Practical Classroom Management Strategies That Work

0:00 [Music] hi friends welcome back I'm Stacy belward the host of the connected families podcast Welcome to our community we are people committed to pursuing God's grace and truth for ourselves and then daily working to pass that Grace and Truth onto our children today I have a very special podcast that is for anyone who's looking for ideas on how to use the connected families framework in the classroom you guys much anticipated we know so whether you're a

0:30 preschool teacher a Christian School teacher or a children's minister or volunteer in a kid's class this podcast is especially for you and I want you to know right off the bat that we have three links in the show notes that you may want to check out the first one is that on December 2nd coming up pretty soon we have a new live webinar that we are inviting you to it's called discipline that connects in the classroom that's the first link the

0:57 second one is that connected family is here to support your church your Christian School and other Ministries with Biblical research-based resources that you can trust and share with your families there's three levels to our ministry partnership program so that's another link tap through to our show notes to get more information about that and third we have a free resource for you today friends you know we love creating solid resources we do it all the time every month you can print them

1:28 off and you can use them but today it's a poster siiz image of the framework messages okay it is perfect for all of you teachers to hang up in your classroom or maybe it's in the playroom in your house too okay tap through to the show notes to find out more about all three of those things hey everybody I'm so glad that you're here with me today I have two guests our first guest is Dr Cindy Wilson she's the partnership

1:56 program manager here at Connected families where she supports and equips churches schools and other Christian organizations who are integrating the connected families framework into their communities Cindy has worked as a family scientist in Academia as well as serving in local churches for over 20 years in the areas of children youth and family ministry welcome to the podcast again Cindy thanks Stacy it's great to be back and our second guest is Magie Rocky she

2:28 is a new connected family certified parent coach woohoo and teaches kindergarten at a Christian School this is her 11th year in the classroom having previously taught kindergarten special education and preschool she loves utilizing the connected fames framework in the classroom and encouraging other teachers to do the same which is why we have her on the podcast today she and her husband have an eight-year-old and a six-year-old at home welcome Maggie

2:58 thank you thanks for having me we're so grateful to have both you and Cindy on the show today let me just start off with a quick question for you megie I keep hearing about school teachers leaving the profession tell us what struggles are teachers facing as they work with children I think there's a lot of factors but I think a big one is a lot of teachers just aren't equipped to deal with all of the kind of

3:23 extra things that children are bringing into the classroom not even related to teaching and curriculum and instruction but kind of all of the emotional development the social emotional development and the behavioral pieces are really big we're going to interview you talk to you about how you use the framework in your classroom and go through each one of those levels but first I want to ask Cindy a question you know for a lot of years here at

3:48 Connected families we've been creating content for parents to use with their children but we frequently hear from teachers and church volunteers that the connected families framework can be applied in the classroom too and honestly they ask us like help us know how to do that and so you have been working on a workshop that we're going to talk about in a little bit and part of the reason that you're the right person to do it is because you've worked

4:17 with churches for over 20 years can you share a little bit about the needs of these types of resources for classroom teachers and volunteers yeah absolutely yeah so like you said I worked in Church Ministries for many years started in youth ministry then did children and family I had the privilege as part of some of those roles to even direct two preschools that were part of my Ministry and let me just tell you I wish I would

4:43 have had the connected families framework back then unfortunately I didn't know about connected families yet but I can tell you it would have saved so much heartache because I often worked with teachers they wanted their students to learn and to grow in wisdom and in their relationship with Christ but they oftentimes found themselves dealing with behavior challenges that quite frankly just made learning difficult and it was really in those challenging moments that teachers often struggled with how do

5:12 they respond in ways that communicate God's unconditional love to their students they wanted church and school to be a safe place for their students but they also wanted to develop wisdom and responsibility in their students and so they struggled with how to do that in these classroom kind of settings and I found that these teachers had great intentions they all had wonderful intentions but even with that many of the traditional classroom discipline approaches that are taught tend to

5:40 follow more of a behavior management approach that oftentimes just fell short in achieving the goals that these teachers had for their students so can you just give us a quick like example of what is the difference between a a philosophy around behavior management and then what does it look like when a teacher has an awareness of the connected families framework and is working with our kids through that yeah so a traditional behavior management approach usually looks like doing out

6:11 punishments for bad behavior and rewards for good behavior and so really is focusing on let's get rid of the bad behavior and let's get more of the good behavior but oftentimes this results in strategies such as maybe yelling putting kids in timeout and oftentimes that timeout includes like sending kids away from the teacher maybe sitting in a corner or just in an isolated place in the class and they really are focusing more on punishing that bad behavior

6:38 giving a lot of big energy to the bad behavior without really considering maybe what's going on underneath the misbehavior what are maybe some missing skills what are some things that those kids are believing about themselves that might be driving some of those behaviors often times again these are really these external kinds of systems even reward systems like sticker charts but one one example I'll never forget honestly was in a class and I was doing an observation and I'm sure this teacher

7:09 had again great intentions they thought it was a very clever system but they actually had created this beautiful bulletin board that had a tree that they had created and then there were apples and on each apple was the name of a child in the classroom and every day the kids name all that Apple start Ed in the tree but for each bad behavior their apple fell further and further down towards the ground and so what I noticed

7:36 is they could only go down there was no way to go up and so what happened is it is really that idea of focus is fertilizer they were giving such big attention to the bad behavior that it was inadvertently reinforcing those behaviors so teachers just played this game of like whack-a-mole where they may have stopped the behavior in that moment but it just came up in another way because they weren't teaching more desirable Behavior or they weren't

8:00 working to really Mentor belief and so what I love about connected families is it's instead of focusing on managing Behavior the focus is on mentoring belief and it's building that identity and that belief system in our students that's rooted in how God sees them right as image bearers of God as loved fully and unconditionally as being capable of good works and capable of making wise choices I love that and I feel sad in my heart for those babies who are in the

8:32 classroom and we're getting a different identity of I'm the Troublemaker I can never go up I'm only going down and so what a different atmosphere to be in with the teacher okay so Maggie you're currently working directly with young kids you're a new certified parent coach and I hear that you have been looking for ways to apply the connected families framework in your classroom so could you tell us some of the ways you've been working to actively communicate the four

9:01 messages the ones that Cindy just said into your classroom with your students so let's just start we're going to go through all four but let's start with you are safe with me yeah so they it starts before even the first day of school um it starts at that like Meet the Teacher Night kids are coming in I teach kindergarten for a lot of them it's their first time ever going to school mightbe their first time separating from their parents and just

9:27 having that warm greeting I'm I'm so glad to see you that slow low listen kind of reading the room is this a kid who's coming in really excited to see me excited to be here or is this this kid who's really nervous and who needs me to kind of you know stand back a little bit with a with a quieter greeting the day today we really focus on our structure and our routine doing the same things in

9:48 the same order every day as much as possible I think that really can communicate safety to children at the start of the day doing my best to be there in the front of the room greeting the kids as they come in individ ually at the door by name doing my best to maintain my composure and then modeling doovers if if I need to if I have a bigger reaction than I need to something happens in the room that is upsetting to

10:12 me I'll say you know what I didn't like the way that felt can I can I try again they've they've never said No and when there is a behavior something that needs to be addressed really making every effort to have that conversation privately whether that's you know pulling a kiddo into the haul or you know holding them back for a minute before they go into the lunchroom not correcting a kid in front of the whole class and then every day we talk about

10:38 we call it our classroom framework and reminding them you know my my job is to keep you safe I'm not going to let anyone hurt you but I'm also not going to let you hurt anyone else and being safe is not just about our bodies it's also about keeping our hearts safe and our minds safe and not hurting anybody else's feelings that's something that my students hear every single day I really love that I see so much of the framework

11:00 in your classroom already and what you're doing in in your room dayto day I love the proactive nature of it even starting with Meet the Teacher Night and one of the mantras that we say with this level of the framework is that kids learn best when they feel safe and you've really built an intentional approach to safety from before even they walk in the door the the first day but I love just that slow low listen approach

11:25 that structuring routine like you said is so important because kids thrive routine and that helps especially more anxious kids to know this is a place that I can know what to expect even creating community and and uh safety with knowing their name I just love that and the modeling out loud like when you mess up doing those doovers is so important I think that's also a reflection of of like thinking as the teacher we talk about this for parents

11:51 but it's true for teachers too that before we launch in with how do I fix this kid's Behavior misbehavior we start by asking the question what's going on in me right because we know from Matthew 12:34 that it's out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speak so I just hear a lot of like self-reflection and how you respond to kids and just humbly being willing to do those doovers and modeling and then just really having

12:17 that mind towards helping anxious kids setting that classroom environment where these kids can find safety and calm and acceptance so I love that so much what I heard in the modeling du overs in the classroom is that you're also communicating to the kids that this is a safe place to mess up and that then we're going to get to the fourth one but you're responsible for your behavior you have a way to make it right yeah I can

12:46 imagine that that's just so valuable and then later maybe teach them about doovers and they can do doovers right megy okay let's move to the second one how do you communicate you are loved no matter what in your classroom so I think a big part of this is you you've got to get to know the kids right it's difficult to love someone really well if you don't know much about them so asking those curious questions anytime there's

13:12 downtime you know talking about do you have a pet at home or oh I love your shirt is that your favorite animal all those kinds of things just letting kids know that they're seen and that they're enjoyed especially at my level the kindergarten level offering physical affection when and where appropriate if a kid asks me for a hug I'll give him a hug or a high five things like that when again when those things come up when

13:34 there is a behavior a situation we need to address always assuming positive intent so that might sound like I I know you didn't mean to hurt your friend but when you did you know whatever it was it did hurt them you know but kind of showing that like I I know I know your heart wasn't malicious but this this is what happened and we need to handle it McKey do you say even if you feel like

14:00 maybe they did want to really hurt him so if I if I think they probably did want to hurt them I might say something like you were so mad you didn't know what else to do because I really feel like that's the case you know we all feel big emotions and when you're five you know when you're five or six years old those emotions can be really really big and you genuinely might not have the skills to handle that level of

14:25 frustration and you don't know what else to do and so it comes out as a push or a hit or a kick so that would kind of be the rephrasing if I'm like you did mean to do that but that wasn't yeah if you were in your best frame of mind it's not the choice you would have made yeah I think that's really looking under the surface and having a bigger vision for what's going on in our kids which really

14:46 is empathy right which I'm guessing there's quite a bit of of empathy at this layer you are love no matter what tell us a little bit about that and how that shows up in your classroom yeah empathy all the time every every day again it's it's hard to go to kindergarten I think we you know as Society think of kindergarten oh it's so cute and they make such fun projects and it is they are cute and we do make

15:09 really fun projects but it's a big deal developmentally what's going on in their bodies and in their minds there's a lot of changes as they're entering kind of that middle childhood age and for a lot of kids again it's the first time they've spent a full day away from home a full day away from their caregiver and so just providing a lot of a lot of empathy is really important yeah and what I love about that too is you know

15:35 empathy really kind of takes the wind out of the sales when kids do misbehave because when you can kind of step into their world and help them see like I see you I see how hard it is right now I see how you're struggling and I want to join you in this but then help point you to a better way it really does communicate love and that's again one of the things we love to say at Connected family is

15:59 that misbehavior is the golden opportunity to show unconditional love so when you show empathy when you assume that positive intent when you're still showing unconditional love and affection even when they misbehave it really is showing them like that just like God demonstrates his own love for us and that while we were still sinners Christ died for us in the same way you don't have to get it right for me to love you there's nothing you can do to make me

16:26 love you or care for you more and there's nothing you can do in this classroom to to take away my love and and care for you and so I love that and I also just love that you know you're thinking about what is what is it like to be my student right now and I think that's an important question is when you see that struggling child to say what's going on inside of them what things are

16:48 they carrying in that proverbial stress backpack or whatever you know what's it like to be that 5-year-old in this new environment and then just really being intentional about connect in before you correct if it's bending down and touching their shoulder you know holding their little hand and you know having that connection piece before you move into correction I I think those are such great strategies to do so I I love hearing these but first connect we love that

17:18 phrase here at Connected families okay let's go to the third level which is you are called incapable how do you use that message in your classroom Magie so this level of the framework is by far my favorite but we we spend a lot of time here the ABCs of affirmation is a tool that I use probably every day um again I teach at a Christian School we have a Bible curriculum that has a character trait every week and so the ABCs of

17:47 affirmation is a great tie in to the curriculum we're already doing clarify real quick for everybody who maybe hasn't heard it doesn't remember for a while but when when we do an ABC for affirmation it's not just saying hey good job it's saying a you're you're having three parts of the phrase right or the affirmation A is for Action so it's what did they do B is the benefit of it that was so great because you

18:13 helped me I don't have to spend as much time cleaning up something like that and C is then the character which is that really shows I don't know what what's the character we want to say you guys care responsibility or thoughtfulness or you were thinking of others or yeah something like that so that's ABCs we'll have a link in the show notes to that too yeah so that's that's when we use all the time so this week our character

18:37 trait in our curriculum is patience I don't know any child or adult really who doesn't need more practice with patience and so that's something I can call out you know when we're waiting for pickup or we're waiting for whatever it is hey you're showing patience you're showing our character trait when you wait patiently it makes it easier for everybody else who has to be in the hallway right now or whatever it is the gift G aai is another tool that I love

19:02 so much that we use all the time cuz there's always something good to call out so that might look like hey you know the Lord has blessed you with a love of Justice I know that the rules are really important to you and you want to follow the rules and it's important to you that other kids are following the rules too that's a good thing that is a gift that the Lord has given you right now though

19:25 you can't use your body to try to enforce the the rules for other kids if another kid is breaking one of the rules for soccer you can't push them down you need to you know go get a grownup or or whatever it is but calling out there is a gift in the midst of this misbehavior um another thing we do uh every child in my class has a job in our classroom they keep their job for a week so there's you

19:50 know somebody is the line leader somebody does the light somebody passes out paper somebody Waters the plants and I start those as soon as possible in the year and really do try to be as hands off about them because they they are capable they can handle those kind of jobs and doing them on their own another one is just asking questions rather than telling them what to do so if you know it's snack time and somebody spills a

20:11 cup of milk and they kind of look up like look up at me like oh no rather than say oh go get some paper towels or rather than going to get the paper towels for them I'll just look at them and say well what should we do you know the milk spilled and sometimes it takes a couple seconds but they'll say well I guess I guess we should wipe it up and I'm like yeah you're right you can reach

20:30 the paper towels they're right back there just trying to communicate that message like you you can handle this this is a problem that you can solve and don't you wish we could have been a kindergartener in Mrs Rocky's class for sure I love that and it just again reminds me of that Mantra that we say in Connected families that I can find and build strengths in my students even in misbehavior and you're doing that when you're asking that question

20:56 what went partially right in this moment what is that gift that I can call attention to because again we see back to my opening example of the tree with the falling apples that the only attention went to when kids were getting it wrong and you're flipping that you're saying no we're gonna affirm what's going right even in misbehavior we're going to look for those golden nuggets that we can affirm and you really are building a classroom culture of like

21:24 communicating competence communicating that you are capable of making wise choices you um are using questions and you know gifts going to ey and all that to build wisdom in students and it really does help communicate that I believe that you are called and capable to be a blessing and you know just from other podcasts and now having kids that are coming up into college I just think wow these messages starting so young are what really build kids resilience so

21:56 that when hard things come and that's going to come soon and and even in kindergarten it's hard as a you know is doesn't matter what age you are there's hard stuff but you are capable and you are called and you can get through this and you can do it and that's sort of the longterm vision of saying hey we have a culture of competence I know you can water the plants you can do it good job

22:22 you know I love it so good this is such good stuff we have more to unpack including we have to get to the fourth message of the framework you are responsible but first let's take a quick break you know everybody here at Connected families we are committed to partnering with schools churches and other Christian organizations as they support and equip parents as well as volunteers and teachers with the connected families framework we have two opportunities to share with you today

22:55 first is a webinar training for applying the frame work in the classroom and second is a way for your organization to get more trusted resources for all of your staff and families so I'm just inviting Cindy Wilson here she is the director of our ministry partnership program Cindy you've been working on a new equipping resource for Ministry leaders and teachers who want to be intentional about applying the connected families framework in the classroom will

23:25 you tell us more about it yeah I'd love to we do have a ton of ideas for how teachers can apply their framework in their classrooms in fact we have way more than we could fit into this single podcast or we would be here all day so I'd love to invite you to our upcoming free live webinar that we're going to be hosting called discipline that connects in the classroom the webinar will be held on December 2nd at 12:00 p.m.

23:52 central Time December 2nd is coming up you guys links are going to be in the show notes I'm really excited that we're offering this because I've been a connected families for over eight years and we've had people asking us for resources for the classroom for a while now but who would be most interested in that webinar yeah thanks so we've been getting questions about this ever since we started the ministry partnership program even before and so really anyone

24:19 who is a teacher a Ministry leader an administrator in either a church or School setting would really benefit from participating in this way webinar and you're going to walk away with ideas that you can use in your classroom today whether that's a full-time you know weekday school program or part-time program or Sunday morning volunteers on you know with kids whatever role you play you're going to walk away with ideas to Mentor beliefs of your students that they are safe loved called and

24:48 capable and responsible for their actions I'm really excited that you are putting that together Cindy just again tap through to our show notes to sign up for that free live webinar on December 2nd you can do that today but I also want to ask you quick Cindy about the ministry partnership program that we have with churches and schools it's for those churches and schools who are looking for more resources for their staff and their volunteers can you speak

25:20 to the issues that those people who are working with families are facing yeah absolutely so while back we conducted our own parent Ministry needs assessment with Ministry leaders and in that assessment we found that 80% of churches and schools and other organizations reported that their organization did not do a good job at meeting the needs of families for biblical and practical teaching on parenting but in that same assessment they also reported that the

25:51 largest felt need that parents reported to them was the discipline of children however only a quarter of those organizations provided any classes on discipline and virtually none of them really were integrating the connected families framework into classrooms and then in a separate study that we looked at by the Bara group they found that the majority of churches Express a lack of emphasis on equipping parents so there's clearly a gap there between what is felt as a need and what resources are

26:21 available to churches and schools and so we really wanted to step into this Gap by creating a Ministry partnership program that's designed to support and equip churches schools and other Christian organizations who are looking for even more resources to support and equip their parents yeah that's our heart to come alongside those churches and organizations so if if one of them does come into this ministry partnership program with us what do they get what's included there's a lot that Ministry

26:52 Partners can receive through a partnership more than I can include in this short commercial but let me just say by being being an official Ministry partner with connected families churches schools and other agencies can provide discounted or even free unlimited access to parents in their Ministry depending on what level of partnership they choose plus we have a ton of other resources to equip you to do intentional parent Ministry in your church and many of the organizations we talk to already love

27:21 connected families they've seen the difference that's made in their own families and they want to find ways to integrate the framework into their church or School culture so that's what we're really about in this ministry partnership program so everybody if you want to know more about how you can bring connected families to your church your school or other Christian Ministry we have adoption foster agencies and preschools all kinds tap through to the show notes yes and I also want to invite

27:50 you to attend an upcoming Ministry partnership Discovery session we do these once a month and they are open to anyone who wants to find out more information about our Partnerships so come and hear more about these three levels of partnership and all the various benefits that you'll get so good okay everybody tap through the show notes go to the ministry partnership page and you're going to find all the information about the things that we talked about

28:14 today we're excited about it and we got through it Cindy woohoo woohoo okay we are back after the commercial Maggie is with us Maggie Rocky she is a kindergarten teacher and a certified connected families parent coach I can imagine what it would be like to be a child in a classroom where they're consistently hearing the messages you're safe you're loved you're called and capable but Maggie I know as

28:47 a parent too right even when teachers or us parents consistently communicate these three messages kids still misbehave they just do so let's talk about the last level of the frame work it's correct it's the message you are responsible for your actions what does that look like in your classroom so part of that goes back kind of to the you are capable message asking questions what should we do giving them an opportunity to do it involving the children even

29:15 really young children involve them in kind of that team problem solving practice and then ultimately it's finding ways to make it right so a lot of times in a kindergarten classroom that might look like so you used your hands to hurt somebody we need to use your hands to do something kind for them how can you be a blessing to that child or you used your words to hurt somebody you said something really hurtful we need to find a way you can use your

29:42 words to build that person up and the message really is it's it's more than just saying sorry and it's certainly more than an unrelated punishment right you you push a friend during math so you lose part of your recess time that's really not related and it really doesn't teach any kind of new behavior and there's really no restoration and so explaining to the kids you know Jesus wants us to be in relationship with each other he wants us to be close together

30:07 and when we hurt one another we break that relationship and so we need to find a way to make it right how can you be in right relationship with your classmate I said earlier I model doovers as needed and then offering them to the kids sometimes as a way to to make it right saying oh you know you were so excited to go to art class you pushed your way right past all these other kids I want

30:30 you to go back to your desk do you want to try to do it again in a way that's not going to bump into anybody which kind of does two things it's you know calls out the behavior that you know that wasn't the right choice but it also gives them a chance to practice it the right way and kind of build that neural pathway of the way that we'd like to see that look in our classroom and then

30:50 another one that we use a lot is the if then otherwise phrasing so that might look like hey if you can keep your chapstick at your desk and it doesn't distract you that's fine with me you can keep it there otherwise if it is a distraction we'll put it in your cubby and you can use it before we go outside or when you need it which kind of has embedded in it that message of of you're

31:11 capable I think you can handle this but if it becomes a problem here's what's going to happen and then just being really consistent with following through on that I see so much good in what you just shared and I just think back to how that compares to traditional classroom like behavior management strategies that you know puts so much responsibility on the teacher to punish that misbehavior right instead of like what we say at this level is that effective discipline

31:36 puts responsibility on kids to write their wrongs and it really is about kids figuring out a way to make right what they made wrong and building that responsibility and that wisdom in kids right and it's responding in a Galatians 61 kind of a way that if someone is called in a sin you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently so I think two key words in that are restore and gently right we're focusing

32:05 on restoration consequences giving them a chance to restore what has been broken but also the gentle response in the way that you come alongside those students and you again communicate I believe that you can make a right choice I'm going to give you a chance to make that right giving them those doovers helping them you know find that way to to restore that relationship with their peers just such great stuff there thank you Maggie so Maggie like you know every

32:35 kindergarten classroom that you walk into is colorful and has art all over the walls and it's all beautiful and I hear that you have used the four messages and the framework even in your physical classroom what does that look like yeah so we have in a bulletin board right in the front of our room right next to our whiteboard we have four messages right on there it says you are safe you are loved you are called and

33:00 capable and you are responsible for your actions we repeat that really multiple times a day we do it as part of our morning meeting we reference it maybe if if we need to during the day saying hey that's not safe and part of our classroom framework is that in this room we're going to be safe and yeah just that we call it we call it our classroom framework as far as physically in the room I have I call it a cozy spot

33:25 teachers have lots of different names for places like like a Relaxation Station something like that but what's really important is that it is not a punishment it is never a place a child is sent to you're being a problem so you have to be separated and go over here rather it's a place that's always available to any student really for any reason if you're tired if you're sad if you're just really missing mom if you have a tummy ache that's a spot you can

33:48 go it's got a really fluffy comfy rug a big pillow back rest kind of thing a box with fidgets and visuals that's just an option and I might suggest test it for a kid if a kid's maybe crying it drop off they just for whatever reason had kind of a rough morning I might say hey would you would you like to spend some time in our cozy spot before before you come join us would that feel good to you and

34:09 usually they'll say yes and sometimes they'll say no and and that's fine too we've got lots of flexible seating options five and six-year-old kids were not built to sit at desks for 6 hours so we've got wiggle cushions and wobble stools and floor seats and pillows and lap desks things like that that again are available to all the kids how do those things fit into you are responsible that's a great question so we talk about using giving the right

34:36 tool for to the right person for the right job so the way I explained it at the start of our year is if there's a house on fire and the firefighter shows up and you give the firefighter a hammer is he going to be able to put out the fire no does that mean that he's a bad firefighter no does that mean it's a bad Hammer no it wasn't the right tool for the right person so you are welcome to

34:57 sit on a wobble stool cuz for some kids that's a tool that really makes it easier for them to learn if you're sitting on a wobble stool and all you're doing is bumping into your neighbors and you're putting your hands up like you're on a roller coaster and you're you know yelling and all that kind of stuff that tells me that's that's probably not the right tool for you for a math lesson right they're tools to be used and if

35:18 it's not the right fit we might ask you to put one away but they are available that's good okay and maybe we could end with talking about the big Banner yeah so we have two banners with the same message one I put up before the school year even started and it's in the back of our classroom and it just says you are God's Masterpiece and there's little handprints cutout handprints with each Student's name on them that's inside our

35:44 classroom and then one of the first weeks of school we all made little paper cutouts so a little punched out people shapes they got to pick the hair they put on and the clothes they put on and the eyes and all that kind of stuff and we put all those together on a big banner that hangs outside our classroom that also says we are God's Masterpiece and it's something that again the kids here probably multiple times a day that

36:08 that's who they are that they are created by God that they are his Masterpiece and that they're here to be a blessing oh I love that so much I know I'm over here I know y'all can't see my face but I'm smiling because again I'm thinking back to those poor kids whose names were on the apples who kept falling off the tree compared to the kids whose names are on a banner that says you're God's Masterpiece and we are

36:32 God's Masterpiece and what a contrast that you are shaping their little hearts to believe that they are part of this masterpiece of a classroom and God uniquely created them and they are capable and and I'm just thinking too like so many classroom teachers have classroom rules but you've adopted the four connected family's messages as kind of your classroom framework and I just love that because it is more about a way of being than just here's the things you

37:00 don't we need to not do in the classroom this has been such a great conversation with both of you about so many ways megie you gave so many ideas for how teachers could use the framework in the classroom and integrated there we're really grateful and actually in both relational ways but also these physical ways it just sounds like it just permeates all of it and I love it and now Cindy the workshop the webinar that you are writing has lots and lots and

37:30 lots of more ideas for teachers to come and be able to learn about how to integrate the framework into the classroom you guys sign up for that but megie we're so grateful that you came and shared with us today I I want to say goodbye to you I know I have a few more questions for Cindy but megie we're just grateful that you are here today thank you so much for having me it's been so good I want to take a couple of minutes

37:57 at the end of this podcast and just talk about the ministry partnership program because I think that as people have been listening they're getting curious so we've already said that it's for pastors who are in churches as churches and Christian schools and I know that these people who are coming alongside families are being confronted with a lot of heartache and a lot of struggle and they themselves are feeling like whoa like you know where are the answers and this

38:25 is big and they are old overwhelmed so what are Ministry leaders saying to you are their pain pain points right now yeah well if you are a teacher or a pastor or a church volunteer you really are on the front lines of working with struggling parents and struggling kids right and there really is a lot being thrown at you that can be overwhelming and as we've already shared many of you lack the resources or even the knooow

38:53 for how to best support and equip parents and teachers and how to to us send these messages to kids in your classroom to help them understand that they're safe loved called and capable and responsible while our ministry partnership program is designed to do just that it's to come alongside you in the middle of these struggles and to support and equip you and your parents with resources to confidently work with kids you know one of the most unique

39:20 opportunities we have here is to create a shared set of messages that parents and teachers can speak into the hearts of children and so we're developing lots of resources resour excuse me so we're developing lots of resources such as the upcoming discipline that connects in the classroom plus a ton of other supports and resources for our ministry partners and we're already beginning to see the fruit of what this can look like when churches and schools begin to integrate

39:49 the connected families framework into their culture so when they do partner with us what does that look like for a school or for a church what could someone know about that well so you know many of the folks that we talk to they do have this stirring to support and equip parents in their Ministry but like I said they don't know how to get there in fact we did a separate needs assessment of ministry leaders and we

40:13 found that only 10% of organizations had any kind of organized parent Ministry so the need is clearly great these Ministry leaders you know they know they want to do more for parents and they've maybe heard about connected families and come to love it but they want to do more to integrate this into their Ministry and so our partnership program is designed to do just that to to equip the Equippers essentially right to support and equip you as you support and equip

40:39 parents and now also teachers and Volunteers in your community and so when you become an official Ministry partner with connected families then you are able to provide discounted or even free unlimited access to parents in your ministry for our online courses and we have different levels of partnership that hopefully you can find something that works for your budget and so forth and we have sliding scales to work with your budget but we also have additional resources we have equipping environments

41:08 we do quarterly Zoom meetups with our partners so they can learn from one another and share their passion for parent Ministry it truly is such a blessing to be part of this community of folks who are passionate about transforming homes and classrooms through the connected families framework yeah one thing that I really love about is we have such a deep list of certified parent coaches that are accessible to our partners also and I know that's a

41:36 whole another line and we'll have to talk to more Cindy about getting information about that but I just love that we are a resource we want to be a resource to both parents and organizations and pastors and teachers and all of these people because we are all in this together we all want Christ centered transformation in families yes and that's what it's about right Cindy yes it is for sure yeah this has been a wonderful podcast thanks for being on it

42:06 we're so grateful to Maggie for having been here and share her story of the framework in the in the classroom but thanks for being with us today Cindy it was my pleasure thank you so much and I just look forward to talking to anyone who really wants to see this Cry Center transformation not only in your homes and communities but in your classrooms well thank thanks for tuning in today friends be sure to check out our show

42:30 notes to get all of those links for the ministry partnership program and the live webinar coming up there was a bunch of stuff mentioned today it's all fun and good so we are a listener supportive organization over 50,000 parents like you listen to this podcast every month individual donations make the work to equip and encourage families possible for more information about connected families follow us on Instagram or Facebook or go to Connected families.org I will see you next time

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