Formando Vidas SEL

Category: Classroom

Where do I Start with College Scholarship Applications?
Where do I Start with College Scholarship Applications?

There are many things to consider when seeking a scholarship to aid in college expenses. If the task seems too great, here are answers to a few questions to get you started.
1. When do I start? The best time to apply for scholarships is between your student’s junior and senior year. Begin your search and applications that summer if you can. Any earlier and you may not have enough GPA history. If you’ve already passed this window, don’t give up! There are many scholarships with other deadlines that might still apply to you.
2. Where should I apply? Don’t limit your scholarship applications to only private organizations. The federal government, individual schools, and many states offer scholarships as well. If your student has school preference(s), call that college’s financial aid department to find out about available scholarships. They can assist you in grants or other financial aid applications for that school.
3. How many scholarships should I apply for? Apply for as many as you can within the deadline requirements. Some awards may not have the same high dollar appeal as others; however, those smaller scholarship amounts add up and are often less competitive or go unnoticed. For example, the Federal Employee Education and Assistance fund (FEEA) offers more than 450 scholarships each year ranging from $250 to $7,500.
4. Where can I find scholarships to apply for? Here are a few scholarship search engines to use to find additional scholarship opportunities: com, Niche.com, and Scholarships.com.
5. What about the application? Don’t forget to carefully read over your application paying attention to instructions, questions and the deadline before filling it out. After completing it, proof the application checking for errors. Make sure you have understood and answered the questions as written. If an essay was required, proof that carefully, too! Asking a school counselor or another set of eyes to read it over is often a good idea. Don’t get your application thrown out on a technicality or careless typos and grammar mistakes. Also, send it in to be received well within the deadline.
Want to know some of the most important advice? Simply get the process started! Don’t wait, don’t hesitate. Start looking now for scholarship opportunities for you. Good luck with chipping away at the bursar bill!
August 26, 2021
Best Practices for Transitioning Back to School
Best Practices for Transitioning Back to School

You have had a fun-filled summer break, and now it’s time for your children to go back to school. All that fun probably meant:
- Staying up later in the evenings
- Extra ice cream, popsicles, and snacks
- Sleeping in most mornings to face a care-free unstructured day
There’s no guilt for a relaxed and memory making summer, but please extend grace when your students are having trouble transitioning back to a more regimented schedule.

Here are some tips for the transitions relating to sleep, nutrition and routines.

Sleep is of utmost importance for children to perform well and thrive in school. Studies have shown that children who get at least nine hours of sleep per night have a higher GPA than their fellow students who don’t get enough. Sleep rejuvenates the brain which is essential in memory, concentration, decision making, and social behavior. To transition, try gradually changing bedtimes 30 minutes earlier per day until adequate sleep time is achieved. Abruptly changing bedtime will most likely result in frustration for both you and your child.

Nutrition is the fuel your student uses to succeed at school. Proper diet gives many of the same benefits as adequate sleep. In addition, it produces a healthier body weight resulting in a sense of well-being, lack of discipline problems, and reduces the risk of illness and disease. Give your student a great start with a healthy breakfast. It’s important to include foods high in protein, fiber, and vitamins. There are many quick foods to aid you in getting out the door on time in addition to giving your children a good start. Be creative when packing lunches sneaking in healthy, lower sugar, lower fat foods. Here is a link to show the benefits of “Eating the Rainbow of Healthy Foods.” This is a great resource showing white, yellow, red, purple, and green foods and specific health benefits for each category.

Routines are the plans in motion that are predictable and familiar. They provide the boundaries and goals for successful school days. These plans help eliminate arguments when facing the hustle and bustle of a busy school morning. A chart can be helpful for younger children as a visual for what they can expect at bedtime and morning time. Older children might find that a calendar or planner is more relatable for the plan. Give your kids the security of knowing what to expect. To eliminate clothing decisions in the morning, plan outfits and lay them out before bedtime.
August 18, 2021
Multimedia Learning is Here to Stay

Multimedia Learning is Here to Stay

Multimedia learning provides so much more than plain text, both in content and in benefits for students! It’s one the main reasons we made sure our curriculum incorporated multimedia elements for every grade and lesson. Here are four ways multimedia learning helps students succeed in their learning journeys.

Visual Creatures

Large sections of the brain are dedicated to perceiving and understanding visual stimuli. Multimedia learning helps engage the mind by using pictures, interactive activities, videos, and animations alongside the text material. Text is strengthened with these tools used together, further engaging the students growing minds by using different areas of the brain to reinforce learning complex concepts.

Engaging Learning Tools

Multimedia is ever-present in our daily lives. Computers, smartphones, and other screens are integrated into everything from entertainment to advertising to professional environments. At younger ages, children are accustomed to media being an entertainment source. Multimedia learning can help children adapt to perceiving media as a learning tool as well. Videos can be gleaned for information, text can be dynamically read, and interactive activities are puzzles to be solved. By introducing multimedia learning, not only can the student’s problem solving be improved, but they can also have a more healthy base relationship with technology by being introduced to it as a resource for learning.

Fosters Curiosity

By properly using the media resources, students can look beyond their own experiences and witness new cultures, customs, subjects, and more. With the aid of teachers and parents, multimedia learning can help expand students’ world views, showing more about the world outside of their neighborhoods. After being shown the world of endless possibilities and education, students become naturally more curious. Once they learn successfully through multimedia and see the rest of what they can know, there is a natural excitement and curiosity when approaching the world around them.

Increased Accessibility

Students are individuals and therefore have various learning styles that they use to understand the world around them. For students who struggle with reading, either due to age or a learning disability, text-only mediums can be problematic as a sole source of information. Multimedia learning opens up new learning opportunities for students like this. With more visuals, audio, animations, videos, and interactive activities, they would have access to information in more ways to help them learn. Multimedia can also help children who struggle to read learn to read better! With engaging activities, targeted visuals, and helpful videos, they can focus on learning to read to increase that skill rather than becoming overwhelmed in information at the same time. With multimedia learning, students can become more engaged in their learning, have a better relationship with technology, become more curious, and help get over learning hurdles. This dynamic content delivery had already made a huge, positive impact on how we help students and will continue to make waves in education for decades to come.

August 11, 2021
Hope Can Be Taught: 7 Steps To Nurturing Hope
Hope Can Be Taught: 7 Steps To Nurturing Hope

The science behind hope is based on more than 10 years of research and 150 published works by Dr. Chan Hellman, Ph.D., Founder and Director of the OU Hope Research Center. According to his research, the strategies developed to nurture hope can show a statistically significant improvement in a child or adult in about one hour of Hope work.

These strategies can be introduced in a short amount of time, allowing for momentum in growth and added efficiencies in the educators’ teaching schedule. The simple methodology behind the Science of Hope is based on three steps:
1. Set short- or long-term goals toward purposeful behavior.
2. Identify the pathway or roadmap to attain that goal.
3. Find the willpower to focus your attention on the pursuit of the goal.
However, there are a few more components to fully round out the process for building and nurturing Hope. Here’s the full outline of strategies used to Nurture Hope:

Introduce Hope

When just getting started, students need to know that Hope is much more than wishful thinking. It’s a belief that the future will be better than the present. Hope is a confidence in a better tomorrow and the mindset that each individual plays an integral role in making that future possible. The first step in nurturing hope is introducing hope and discussing its core components.

Goal Setting

Setting goals means deciding on or identifying something that is wanted and valued. This must be personally relevant! Most high trauma youth are in survival mode and are likely to initially set short term goals. When goals are clarified, it increases the agency (or willpower) to attain them.

Identifying Pathways

This is the step in the process where students discover various ways to achieve their goals. This is the creation of the roadmap to get from Point A (where we are) to Point B (where we aim to go next). It’s important to list and discuss potential pathways, consider the barriers that will come up, and which alternative pathways might be an option.

Cultivate Willpower

Harnessing willpower is finding the inner force to make the goals a reality. This is the mental energy that is required to complete the goal. Cultivating willpower including identifying and describing the motivation behind the goal.

Problem Solve

It’s difficult to be hopeful, especially when students have faced significant trauma. But by helping children look for obstacles while discussing ways to overcome them, we help them develop their problem solving skills as they nurture the hope. Failed attempts and not quitting are sometimes a part of the journey.

Create a Hope Visual

A gallery of Hope serves as a Visual Map for this Journey to Hope. This visual, created with the student, can serve as a reference tool throughout the duration of the process. It should highlight where the student is headed and the process or steps required to get there.

Re-Goaling

After the goal is attained, it is important to remember that we all have the ability to “re-goal.” Hope can continue to grow. We can work through the process again fully in order to reach another set goal.

When educators use a social emotional curriculum infused with Hope, it reduces the impact of toxic stress and builds resilience in students, especially those who have experienced trauma and adverse childhood experiences. My Best Me is a series of lessons designed to deliver SEL competencies and help students discover their true identity and purpose. It’s also certified to increase hope, and lessons can be taught in just one hour a week.
July 14, 2021
Learning the Students Way: Student-Centric Approach to SEL

Learning the Students Way: Student-Centric Approach to SEL

Many students struggle to learn effectively with a one-size-fits-all approach to education. It may become difficult for them to fully understand and retain information, causing their performance in school to drop. This struggle can lead to poor student self-esteem, low participation, and a sense of disinterest in learning. Not only is this harmful to the student, but it can affect the classroom environment as well.

Hope Rising takes a better approach: Student-Centric Learning.

To be human is to be uniquely individual. Between personality traits, age, upbringings, and learning style strengths, each student is their own, rapidly growing into an even more unique person.

A key part of engaging in education is understanding how your brain works. How, as an individual, do you approach problem-solving? What kinds of learning come naturally, and what is more difficult? With a deeper understanding of themselves, students can more easily approach their education as a whole.

By learning how they approach problems, they are better equipped to solve them. By knowing their role in a group setting, they are aided in collaborating with others well.

Student-centered learning is very effective, but how can students achieve this kind of awareness?

My Best Me uses Social Emotional Learning in a student-centered way to foster skills to help students effectively and ethically deal with new tasks and challenges. With age and grade-appropriate direction, our curriculum helps teachers talk with their students about how to approach problem-solving, conflict resolution, growth mindsets, goal setting, and more value topics in a way to help students grow.

By approaching these vital skills in an age-appropriate and learner-centered way, students can learn with more confidence, positivity, and success. When students are shown time and time again that they can learn successfully, their curiosity and desire to learn grow.

After being engaged with student-centered learning, you may notice students being more inquisitive and start pursuing learning new things with a sense of excitement and curiosity. Subjects they may have been daunted by before will come alive and become enjoyable to learn.

Student-centered learning isn’t restricted by age or background because of its innate focus on the learner as a person. From PreK through high school, students of all ages can benefit from our curriculum, which teaches the science of Hope and SEL competencies with the student individual in mind.

If you would like more information on our program, please reach out to a member of our sales team.

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June 30, 2021