Year 7 Emotional Regulation
Starting secondary school is a significant milestone. For our Year 7 students, it represents new routines, new friendships and new expectations. That’s why explicitly teaching emotional regulation at this stage of schooling is essential.
We all understand that adolescence is a period of rapid brain development and whilst we acknowledge that our Year 7’s have shown great resilience in managing the transition to high school – their emotional regulation is still developing. This means students can feel emotions intensely, even when they don’t yet have the tools to manage them effectively.
One of our key partners, Toolbox Education, last week delivered workshops to our Year 7’s providing them with tools to name, understand and regulate strong emotions. These workshops were well received by students with the following feedback provided:
- I learn lot of way to calm down when I’m feeling to explode
- I liked the strategies
- The fact we could relate to the different tools that we can use
- I liked everything was definitely a 5 star
- I need to say a big thank you to toolbox for coming to Mount Waverley Secondary College to teach us ways to control our emotions
Importantly, emotional regulation is not a one-off lesson. It is a skill that develops over time in and of the classroom.
Teaching social and emotional skills is a key element of our whole school wellbeing model. Not only are we invested in supporting our students to get the best out of themselves academically – we are also focused on helping them navigate the world with the appropriate soft skills.
Mr Paul Graham
Student Support and Resources Manager