Main Idea:  Sleep is Underrated

May is also Better Sleep Month

Dov Davidoff may be a comedian, but sleep is very real, and our need for good, restorative sleep is way overlooked.  It’s often the first thing we skimp on when we get busy.

My wife and I recently gave into the Smart Watch craze and now have Pixel watches with FitBit that tracks your sleep and gives you a Sleep Score every morning.

The skeptic in me wonders how much it can really tell about your sleep based on your heartbeat, but if nothing else, I’m very aware of my sleep now.

Part of a good night’s rest is good sleep hygiene. Part of what enables you to sleep well is your behavior and choices leading up to bedtime.  Matthew Walker has written a great book on sleep and outlines some important actions to consider for a decent sleep:

• Find a routine - attempting to catch-up on sleep during the weekend throws off your natural rhythms and can actually result in mental and physical fatigue.
• Reduce caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol.
• Get some sun - at least 30 minutes during the say helps set your body’s rhythms.
• Ditch the devices and cardio right before bed.
• Avoid lying in bed for too long - if you can’t fall asleep within 25 - 30 minutes, get up and do something relaxing until you feel sleepy.

This week, try this: Keep a sleep log. Record when you go to bed, when you wake up, and a general sense of how well you slept (how rested do you feel, what does your body feel like, etc.).  Maybe a simple 1-10 rating.  Even something simple like this ensures that sleep becomes more of a priority and you will start to see correlations between daytime behaviors and success with sleep.
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Quote:  "Lack of sleep is only bad if you have to drive, or think, or talk, or move."  ~Dov Davidoff

Educator Resources:  Amazon’s Best Sellers in Children’s Sleep Issues - Not sure why it’s ‘Sleep ISSUES’, but these look like good ones, even for the kid in all of us adults.  Top 13 Books on Sleep - If you’re more into big-kid books, here’s a list of books on sleep (who knows?  Reading one may just put you to sleep!).

Dad Joke: Where to rainbows go when they've been bad?  To prism, but it's a light sentence.

May?!  What?  Looks like we're heading into the home stretch, y'all.  Stay healthy!

​Matt Weld, Area 5 SEL Coach

Main Idea:  Avoiding things can be more harmful than good. 

I had a conversation with the wise and wonderful Lisa Dinhofer this week, and one word leapt out at me: AVOIDANCE.
That had me thinking about my day-to-day and how much I avoid doing things that I think will be uncomfortable.  Not just the painful stuff, but the merely uncomfortable.

Then I got my butt out of my chair and went for a walk and ‘had a think’ (one of Lisa’s phrases) about the significance and the prevalence of avoidance in schools.

• How many conversations are avoided?
• How many opportunities for connection are missed?
• How much real work is never accomplished?
• ​What if a key lesson we explicitly taught kids was non-avoidance?

…just because we think doing it might bring a twinge of discomfort?

​And let’s be honest:  actually doing it is (99.9%) never as bad as we imagine it will be.

This week, try this: On your to-do list, find the thing you least want to do.  Take a few seconds and figure out why that’s so, and then do it first.

Quote:  "The avoidance of suffering is a form of suffering.  The avoidance of struggle is a struggle.  The denial of failure is a failure.  Hiding what is shameful is itself a form of shame."  ~Mark Manson

Educator Resource:  First Five - Jumpstart reader April B. recommends this resource.  Her school uses it and loves it. You receive an email everyday that has a bundle of resources for primary, and a bundle of resources for secondary.  Some are super-quick (a meme or a joke you can use in class), some are longer activities.  Produced by Edtomorrow.  Register.

Dad Joke:  What can't you breed an eel with an eagle?  It's eeleagle.

Wherever you are, keep one eye on the sky and stay safe!
Matt Weld, Area 5 SEL Coach

Main Idea:  Where I work through the concept of "You are enough."

To be completely honest, I’ve always had a bit of a “hmmm” + *scrunchy face* reaction when it comes to the phrase, “You are enough.”

I mean, doesn’t ‘enough’ imply you’re not quite there yet?  According to Mirriam-Webster, the second definition is ‘fully, quite”. The third definition, “in a tolerable degree” was more what I had in my mind when I scrunch my face. Without going down a semantics rabbit hole, let’s agree to use “fully, quite” as the definition behind this phrase’s intention.
Then I read an interesting blog post by Makeda Pennycooke on ‘What Being Enough Means’. She writes that it means: 

1. Imperfections are celebrated
2. ​Mistakes are allowed
3. Growth is welcomed
4. Support is given and received
5. Permission is granted

As I leaned into Ms. Pennycooke’s writing and contemplated Mr. Blake’s quote, I remembered when I first learned about using non-examples as a way of defining something. I was in a first grade classroom as a tech coach helping them make books on iPads about amphibians. One of the pages the teacher required was a non-example. #mindblown! I was not taught about using non-examples as a junior high teacher, but what a useful tool!

This week, try this: I think that remembering you’re enough is partly a stand against perfectionism (see JumpStart on this topic). The next time a student asks you, “have a written/run/done/whatever enough?” ask them what more than enough might look like.  OR, think about this: “Am I more than enough?” / “When am I more than enough?”

Quote:  "You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough."  ~William Blake

Educator Resource:  Lose the Very - OK, so this isn’t necessarily SEL-related, and it’s most likely the ELA teacher/writer/tech coach in me that geeked out, but it’s a simple, handy tool when you’re looking for a better word than ‘very something’. For example, very + pretty = statuesque.

Dad Joke:  I found stir fry all over my bed this morning.  I must've been sleep wokking again.