Students learned that a resolution is the decision to do or not to do something. They also learned that it is healthy to create goals for ourselves. Growth Mindset: Each class has learned about having what is called a growth mindset. Growth mindset is the belief that a person’s abilities can be developed through practice, hard-work, dedication, and motivation. Students that focus on having a growth mindset are more likely to learn from mistakes, seek feedback, put in more effort, and challenge themselves. Here are some ways that growth mindset can be fostered at home: ~Talk about it: Talk about mistakes and what your student learned from the process. ~Praise the process of learning and growing: For example, say “You must have worked really hard at that.” ~Help change fixed language: If they say, “This is too hard!” help them change that to “I can’t do this yet, but I will keep trying.” Give them the words to say when they are feeling defeated. ~Remember: Be the reminder that the brain can grow and so can our abilities. Dear Families, Hope you all are staying warm and safe this holiday season! Here's an update on what the School Counseling program at Custer has been up to: Open HandsIf you registered your student for an Open Hands winter food bag, please read the following! Distance Learning Families: Winter food bags will be available for pick up on Wednesday the 16th from 10:00 to 12:00 (same time as the school district’s weekly meal pick up). Ms. Wood will be outside with bags for distance learning families that registered for a bag. Hybrid Learning Families: Students will bring home the food bags on their last day of school before break (Tuesday the 15th for students on the AA schedule; Friday the 18th for students on the BB schedule). Wednesday WellnessOur December Wednesday Wellness lessons are focusing on how to handle our anger. On December 4th, students learned how our brain can react to anger and one strategy to bring ourselves back to a neutral mindset. This week, students will build their toolbox of calming strategies. Click here for our Wednesday Wellness lessons. Students in our hybrid program are also learning about growth mindset! Instilling a growth mindset helps children develop a lasting impact on their learning outcomes. For elementary children this look like persistence and having a positive attitude toward personal and academic goals. Despite failures, challenges, and hardships, children can focus on the learning rather than the performance to ensure personal gain. One great way to learn about growth mindset is to research a successful person (e.g., Walt Disney, successful family member, etc.). You can explore and discuss strategies the person used when faced with challenges and failures. December De-StressI don't know about you, but I decorated EXTRA this season. I hope you are finding ways to cultivate your own "joybursts" this month. Oftentimes December can bring on a lot of stress, so I wanted to share this article about ways for you and your family to De-stress your December. Just a reminder that It's always okay (and ideal!) to take care of you, and make time for your own sense of joy and peace.
Hello Custer Families, Ms. Wood here! I hope that everyone is staying safe and getting a chance to enjoy warm tea, cocoa, and apple cider during these rainy days! Here is an update from the Custer counselor corner Community Supports Some families have holidays or other events happening in the coming weeks, and our school community knows that this can be both an exciting and sometimes stressful time. Please reach out to me if you need any material or emotional support. I am here to help! Here are a couple of winter supports that are coming up.
Wednesday Wellness These next few weeks our Wednesday Wellness lessons will focus on bullying prevention. Click here for the K-2 and here for the 3-5 Bullying Prevention units. Students will learn what bullying is, how to respond to bullying behavior, and how to report bullying to adults in the school.
Lunch Bunches Are your students needing some social time? We have weekly lunch bunches on Wednesdays. If you are interested in signing up your kiddo for a weekly lunch bunch with grade level peers, you can sign them up here. I will send you and your family a Zoom link and time for where to access our virtual lunch bunch!
Hello Custer Cougar Families, I hope that you have had a great first week in November! It has been amazing to see all of our 2nd and 3rd grade students come into the building this week! We look forward to seeing the 4th and 5th graders next week! See below for this week’s counselor update! -Ms. Wood Wednesday WellnessWe have wrapped up our series on big feelings and treating others with kindness! Our next few weeks of Wednesday Wellness lessons will focus on bullying awareness and prevention. Every year, our school counselors raise awareness so that we can keep an accepting and safe environment here at Custer. Community and Family SupportsIf you are looking for assistance for the winter season and holidays or looking for ways to help others, check out these wonderful community resources.
Lunch BunchesMany of you have expressed wants to continue virtual lunch bunches. I also know that our distance learning students still want to see their friends! I will continue these lunch bunches to keep our students connected. See blow for dates, times, and links for your student to join!
GratitudeRenowned author, professor, and researcher, Brené Brown found, after examining 12 years of research, an irrefutable link between joy and gratitude. Her initial conclusion was that people who described themselves as joyful were more likely to be grateful for the people and experiences in their lives. However, to her surprise she found that instead, it is practicing gratitude that results in joy.
The wonderful thing about gratitude is that it doesn’t have to be something extraordinarily good or special to have a positive impact. Simply recognizing the small things in your life that you are grateful for—perhaps your health or the health of your loved ones; the relationships you have with those who mean the most to you; or even something as simple as the pillow that you rest your head on each night. The more that we practice gratitude, the more we experience it naturally. Consider keeping a note to yourself—it can be on paper, in your phone, or wherever—and keep track of 2-3 things that you are grateful for each day. It might be tricky to think of things at first, but the more you practice, the easier the process should be. If you are interested in reading more about Brené Brown’s findings on gratitude, consider reading this article. Back to School Emotions
Wondering what you can do to help??
Community ResourcesFerndale's community partners are providing assistance to families in need. Explore the resources below or reach out to Ms. Wood information on community supports.
Wednesday WellnesThank you all for being supportive the counseling team’s Wednesday Wellness lessons! Here is a recap of what our students learned over the last few weeks of October. Next week, we will focus on kindness, perspective taking, and appreciating others! Click here to access Custer Elemetary's Wednesday Wellness videos. Strong emotions
Coping strategies can help us work with our big emotions and help our thinking brains stay in charge.
Parent Webinar: Managing Your Child's Big Emotion
Hello Custer Families! I hope that everyone has had a chance to practice self-care in some capacity. I wanted to let you all know that you are doing an amazing job. This week I wanted to focus on ways to connect and ways to support children during distance learning and transitions. Virtual Lunch Bunches This week, I will be hosting optional virtual lunch bunches on Zoom. They will be on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday and will be from 12:15 to 12:45. Tuesday will be for K and 1st, Wednesday will be for 2nd and 3rd grades, and Friday will be for 4th and 5th grades. If your kids are missing their friends this is a great place to send them! Here are the links to each lunch bunch:
Connect with Ms. Wood As we learn to adapt our roles in this new online world, I want to be sure that all of my students still have access to me. To that end, I have created a meeting request form for parents, students, and staff to fill out to let me know they would like to meet. If students are in K-4th grades, I will then send an email to their caregiver’s email address from Skyward for a meeting during one of their breaks. If the student is in 5th grade, I will send a zoom link to their Ferndale School District account. This is one way that our kids will get to practice their independence and self-advocacy skills.
Caregiver Support Webinar: Handling Big Emotions The Ferndale elementary school counselors hosted a live webinar for parents and caregivers on October 6th. It focused on your children’s big feelings during this time and how you can help ease those feelings! We presented some of the strategies we have been passing along to individual parents. We will try an host more webinars to support you, our awesome parents and caregivers.
Supporting Students Through Transitions With the abundance of changes and transitions we are adapting to in so many areas of our lives right now, anxiety and our desire to control things can skyrocket. As adults, we are feeling this, and it's no wonder that our kids are as well. This can look like big emotional reactions over small things, difficulty changing from one task to another, or heightened stubbornness in an attempt to hold onto control of something. I wanted to share a couple great articles as resources for how to help our kids with changes and transitions when they too may be feeling out of control, heightened levels of worry or uncertainty, and are still very much working on their own coping skills in these areas. These practical, day-to-day steps can help our kids know what to expect, rely on some predictability (even within a time of very little of that outside of our homes), and to give them ways to have their voice heard throughout the process.
Daily Feelings Check In
In conjunction to our Wednesday Wellness lessons around strong emotions, I am starting up an online feelings check in system called CloseGap: daily wellness for kids. It is a great resource for our students to track how they are feeling each day and gather effective calm down strategies.
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Ms. WoodParents, look here for updates on Custer's counseling program and community resources. Archives
January 2021
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