trauma informed practices

What is trauma?

• Can be a single event, complex, or developmental

Trauma can be

• Physical
• Sexual
• Emotional
• Poverty
• Neglect
• Separation
• Witnessing violence or substance abuse

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Trauma

• An experience or prolonged experiences, and/or a threat or perceived threat to one’s wellbeing
• Daily coping mechanisms can be affected
• Subsequent behavioral responses to daily life may be filtered through this perspective
• Can serve as a filter or lens through which a person views the world

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Trauma can be found to

• Change the structure and activity of the brain
• Decrease size/connectivity in some parts of the brain
• Impair the emotional/behavioral function of the child

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Triggers

• Signals that act as signs of possible danger, based on historical trauma experiences and which lead to a set of emotional, physiological, and behavioral responses that arise in the service of survival and safety

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Signs of trauma

• Reduced sense of efficacy
• Concentration and focus problems
• Apathy and emotional numbness
• Isolation and withdraw
• Exhaustion

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Types of trauma

• acute

-Single, overhwhelming event such as rape, death, or natural disaster

• complex

• Extended exposure to traumatizing situations such as prolonged exposure to violence or bullying, profound neglect, series of home removals

• crossover

• Single traumatic event that is devastating enough to have long-lasting effects such as a mass casualty school shooting, car accident, etc

• secondary

• Process through which one’s own experience becomes transformed through engagement with another individual’s trauma

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Mental health issues linked to trauma

• PTSD
• Separation anxiety
• Social anxiety
• Depression
• Suicidal ideation
• oppositional/ aggressive behaviors

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Impact of trauma on learning

• Unable to access their critical thinking skills for problem based learning
• Unable to trust their environment
• Unable to self regulate, focus, learn from past experiences, or control impulses
• Difficulty forming/ keeping relationships, engage in unhealthy relationships, isolate themselves

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