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Week 2 Pupil Free Day

On Monday of week two, all staff members attended professional learning sessions on executive functions and interoception.

Staff were guided through presentations discussing what executive functions are and the impact we can have on them as educators. We learned about the links between self-regulation and how they work alongside each other. A person who is regulated has a greater executive functioning capacity compared to someone who is dysregulated.

When we examine executive functions, there are skills such as organisation, planning, time management, attentional focus, self-monitoring, and self-control. Alongside these, we have the underlying cognitive processes (working memory, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility), which were mentioned in last year's newsletters. Even though these processes are what we often hear and talk about, the executive functioning skills are much easier to change and have an impact on as educators. As a staff, with assistance from the self-regulation service team, we were able to explore and discuss different strategies to support these skills within the classroom.

Interoception is one of our eight sensory systems, providing information about internal sensations and changes in physiology. This includes heart rate, breathing, thirst, hunger, a full bladder or bowel, body temperature, pain, and other somatic sensations.

We spent considerable time learning about interoceptive awareness and how to work with our students to recognise their body signals and the meanings they convey.

The training taught us many activities and strategies to use with our students, including a body check/scan to encourage students to think about how their body feels at different times, such as before a test. We had time to explore various resources and check different interoception activities we can trial in our classrooms.

If you have any questions about these topics, please feel free to contact me to discuss further.