The triune brain

As teachers we often meet pupils who challenge us in different ways, and this changes us as teachers. What maybe changes us most is meeting pupils who display problematic or harmful sexual behaviour. We adults usually panic and lose the calm needed to best approach the situation.

However, new brain research may allow us to approach pupils struggling, especially with a sexualized behaviour, but also other kinds of disruptive behaviours. You see, the brain is divided into three parts: we have a survival brain, an emotional brain and a logical brain. The logical brain is activated when we are safe and calm, but the connection between the logical brain and the survival brain is shut down when we are worried and in a state of emergency preparedness, as we call it. This means that if us teachers are to educate pupils open to learning new things, we need the logical brain to be firmly activated.

A very useful tool for explaining when children and adults have their logical brain “on”, is “the Window of Tolerance”. All humans have a window of tolerance, and while we are safe and open to learning within it, outside of it we enter “emergency preparedness”. Being in a state of emergency preparedness means the body is completely focused on how to avoid danger. For teachers, this means that we have to regulate children into their window of tolerance in order to educate, which, in turn, requires us adults to be calm and regulated ourselves.

It is typical of us adults to go outside of our tolerance window when we are met with harmful sexual behaviour. It is therefore very important for us to be aware of our own triggers and reactions in order to approach children in the best possible way.

We teachers use ourselves to teach, meaning our own self is the main tool we use in our profession. This fosters not only professional development, but a personal development, and means that when I, as a teacher, become triggered, I have to be very aware of what is happening to me personally, since I am the tool in the situation. Yes, relations and safety in school have been discussed for many years, but I think what is missing from the conversation is how we as teachers integrate ourselves when working on relations. Since, when we are safe and calm ourselves, we can make our pupils feel safe.

We teachers need to stay calm upon meeting challenging behaviour. Being able to deal with pupils who behave in a way that triggers us, may be one of the most important things we do. You see, to be able to make change happen, we need to have a close relation with the pupil in question. In other words, us teachers are responsible for the relation and must invest in it from the first day of school, so that when hurtful and difficult situations occur, we can help regulate the pupil into their tolerance window. We can then encourage change via close dialogue and genuine guidance that does not feel constructed or fake.

I believe attempting to correct pupils displaying any kind of challenging behaviour – but maybe especially sexualized behaviour – without having laid the ground work of building a relation, can result in the intervention going so badly you close the door on providing aid. This is why we emphasize building relations and safety first as part of the work of universal prevention in schools.