by Fundraising | Oct 27, 2016
On December 3rd Futuro Verde will be hosting its first Christmas Bazaar. With this new yearly iniciative, Futuro Verde hopes to support both small Costa Rican producers and our student community.
The raised funds will be used to fulfill educational and administrative needs such as science materials, laptops for our teachers, educational games for primary, social studies maps and globes, dictionaries, and musical instruments for our school band.
It will be an afternoon full of music, art, prizes, gastronomical delights, and national products. Don´t miss it! Support national producers and Educational Center Futuro Verde.
by Stuart Millar, IB coordinator | Oct 27, 2016
Balanced: We understand the importance of balancing different aspects of our lives – intellectual, physical, and emotional – to achieve well-being for ourselves and others. We recognize our interdependence with other people and with the world in which we live.
Life has its ups and downs, but as parents, guardians or teachers it is our responsibility to provide the children in our care with the necessary resilience and coping skills to work through those periods in order for balance and normality to be restored. Those down times can come from a multitude of reasons, including frustration, disappointment, change, loss, conflict, or humiliation. Resilience comes from feeling good about oneself, feeling settled with all your needs met, and feeling capable and confident. Signs that our children are not coping might include bouts of depression, shutting down, getting upset easily, blowing things out of proportion, acting aggressively, and giving up quickly.
How does one teach our children to keep trying and not give up, encourage them to try a new approach, and to talk positively to themselves so they can cope and deal with the stresses life throws at them? Adults can help their children in lots of ways. Be empathetic and show you understand, talk about your own frustrations and how you are working through them, model optimism that things will improve, use positive language, try new things and encourage them to do the same, and help them break down big challenges into smaller more manageable chunks. Unfortunately, it seems to be human nature to remember the negative things in life more than the positive ones. Help your child be happy so you can remind them when times get tough that things will get better. Make a conscious decision to do one fun thing every day with your children and help them build a habit of enjoying themselves.
For a deeper exploration of the topic and to learn more, read: Learning to keep a balance
by Stuart Millar, IB coordinator | Oct 13, 2016
We understand the importance of balancing different aspects of our lives—intellectual, physical, and emotional—to achieve well-being for ourselves and others. We recognize our interdependence with other people and with the world in which we live.
(*Seesaw = teeter-totter in USA English)
People may feel that balance implies equal parts, for example between work, family, exercise, and personal time. However, balance of self does not necessarily have to mean equitable division between all aspects of our lives. It is about finding the right amount of each of these things so that you achieve balance within life to ensure health in body and mind, and positively affect those around you.
by Noelia | Oct 12, 2016
Born and raised in Hermosillo, a small city in northern México, Fabiola comes to Futuro Verde boasting a degree in Psychology and professional experience as a preschool teacher and an after-school academic tutor in both English and Spanish. Fabiola has an international background having volunteered in Lima, Perú where she worked with children who deal with abandonment, as well as with battered women, children with special needs and other vulnerable groups. She is excited to work in Futuro Verde and share her knowledge while learning from others and is honored to play an important role in the education of her students and to be a part of their journey in creating a positive self-image and a positive outlook on life. In her free time Fabiola enjoys spending time in nature, walking on the beach or the jungle, running, reading and studying. Fabiola hopes to take advantage of Futuro Verde’s beautiful location to learn to surf and to do yoga, as she has always longed to try both.
by Noelia | Sep 23, 2016
The world has been taken aback by the outrageous statements made by Donald Trump about immigration, people of Color, and Muslims. As a teacher, I see Donald Trump as the non-example of one possessing cross-cultural and critical thinking skills with a deep understanding of different cultures and perspectives, and social-historical-economic patterns of discrimination and oppression. Fortunately, like me, teachers and school leaders around the world want their students to become knowledgeable about different cultures, skilled in cross-cultural understanding, and able to work toward social change for a better world. But how is this accomplished? A common approach taken by schools is to hold a “Multicultural Day” during which classrooms of students create displays of maps and artifacts, and sometimes present a performance, that reflects what the students have learned from their study of a particular “diverse” group or country. But, does this approach to multicultural education meet the goals that teachers and school leaders have for their students? To answer this question, it is important to look at what multicultural education is and the goals it hopes to accomplish.
Multicultural education scholars define multicultural education as education that promotes the affirmation of differences while also addressing issues of inequity and oppression. Knowledge of other people’s lives and customs is only a part of multicultural education and does not provide students with deep understanding of the complex patterns of human interaction that have led to the polarization and marginalization we are seeing played out in our world today.
James Banks, a leader in the field of multicultural education, developed a model for the different approaches to multicultural education that describes the least effective (only scratches the surface) for reaching the goals of multicultural education to the most effective (provides deep understanding and critical thinking and cross cultural skills). Level one of Banks’ approaches is called the Contributions approach, or the Heroes and Holidays approach. This approach requires no alterations to the existing curriculum because one-time events “take care of” teaching children about other cultures. Level two, the Additive approach, is similar to the Contributions approach in that teachers “add” information about a cultural group to units of study but the group is still represented from the dominant group perspective. An example would be indigenous groups being presented as peacefully welcoming “explorers” but leaving out the negative consequences that resulted from this encounter. The final two levels, the Transformative, and the Decision Making and Social Action approaches, differ significantly from the other two levels. In these approaches, teachers research and gather materials to include perspectives and voices not traditionally presented in the curriculum and examine historical roots of racism and oppression. At the Decision Making and Social Action approach, teachers go even further by working with students to take action to make positive changes to address an issue or problem they have studied. These approaches become the curriculum throughout the year and across content areas.
A “multicultural day” can be a fun experience for all involved but research has shown that it is a short walk in a shallow pond that often perpetuates stereotypes instead of developing cross cultural and critical thinking skills in our students. Now, more than ever, we need our current and future generations of citizens and leaders to work to create a world that is inclusive, equitable, and just for all its inhabitants. To achieve this, multicultural education needs to extend throughout the school year and infused into all content areas.
by David Brookshire, MPH/ School Counselor & Special Education Case Manager | Sep 23, 2016
Last month’s topic explored the benefits of mindfulness with an emphasis on selective attention, flexible thinking, and nonjudgmental awareness. The concept of compassion is intimately linked with mindfulness and vice versa. Simply put, compassion can be defined as sympathy for the suffering of others accompanied by a desire to alleviate such suffering (Merriam Webster 2016). Suffering exists on a broad spectrum and can range from severe to mild. For the purpose this discussion, let’s frame it as discord, strife, or disharmony at any level. It could be in the form of stress, anxiety, or struggle. Suffering is something we all experience at some level, at some point in our life and we generally overcome it with reflection, change, and support from others. This often comes in the form of compassion. Compassion for ourselves and compassion from others.
We can all think of a time when we showed compassion for a friend or someone in need when we offered them support. Sometimes this takes the form of a helping hand, a listening ear, or positive encouragement. When friends need help, we generally do our best to offer kindness as we treat them the way we would like to be treated if we were in a similar situation. This, of course, is known as the “Golden Rule.” But, how often do we treat ourselves with such kindness in times of stress or failure? Dr. Kristin Neff of the University of Texas at Austin, has spent a good part of the last decade studying self-compassion and it is based on this notion of treating ourselves with kindness as we do with others when they are in need, basically the Golden Rule in reverse. And, when we practice this level of kindness with ourselves first, we are much more resilient in times of stress and much more capable of giving kindness to others. Dr. Neff identifies in her research, the three components of self-compassion as: self-kindness vs. self-judgment, common humanity vs. isolation, and Mindfulness vs. over-identification (Neff 2016). These three ideas can help as we learn to be more self-compassionate.
Beginning with Mindfulness, we practice being aware of our thoughts and emotions without judgement and practice less impulsivity and reactivity to our experiences. This helps us to be more thoughtful as we act from a place composure and control. This takes a lot of practice because often, we are not even aware of our thoughts and feelings until after we have reacted, sometimes in a negative way or in a way in which we wish we hadn’t. This practice is helpful in the school setting and in life, in general, because when we act from a place poise, we take into consideration our role in a given situation and demonstrate the best version of ourselves as we make choices. Once we practice being aware of our thoughts we realize that we are often not very kind to ourselves, as we would be to a friend. We tend to be very judgmental and critical in our thoughts without even being aware of it. Without Mindfulness, we tend to over identify with this judgement which can affect our overall opinion of ourselves, our self- esteem, and self-confidence. So, by practicing being aware of our thoughts, we can practice being kinder to ourselves by changing thoughts of judgement and criticism into thoughts of self-support and self-encouragement.
Being self-supportive and self-encouraging takes practice in order to embrace Dr. Neff’s concept of self-kindness. From her research, Dr. Neff reminds us that, “Self-compassionate people recognize that being imperfect, failing, and experiencing life difficulties is inevitable, so they tend to be gentle with themselves when confronted with painful experiences rather than getting angry when life falls short of set ideals (Neff 2016).” This idea allows us to be less self-critical and more accepting of whatever current situation we find ourselves in. From this place of acceptance, we are more able to process life’s difficulties and move forward in a way that gives ourselves permission to fail and make mistakes. When we do this, we realize that failure is a very important part of the learning process and an opportunity to learn and grow.
As we learn and grow and incorporate an attitude of Mindfulness and self-kindness, we realize that we are all in this together. This explains Dr. Neff’s concept of common “humanity vs. isolation.” Dr. Neff reminds us that,” self-compassion involves recognizing that suffering and personal inadequacy is part of the shared human experience – something that we all go through rather than being something that happens to “me” alone (Neff 2016).” By recognizing this, we’re more likely to understand that trials, tribulation, failure, and stress are all a part of life that we all experience at some point. In a way, this gives us permission to push forward as we realize that “this too shall pass” and we can learn from our experiences. This helps us to be resilient and as we see life’s difficulty as opportunity to become better versions of ourselves as we reach for our goals and realize our desires.
As we learn as children who we are and how we relate to the world and as we continue to learn it in adulthood and throughout life, incorporating an attitude of self-compassion can allow us to be more accepting of ourselves, and therefore more accepting of others. The next time we make a mistake or an undesirable choice; instead of criticizing, blaming, and judging ourselves, we can say something like, “It’s okay, I’m really frustrated,” or, “I’m going through a difficult time right now.” Statements like this, according to Dr. Neff, can help us realize that we’re all really doing our best most of the time, given the circumstances. This attitude of acceptance can act as a springboard to explore better choices as we learn from our experiences. When we learn from and integrate our experiences and teach our children to do the same, we become more balanced, adaptable people always able to handle the highs and lows of life.
References
- Merriam Webster (2006). Available at: dictionary.com
- Kristin Neff, Ph.D. (2016). Definition of Self-Compassion. Available at: selfcompassion.org.
