The role of co-regulation in trauma-informed pedagogy: principles for educators

• In Event: Holistic Education: Pedagogies and Learning Outcomes

Proposal

In recent years, the most significant and impactful treatments to help individuals heal from trauma have been somatic in orientation. Their guiding insights come from a scientific approach that is different than traditional psychology, being body-based as much as it is brain based. In particular, these interventions are guided by neurobiology, the biology of the nervous system.



This paper will frame what a trauma-informed pedagogy means for educators who are not mental health professionals. It first discusses the concept of interoception, the ability to interpret bodily signals—and how this sense becomes dysregulated in persons with trauma. There is an overview of the science of trauma healing and how this breakthrough is applied within four body-based treatments: Interpersonal neurobiology, Polyvagal theory, Sensorimotor psychotherapy, and Somatic experiencing. Extrapolating from the discussion, the paper promotes the idea of co-regulation in the learning environment, how it is the central responsibility of an educator to promote and send out signals of bodily safety to their students. There also a discussion of how an instructor can incorporate specific brain-body exercises, which will in turn enable their students to build physiological resilience to stress and so become more active and thoughtful learners.

Authors

• Peter Weinberger, World Learning

• Deepa Srikantaiah, USAID, Africa Bureau/SD