Online Courses for Teachers

PDI Course Number: 136T02

UCSD Course Number: EDUC42343

Learn how to receive UCSD graduate-level credit for completing this course.

Course Timeline

Participants have one year to complete the course. Participants must spend a minimum of three weeks in this course.

Course Description

Are you noticing a drop in overall wellness and mental health, not only for you personally, but for your students and your entire school community as well? As most teachers are acutely aware, being a teacher is an awesome privilege, which is why it is one of the most rewarding and satisfying professions; however, it also has the potential to be one of the most stressful. Additionally, many teachers also know that students who have poor mental health and coping skills are more likely to disengage from school, engage in unhealthy behaviors, and lack healthy relationships with adults. This online course is specifically designed to assist PreK-12 teachers as they search for ways to make wellness, mindfulness, and mental health a priority, not just for their students, but for themselves as well. Teachers will learn specific self-care strategies for both students and staff. Teachers will explore ways to cultivate a more joyful classroom and school environment so that everyone’s social and emotional needs are better met. Specific strategies to cultivate empathy, compassion, and diversity are shared, including circle practices, modeling, making curriculum meaningful, connecting with the greater community, and celebrating student success. By the end of this course, teachers will feel more confident and successful in their quest to uncover strategies to embed the principles of social-emotional learning into their own teaching practices so that the wellness needs of both students and teachers are more wholly and efficiently met.

Educational Outcomes

1. Teachers will understand the importance of breaking generational trauma in order to boost overall wellness and equity.
2. Teachers will explore the current mental health crisis.
3. Teachers will understand the important role that community plays in the well-being of students and staff, and they will understand that successfully building a successful community contributes to the long-term success of students — academically, socially, and emotionally.
4. Teachers will understand what self-care truly means, and they will explore the reasons why teachers tend to struggle with it.
5. Teachers will understand the effect of self-care on wellness, and they will explore several strategies for increasing their own-self-care.
6. Teachers will be introduced to several solutions for combatting the mental health challenges they face in school.
7. Teachers will explore several challenges students face in terms of their self-care needs, including such things as work and family balance, home life, mental health issues, and sleep schedules/internal biological clocks.
8. Teachers will understand and appreciate the importance of caring relationships to students’ self-care, and the fact that those relationships need to be built on mutual trust.
9. Teachers will learn strategies for building trust with their students.
10. Teachers will deeply explore several specific strategies in order to get to know their students and their families better, so that trust can be developed.
11. Teachers will learn how to create an action plan to address students’ self-care needs.
12. Teachers will explore several self-care strategies that can be used to engage students in the classroom.
13. Teachers will learn a variety of specific strategies to develop students’ curiosity and joy.
14. Teachers will learn how to create time and space for joy, both in and outside the classroom.
15. Teachers will learn about the different types of empathy.
16. Teachers will learn specific strategies for diversifying the curriculum as a way to cultivate and promote empathy in the classroom.
17. Teachers will learn how to use circle practices to build community and empathy within the school community.
18. Teachers will learn about restorative justice, including how it can be used to increase empathy within their own school communities.
19. Teachers will understand the importance of including patience and compassion in their teaching repertoires as a way to build empathy and increase overall well-being, and they will learn specific strategies for incorporating both into their own teaching practices.
20. Teachers will explore ways to make school meaningful for teachers and students, including incorporating students’ interests, teaching relevant skills, and creating meaningful curriculum and assessments.
21. Teachers will understand what service learning is and how it can be used to connect to the greater community so that wellness is increased.
22. Teachers will explore specific strategies for incorporating service learning opportunities, both within the school community as well as the broader local and global communities.
23. Teachers will learn how to increase the mental health and wellness of their students by using strategies such as student shout-outs and showcases.

Instructional Media

• Online Discussions
• Online Engagement
• Online Collaboration
• Instructor Feedback
• Instructor Interaction
• Online Resources and Websites
• Supplemental Instructional Materials
• Printable Classroom Resources

Evaluation

• Online Discussions
• Online Engagement
• Test #1 (5% of final grade)
• Test #2 (5% of final grade)
• Test #3 (5% of final grade)
• Test #4 (5% of final grade)
• Test #5 (5% of final grade)
• Autobiography and Goals for the Course (10% of final grade)
• Article/Video Reflection (15% of final grade)
• Course Collaboration/Share Ideas with the Class (10% of final grade)
• Cumulative Assignment/Project: Respond to Classroom Management Scenarios with a Wellness Twist (20% of final grade)
• Culminating Practicum (20% of final grade)

Topical Outline

Unit One

• The Importance of Mental Health
• The Current Mental Health Crisis
• Importance of Community for Staff and Students
• Assignment #1

  Write an autobiography including information about yourself, your grade level and what you specifically hope to learn about incorporating the 21st century skills of critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, communication, culture, and civic and global readiness into your teaching practices. Your autobiography should be a minimum of three paragraphs.

• Test #1

Unit Two

• What is Self-Care?
• Understanding Changing Circumstances
• Self-Care at School for Staff
• Assignment #2

  As an educator, it is important to be aware of the research, studies, and professional work done in the field. In the course, you will find an article and video that are relevant to the specific course content. Read the article and then write an essay with your thoughts.

• Test #2

Unit Three

• Challenges with Students’ Self-Care
• Relationships to Promote Self-Care
• Self-Care at School for Students
• Assignment #3

  Online Discussion Board Participation/Engagement: Please post a tip, strategy, or idea that specifically relates to effectively incorporating the teaching of 21st century skills into the classroom so that students will be college and career ready. The tip, strategy, or idea that you share needs to make a difference to other teachers in their own classrooms. Your assignment should be a minimum of three paragraphs and detailed enough for another teacher to follow easily. This is a great opportunity to share and collaborate with other teachers at your grade level around the country. Take time to review and respond to other postings that are relevant to your classroom population in order to gain effective ideas to use immediately in your classroom.

• Test #3

Unit Four

• Creating Joy in School
• Academic Benefits of Joy
• Making Time for Joy
• Test #4

Unit Five

• Cultivating Empathy and Diversity
• Circle Practices and Restorative Justice
• Modeling Patience and Compassion
• Test #5

Unit Six

• Making School Meaningful
• Service Learning and Giving Back to the Community
• Celebrating Student Success
• Assignment #4

  Out of the ten hypothetical classroom management situations presented in the assignment, choose six scenarios, and write a minimum one-paragraph response for each explaining how you (as the teacher) should respond to each situation so that empathy, diversity, patience, and compassion are used as the basis for attending to the overall well-being of yourself and the class. Each response should be written in no less than six detailed sentences and should be directly related to the chosen scenario. Format your assignment by pasting your chosen situations (in their entireties) into the assignment as well as your response under each appropriate situation. To obtain full credit, be sure to follow all the parameters set forth in Assignment 4.

• Assignment #5

  The culminating practicum is a three-step process. (1) In the first assignment, you were asked what goals you had and what you hoped to learn from the course. Think back to your original goals for this course. Write a minimum two-paragraph reflection specifically describing how what you learned can be used to help you reach those goal(s). (2) Next, write a minimum three-paragraph plan that specifically describes the ways in which you intend to implement a particular strategy you learned in this course into your own teaching situation. (3) Last, write a minimum two-paragraph reflection describing a student you have or have had in the past. Then, discuss how the strategies you learned in this course will specifically benefit that student as you put your plan into action.

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