From Teacher to Social Worker: Supporting the Whole Child

Many years ago, when I was working on my undergrad in Early Childhood Education, I had enough credits to work on a minor as well and chose to minor in social work. I always thought the two worlds of education and social work went well together. Many of the social work classes taught me so much about the struggles families and young children go through before arriving to their teachers at school. It really brought the concept of an invisible backpack to light for me. It was a term that I had not known about prior. For those that might not know what an invisible backpack is, it refers to all the things we might carry with us throughout the day, and that then influence how we might act and interpret the world.  

There are so many factors that go into influencing how we carry ourselves and behave that often get overlooked. Did the child see their parents fighting last night? Do they not have food at home, and they came to school hungry? Or maybe they are just tired today? These are just a few of the things that could influence any of us, but especially a small child, in a negative way. 

Over the years, I have worked in many various education roles and with all ages of children. Most recently, I am teaching in a Preschool For All classroom. Preschool For All is a state funded preschool program that focuses on preparing at risk children for kindergarten. Every student in my room is there because they need a little extra support before going off to kindergarten. Some of my students over the years have been homeless, recent immigrants, from families of low socioeconomic status, or developmentally delayed, to name a few. At 3-5 years old, so many of them have already had many obstacles to overcome. 

I love my students and love what I do, so the question is, why become a social worker, right? In this role as a Preschool for All teacher, I have seen my fair share of trauma-induced behaviors. These students are carrying invisible backpacks that are just so heavy for their tiny bodies. I found myself struggling to find the right tools and strategies to use to support some of these children. I wanted to help them and fix it all, but there was only so much I could do within my four walls and my own knowledge. I found myself constantly calling for support from our school social worker and our district's behavior specialist. Both are incredibly kind, supportive, and knowledgeable women. Watching them use strategies I never would have thought of and never giving up when it got tough was so inspiring to me. It made me say to myself why wouldn't I go back and finish up my social work degree? I wanted to have those tools too. I wanted to be able to do my very best every day for every single child that steps into my classroom. So here I am, almost a year into my MSW program, trying to gain all the tools I can to help our littlest and strongest learners.