From Chaos to Calm: The “Zen” Classroom

About This Course

Are you tired of feeling overwhelmed and stressed in your classroom? Do you dream of creating a calm and focused learning environment for the infants and toddlers under your care?

Traditional approaches seek to stop disruptive and difficult behaviours without first addressing children’s most basic and pressing needs: a felt sense of safety (physically and emotionally) and relationship.  It is important to recognise that there is no one solution or fixed approach to managing children's behaviour. A simple maxim is:

'When what you are doing isn't working, stop doing it and do something else'.

Emotions are a part of every school day and emotional regulation is more than just self-control. As educators and caregivers, helping children build emotional regulation skills has become an essential part of cultivating a healthy environment because we recognise that children’s behaviours are their way of communicating unmet needs. According to Head Start, responsive relationships and social-emotional growth support everything from attention span to mental health far beyond the classroom.

Effective educators assess the nature and context of the behaviour observed, decide what needs to be improved and consider what appropriate skills or strategies can be used to achieve the desired outcome. Any approach educators apply to the situation will likely be more successful if they believe it will work and communicate positively to the children.

The goal of this course is for early years educators to learn how to reflect on their practices when working with infants and toddlers in the classroom. Educators will learn strategies to guide infants’ and toddlers’ behaviour by creating a safe and secure relationship with the young children.