Resources

End of the Year Report

A good way to share results data is through an End of the Year Report.  I share this with my principal at the end of the school year.  I also use this to complete my Management Agreement.  I keep track of the numbers throughout the school year. 

Counseling By the Numbers 

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1X4rLdkMcrXeSD_J7W5Jwdxieb_QZGJ5eEh0z1hKhx_s/edit?usp=sharing



ASCA Conference 

It seems that something exciting always happens happen at the ASCA conference when I am pregnant.  I was pregnant with our first daughter in 2014.  At the 2014 conference I was able to hear First Lady Michelle Obama give a dynamic speech about the importance of school counselors.  By luck I was able to sit in the fourth row and her words inspired me to be a better counselor.

At the 2017 ASCA conference when I was pregnant with my second daughter,  I presented for the first time with three of my colleagues.  We presented on the topic of how to incorporate mindfulness in your school counseling program.  Below is the presentation.  

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_kV8Ry0sVFUdFdJNFludlRRSU0/view?usp=sharing

As the only school counselor in an elementary school, I miss the collaborative planning with colleagues as I once had as a teacher.  I look for ideas from other school counselors because after being a counselor for several years, I feel like I need fresh ideas to keep my program running.  Some of the ideas that I get I adjust based on the needs of my students.  Below are some lessons that I created after being inspired by other school counselors.

Test Taking Strategies 

I loved the test taking foldable created by the http://savvyschoolcounselor.com/.  Every year we have a new theme for test taking and this year our theme was based around technology and twitter.  We had twitter birds up in the ceiling with positive test taking tweets that students created.  Teachers also created tweets to send encouraging messages about test taking.  I created the test taking apps and created a poster for each teacher to use in their classroom.  I took this picture on my ipad after I created the app pictures.  

How Do You Handle?

As a school counselor I feel that people expect you to know everything about everything especially how to deal with students that are disruptive or angry and the list goes on.  I have had the opportunity to hear the behavior doctor, Dr. Riffel www.behaviordoctor.org speak and she is a wonderful resource.  The first time I heard her speak was at a PBIS workshop.  I thought that she offered practical strategies and I talked to my principal about getting her to come speak at my school for one of our professional developments.   My principal was able to get Dr. Riffel to come to our professional development and overall the staff enjoyed the presentation.  

The website offers strategies for dealing with all types of behavior and the best part is that everything on the site is free.  Some of my favorites on the website:

• The calming videos are good videos to use when students come back from recess, lunch or even a good way to start off the day.  
• I like the CSI worksheet and I use this when stduents are sent to me because they displayed a negative behavior and teachers want me to talk to them about the behavior.  I use this along with the appropiate social story. 
• The social stories.

There are so many wonderful things on this website that you have to check it out for yourself!

Books, Books, and More Books

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