A practice in understanding and communicating feelings, Tools for Life activities have been implemented in classrooms across the district this past Bullying Awareness and Prevention Week.
Originally piloted in the Wellington Catholic District School Board by youth workers and principals in three schools prior to being implemented board-wide, Tools for Life’s activities offer a school-wide approach to social-emotional learning that will help create a safe and positive school climate by promoting students to feel empowered to solve problems.
“We saw huge growth in our students over the years that we implemented it, so the program has continued to flourish,” shared Stacey Frasson, child and youth worker at St. Joseph Catholic School in Guelph.
Well received by students, the Tools for Life program empowers them to be able to solve problems independently.
“The students love it,” she said. “I believe students feel empowered when they experience success with this. When the adults in the building are using the language of the program consistently, the students do as well. It is busy in the classroom, but once staff started seeing the students’ success, they saw how valuable teaching the lessons and reinforcing the language and the skills within the program was.”
“I love the Tools for Life program - I routinely use the vocabulary and some of the posters in my day-to-day conversations with students of all ages,” added Bridget Dorantes, Child and Youth Worker at Sacred Heart Guelph. “It is gratifying to help them see how they have used them and have worked for them.”
At the completion of this program, students have been taught the skills to empower kindness in their actions and responses.
“I love that Tools for Life teaches students to be confident problem solvers. This program supports independent, self-esteem, self-regulation and is a real life skill,” shared Tina King, child and youth worker at St. James Catholic High School.
This year, students from across the district participated in a number of classroom-based learning throughout Bullying Awareness and Prevention Week, with a special focus on identifying negative relationships and promoting kindness with one another. As Frasson explains, Tools for Life’s activities help to instill the tools needed to do combat these situations.
“Tools for Life gives them the tools they need to problem solve so they can hopefully prevent what is often regular conflict, before it becomes a bullying situation,” she said. “I've been a huge proponent of this program for many, many years. I've seen how much students can grow when we take the time to teach them more about their feelings, how to communicate them properly, and how to solve conflicts more effectively. My view is that we come into work every day with hopes that we're helping to 'build better people' on a daily basis, and I believe this program helps us with that mission. These are social emotional skills that we need as adults. So we can continue to communicate in our relationships beyond our schooling years.”