As early educators manage their professional development, safeguard the well-being and mental health of the children in their care and connect with families from a wide range of backgrounds, they can become depleted by chronic stress and secondary trauma. The NC Birth-to-Three Quality Initiative’s (B-3QI’s) team of regional birth-to-three specialists provides coaching and consultation to birth-to-three teachers and child care administrators facing these challenges, compounded by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. As a team, the B-3QI has collaborated with Duke’s Infant Toddler Trauma-Informed (ITTI) Care Project to integrate and advance innovative, responsive, relationship-based and resilience-focused practices across the state.
During the pandemic, B-3QI assessed regional birth-to-three workforce needs and seized opportunities for team members to receive training and professional development to address those needs. The McCormick Center’s Director’s Toolbox, Circle of Security International Classroom Approach, Conscious Discipline, the Abecedarian Approach, and team-led book studies on Trauma-Informed Practices for Early Childhood Educators: Relationship-Based Approaches that Support Healing and Build Resilience in Young Children and Culturally Responsive Self-Care Practices for Early Childhood Educators allowed the team to delve deeper into the ways their personal backgrounds, values, and belief systems affect their personal and professional relationships. ITTI Care representatives walked the NC B-3QI team through a virtual eight-week session filled with self-reflection, strategies for stress reduction and addressing the effects of trauma, and workday wellness plans. One cohort at a time, NC B-3QI specialists have taken part in ITTI Care for the past five years, pairing with an ITTI coach to unpack the heavy emotional component of supporting a workforce in crisis. NC B-3QI management and ITTI meet monthly to discuss specialists’ experiences and growth from a trauma-informed coaching and training perspective. Together, they plan an approach to provide each specialist with the highest-quality tailored support possible.
The NC B-3QI team has created a variety of tools to incorporate trauma-informed practices into their coaching, including a Specialist’s Guide to Building Connections, and Professional Growth & Development Plan that encourages the workforce to reflect on their own development and motivations for skill-building, and incorporates self-care practices. The team has compiled a comprehensive library of handouts and exercises to address chronic stress and boost strategies for well-being. Values sorts and the Devereux Adult Resilience Survey help providers to understand their own values and strengths. Guest speakers regularly meet with the NC B-3QI team to infuse play for a sense of togetherness and wellness, and to highlight each team member as unique and as an integral part of the whole. In a cohort-based learning format, members of the management team pieced together Love Them Through It, an ongoing learning network for providers to become aware of the effects of trauma and respond to children’s needs. For the initial session, over 400 providers across the state applied to take part in this community. For administrators, NC B-3QI offers Leading the Way and Leadership in Action, which focuses on challenges specific to child care management. Directors are able to lean on each other for a sense of belonging, problem-solving, and simply to be held and heard.
NC B-3QI management is wrapping up a year-long Reflective Supervision Learning Collaborative offered by the North Carolina Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Association (NCIMHA). The management team has designed and implemented a system of Reflective Supervision for specialists as individuals and in small groups. Currently, the entire NC B-3QI team is working toward becoming endorsed by the NCIMHA to signal the robust nature of their education and training on infant, toddler, and caregiver mental health. NC B-3QI continues to make efforts in service of the team’s transformation and demonstrated commitment to cultural responsiveness, opening healing pathways for providers, families and their children.
