The unthinkable happened to our school family - a teacher went home saying she was ill and had a migraine, and she passed that evening. Other than being totally shocked, it seemed unreal to the whole school. She was the backbone of her team, knew all of the children and their parents, and was our Paraprofessional of the Year. During the holiday party, she stood up and spoke about how blessed she felt to be at our school. It truly was a tragedy...
How do you come back from that? How do you tell her Kindergarteners that she passed? How do you address these things as a school leader? These are the difficult conversations that I am not good at having or even know how to initiate. Since one of the teachers who worked closely with her is one of my new teachers, I did some research and found some texts to read with children about coping with loss (http://www.naeyc.org/files/tyc/file/Childrens%20Books%20About%20Death.pdf), and I even helped prepare the letter and announcement that went out to our school community - that was tough. Selecting the right words, respecting privacy, while still remaining professional was no easy task. This site helped a lot with actionable items as well as ways to communicate ( https://suite.io/kirsti-a-dyer/3byz203) and the grief counselors at our district also gave me some great information about navigating uncertain waters with parents.
It is tough to call it a learning experience, but it truly was. Something so unexpected can happen and it is good to have a protocol, however it would be nice to not have to use that protocol ever again...
Kolt, I blogged about this same thing earlier last semester. I had the exact same questions.
ReplyDeleteIt was explained to me that a place of normality has to be reached so it may seem that people aren't concerned with the loss. I argue if genuine relationships are there, then they should be taken into account as if it was a biological family member.
I am not sure how you tell Kindergartner or how administrators should respond. Death is something serious and I feel that we have to operate in love and care.
I enjoyed the article. If you find more readings, please share.
Thank you for your kind words, Michael, and sorry that you have gone through the same thing. I love that you spoke about finding the normalicy in all of it becuase that is what they kids and the school needed to see. The shock of it all threw us off balance for a while, but our fearless leader was able to balance us with that normal. Of course, if I find more articles I will share them, but hopefully we won't need them.
DeleteKolt-I'm so sorry to hear about this. This tough situation really highlights how personal our profession is. Relationships matter and I hope they can help you and your school family work through this tough situation. Hopefully, you also have strong guidance counselors who have some training in dealing with grief for both adults and children.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of guidance couselors, she was actually really close with our teacher and she was highly upset! We acutally had a team of grief counselors come to the school since (1) her students were so young, (2) a majority of the staff were affected, and (3) the normal Michael spoke of was disrupted for awhile.
DeleteWhat was a strong learning point for me was watching how my principal and assitant principal navigated through some merky waters but "helping" some people get back on track. For example, the service was on a Friday and a good 70 - 90% of the staff wanted to attend. She elected to send representatives to the team and others would ahve had to taken the day. It was a truly smart move and I learned a lot from watching her work!
Bookmarked those sites for sure! Wow! I can't imagine. I have had colleagues pass away, but not when I was serving as their leader, only as their equal. I hope I never have to use your resources, but thank you for sharing.
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