Breathe for Change Podcast

Breathe for Change
  • 5.0 (18)
  • Education
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Breathe for Change Podcast is hosted by Dr. Ilana Nankin, co-founder of Breathe for Change. After certifying 20,000 educators and impacting millions of students, we're digging deeper into what really drives learning: Human Intelligence. Each week, we explore how educators can unleash the full human potential in themselves, their students, and their communities to transform education from the inside out.

  1. 3d ago

    Teaching Chooses Us: From Burned Out Teacher to District Leader

    Most educators who consider a master's degree hit the same wall. There is no time, no energy left at the end of the day, and little appetite for a program that pulls them further away from the students they became teachers to serve. Traditional graduate programs often ask teachers to set their own classrooms aside and study something somewhere else. Dr. Ilana Nankin makes the case that this is backward. With kindergarten teacher Kristy Herrera and former second grade teacher Beth Schreiber, she argues that the most meaningful research an educator can do is already happening in their own room, and that higher education should help teachers improve the work they are already doing rather than add to it. That approach begins with purpose, not a research topic. Create Your Vision, a Cognitive Intelligence practice from the Human Intelligence framework, and a personal why statement give educators an anchor before they choose a focus. From there, the focus is the challenge already in front of them: multilingual kindergartners learning English through a morning SEL circle, or a staff worn down by stress finding relief in a weekly wellness hour. The data is often already there: anecdotal notes, quick check-ins, and simple before and after surveys. The harder question is what happens to the teacher. Doing this work changed how both of these educators saw themselves, and it carried them into leadership they never went looking for, from opening district meetings with 3 Collective Breaths to coaching teachers across a district. Growth came through small, consistent steps, not one big leap. For any educator wondering whether they have anything left to give: the evidence that it matters may already be in your classroom. You only need a way to see it. BEST MOMENTS: "Teachers don't choose teaching. Teaching chooses us." Beth names why educators stay.Kristy pitches a project she thinks is "too easy" because she's already doing it, and learns that is exactly the point.Beth sets out to lower staff stress and stumbles onto a second finding she never planned to measure: job satisfaction.A kindergarten teacher who once dreaded talking to adults opens a district-wide gathering with one collective breath, because three felt like too many. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN: How to write a why statement that anchors decisions when the year gets heavyHow to choose a research focus from the challenge already in your classroomHow to treat anecdotal notes and quick check-ins as real dataHow to measure the effect of a staff wellness practice on stressBuild confidence to lead beyond your classroom through small, consistent steps EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS: 00:00 - Episode Opening 01:55 - Introduction & The Vision of the Breathe For Change Master's 04:12 - Why Kristi & Beth Joined Breathe For Change 08:39 - Starting with the "Why": Crafting Your Educator Vision Statement 17:09 - Defining the Focus: Choosing an Accessible Action Research Challenge 24:42 - Designing the Classroom & Educator Initiatives 27:43 - Data Collection: Anecdotal Notes, Surveys & Measuring Real Impact 41:24 - Post-Graduation Growth: Stepping into Leadership & Advocacy 49:47 - District-Wide Ripple Effects & Superintendent Partnership 51:01 - Closing Reflections & How to Join the Master's Program HASHTAGS: #TeacherWellness #Education #SocialEmotionalLearning #ActionResearch #TeacherLeadership #BreatheForChange

  2. Oct 28

    Why You're Facing Challenging Elementary Student Behavior

    Every early childhood and elementary classroom has the student who throws the pencil box, hides under the table, or says no before the directions are finished. Most educators answer the same way every time: redirect, consequence, repeat. Before long, the loop runs the room and the adult inside it runs on empty. Dr. Ilana Nankin and Beth Schreiber make the case that the loop fails because it only responds to what is visible. Underneath an outburst, a shutdown, or an apology offered just to make things stop is a young nervous system outside its window of tolerance, asking whether it is safe here and whether it belongs. Regulation, in that light, is not silent hallways and hands behind backs. It is safety. What works instead is a four step sequence, usable one piece at a time or as a whole: regulate, relate, repair, reconnect. Regulation comes first, through practices taught proactively so students can reach for them in hard moments, such as 3 Collective Breaths to open morning circle, Sun Breath to reenergize after lunch, and Shake It Out to discharge stress. Relating means naming the feeling under the behavior while holding the boundary. Repair uses Honor Intention, Own Impact and the Peace Process so students learn to resolve conflict themselves. Reconnection asks the most of the adult. The students with the hardest days are often the ones who hear the least appreciation, at school and beyond it, and changing that takes deliberate, constant effort. Ilana and Beth are candid that these practices from the Human Intelligence framework are still daily work in their own homes. If the loop has you wondering whether you can keep doing this, you can. What feels like running out of patience is usually a missing sequence, and a sequence can be learned. BEST MOMENTS: Regulation is not silent hallways and hands behind backs. "It's compliance. And that is not what we do."Four-year-olds checking in as "proud and joyful" and "inspired and connected," thanks to a classroom emotion wall built from their own faces."The humanity in me can still access the humanity in you," and how to hold a boundary without losing the student.A peace corner so well practiced that the tattling stopped within two months.Calling home about the one good thing, even on a six-outburst day: "positive bragging behind the back." WHAT YOU'LL LEARN: How to recognize fight, flight, freeze, and fawn in the classroom, and what each state needsHow to match a regulation practice to the moment: grounding, energizing, or releasing tensionHow to use the 2 Word Check In to grow young students' emotional vocabularyHow to hold a firm boundary while a student still feels understoodUse Honor Intention, Own Impact and the four step Peace Process to turn conflict into repairBuild daily appreciation for the students who hear it least EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS: 00:00 - Introduction to Disruptive Behaviors and Teacher Burnout 02:11 - The Four R Framework: Regulate, Relate, Repair, Reconnect 09:32 - Step 1: Regulate and Understanding the Nervous System 20:25 - Implementing Classroom Regulation Practices 30:26 - Step 2: Relate Through Empathy and Boundaries 37:28 - Step 3: Repairing Harm and the Peace Process 48:50 - Step 4: Reconnect by Affirming and Building Trust 54:59 - Conclusion and Breathe For Change Master's Program HASHTAGS: #ClassroomManagement #SocialEmotionalLearning #EarlyChildhoodEducation #ConflictResolution #Belonging #RelationalIntelligence #BreatheForChange

  3. Oct 21

    A New Kind of Master’s of Education to Transform Your Life and Teaching

    What if your master's degree started with the change you want to make in your own classroom? Breathe for Change Founder and Co-CEO Dr. Ilana Nankin sits down with Dr. Kelli Sammis, a 30-year public school educator and former principal who has advised more Breathe for Change master's students than anyone else. Most educators already know which practices work in their room. They have watched a class settle after a few shared breaths, and felt their own day change when they arrived regulated instead of rushed. What they rarely have is evidence the people who make decisions will act on. The usual model hands teachers another curriculum or a study run by someone who has never stood in their room. That gets the order backward. Ilana and Kelli unpack how action research closes that gap, why it runs through all three semesters of the M.S.Ed. in Transformative Teaching and Learning, and why it starts with the well-being of the adult in the room. An educator names the challenge that keeps them up at night, whether constant redirection, low staff morale, or student anxiety, and chooses a small, consistent practice to meet it: a 2 Word Check In at morning circle, 3 Collective Breaths before instruction, a weekly Mindful Movement session for colleagues. They gather baseline data, keep going, and measure again. The result is something a principal, school board, or district can read. Kelli and Ilana share example after example of teachers leading change in their communities, including a teacher who opened every class with breathing and targeted SEL strategies and watched her redirections fall from 35 to zero in four months. If you know in your gut that your work matters, you're right, and you can measure it. The proof is closer than it feels. BEST MOMENTS: Why a jeans pass on Friday can no longer refill a teacher whose "internal reservoir is empty.""You know in your heart that what you're doing works." What changes when you can show it.Breathe for Change's theory of change in three steps: transformation of self, then teaching, then learning.Kelli's closing advice to every educator: stop closing the door and doing this alone. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN: How to turn a classroom challenge into a research question you can actually answerHow to collect simple baseline data with nothing more than a counter and fifteen minutes a dayWhy educator well-being comes before teaching quality and learning outcomesHow short, consistent practices like a 2 Word Check In can support literacy, belonging, and regulationHow to bring well-being practices to colleagues, not only to studentsWhy community, more than willpower, is what keeps educators well in the profession EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS: 00:00 - Opener: Why Transforming Education Starts with Self 01:18 - Welcome Kelly: A 30-Year Career & Joining Breathe for Change 05:15 - Flipping the Script: Putting the Educator First 08:54 - Grassroots Leadership & Systemic Ripple Effects 11:15 - The Master’s in Transformative Teaching and Learning 12:55 - Action Research: Conducting Research from Within 16:20 - A Degree Designed to "Buy Back Time" for Burnt-Out Teachers 20:24 - Beyond "Jeans Passes": Investing in Real Wellbeing 23:00 - The Theory of Change: Self, Teaching, and Learning 26:05 - Getting the Proof: Equipping Teachers with Data 28:10 - The Practicum Journey: Reconnecting with Your "Why" 33:38 - Addressing Behavior Challenges & Supporting Colleagues 37:15 - Capstone Spotlight: Bilingual Literacy & Morning Circles 40:00 - Capstone Spotlight: Dropping Pre-K Redirections to Zero 44:10 - Capstone Spotlight: Reversing Staff Burnout & Boosting Retention 49:15 - Breaking Educator Isolation Through Community 53:30 - Real-World Impact: 20,000+ Graduates and Growing 55:00 - Kelly’s Advice: Never Teach in Isolation & Truly See Every Child 57:50 - TeacherCon, Free Resources & Connecting with the Team #TeacherWellness #Education #SocialEmotionalLearning #ActionResearch #TeacherBurnout #Mindfulness #BreatheForChange

  4. Oct 14

    You Don't Have to Lead Alone: What 11 Years of Co-Leadership Taught Us

    Most educators lead alone. One adult in a classroom, one principal in a building, one name at the top of the chart. Every decision runs through you, every hard moment lands on you, and the unspoken expectation is that a good leader already has the answers. Dr. Ilana Nankin and Michael Fenchel co-founders and co-CEOs of Breathe for Change, make the case that this model is not only lonely, it is limiting. A leader who answers to no one is rarely asked to own their impact, and one who thinks alone has only one perspective. After eleven years of leading side by side, through fast growth, power struggles, and a season apart, they argue that shared leadership is harder, and better. What makes it work is not a title. It is a set of skills that can be practiced. Mindful Listening means offering full presence and reflecting back the essence of what you heard before deciding anything. Desires, Fears, and Requests gives two people a way to name what they want, what they are afraid of, and what they need, even in the middle of a conflict. Repair means owning your impact rather than defending your intentions, so trust can rebuild after the inevitable rupture. The harder question is personal. Sharing leadership means letting go of control, of being the one who does everything, and of needing to be the central figure. Both founders are candid about how long that took. These practices come from the Relational Intelligence layer of the Human Intelligence framework, and none of them require a co-CEO title. A teacher with one trusted colleague and a weekly check-in has already begun. For any educator carrying everything on their own right now: you were never meant to. The best things are rarely built alone. BEST MOMENTS: Four texts in one afternoon from four different people, all asking Ilana the same question: "Do you know Michael Fenchel?"Two days before a 450-person event, a friend with no contract and no paycheck offers to run the whole thing, and Ilana says yes."It doesn't add up to 20. It adds up to 100." The math behind co-facilitation.Why a leader who answers to no one is never really accountable."I used to think that I could do everything." What letting go of control made possible. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN: How to use Mindful Listening to help a colleague feel seen before you decide anything togetherHow to name desires, fears, and requests in the middle of a conflict instead of after itWhy owning your impact, not explaining your intentions, is what rebuilds trustHow to divide leadership by strengths and clear ownership rather than by hierarchyHow to stop doing everything yourself without losing what matters most to youHow an educator working alone can start shared leadership with a single trusted colleague EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS: 00:00 - Opener: The Multiplying Effect of Shared Leadership 03:00 - How Ilana and Michael Met in 2013 07:11 - The PhD Dissertation That Sparked Breathe for Change 14:18 - Collaborating on Their First 450-Person Event 23:18 - Navigating Ego, Control, and Early Power Struggles 32:00 - Michael Steps Back from Day-to-Day Operations in 2019 35:39 - Personal Growth and Letting Go of Control 42:54 - Applying the Human Intelligence Framework to Partnership 50:38 - The Relational Intelligence of Conflict Repair 54:00 - Reconnecting in 2020 and Committing to the Co-CEO Title 01:05:00 - Mindful Listening as an Essential Leadership Practice 01:07:38 - Final Reflections on the Necessity of Co-Leadership #BreatheForChange #RelationalIntelligence #Education #TeacherWellness #Leadership #SharedLeadership #ConflictResolution

  5. Oct 7

    Why Students Need to Practice Disagreeing, and How to Make It Safe

    Election season has a way of walking into the classroom uninvited. A student repeats something from the dinner table, a classmate's face falls, and the whole room turns to see what the adult will do next. For many educators, silence has started to feel like the only safe option. Dr. Ilana Nankin, Emma Humphries, and Mya Baker of iCivics make the case that avoidance costs students far more than it spares them. The conversation still happens. It just moves into feeds built to confirm what students already believe, where no one teaches them to listen to someone who sees it differently. What works instead is preparation, not bravery. Build Community Agreements early, define them as actual behaviors, and keep them on the wall. Trade verdicts for questions, so students weigh what a president should be able to do, not whether one person was right. When a comment lands hard, a pause and an invitation to try again protect the student who was hurt without shaming the one who spoke. Before it begins, 3 Collective Breaths and a one-word Intention Setting help the room arrive settled and choose how to show up. Underneath every strategy is a question for the adults. Students read a teacher's nerves before they hear a word, so regulation starts at the front of the room. Educators cannot model curious, open conversation unless leaders model it for them and have their back when a parent writes in. These practices, drawn from the Somatic and Relational layers of the Human Intelligence framework, work in a staff meeting as well as a classroom. BEST MOMENTS "That is the laboratory of our democracy." Emma on why the social studies classroom may be the only place students ever practice disagreeing.The five-word question Emma uses with students and her own kids when a comment lands wrong: "Can you try that again?"Why "be respectful" fails as a classroom norm until it is spelled out as behavior, and what to say when someone breaks it."Who are you voting for, Miss Ilana?" and how to answer a student's direct question without shutting the conversation down.Emma's apology to every student who never got to have these conversations: "It's our fault, the adults." WHAT YOU'LL LEARN How to build Community Agreements at the behavior level and use them in the moment a conversation turnsReplace verdicts with inquiry questions that keep the focus on ideas instead of personalitiesHow to respond when one student's comment leaves a classmate feeling attackedOpen a hard conversation with 3 Collective Breaths and a one-word Intention SettingBring parents in before a sensitive lesson so concern becomes a conversation, not a complaintHow to answer when students ask who you're voting for EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 00:00:00 - Introduction and Teaser 00:01:08 - Welcome to the Podcast: Navigating Election Season 00:03:07 - Meet the Guests: Emma Humphreys and Mya Baker 00:06:13 - Current Challenges: Why Educators Avoid Political Topics 00:09:03 - The Cost of Avoiding Hard Conversations 00:11:44 - The Impact of Social Media and Echo Chambers 00:16:59 - How to Create a Safe Space for Disagreement 00:20:36 - Classroom Strategies: Inquiry-Based Learning 00:22:46 - Trusting Your Gut: When to Pause a Conversation 00:27:58 - Utilizing Breathing and Intention Setting Practices 00:33:09 - The Ripple Effect of Transformational Teaching 00:35:44 - Building Trust with Parents 00:39:17 - What to Do Without Administrative Support 00:42:07 - How to Handle Hurtful Comments in the Moment 00:44:56 - Co-Creating Classroom Norms and Agreements 00:50:05 - Should Teachers Share Their Political Beliefs? 00:55:01 - The Long-Term Benefits of Civic Discourse 01:00:21 - Final Actionable Takeaways 01:02:57 - Outro and Free Resources HASHTAGS #Education #CivicEducation #CivilDiscourse #Belonging #SocialEmotionalLearning #ClassroomManagement #BreatheForChange

  6. Sep 30

    Why Student Engagement Starts in the Nervous System

    Most teachers can name the moment a lesson gets away from them. A student who will not take a seat. A conversation that will not stop. A head that has been down on a desk since second period. Nothing in a preparation program covered this. The default is to manage the behavior and get back to the content. Dr. Ilana Nankin and Beth Schreiber make the case that this gets the order backwards. A student in fight, flight, freeze, or fawn is not refusing to learn. Their nervous system has left the window where learning is possible, and redirection cannot reach a brain that is offline. What works is reading the state before responding to the behavior. A loud, defiant, out-of-their-seat student is usually over-activated and needs grounding: Feel Your Roots, a few slow breaths. A silent, sleepy student hiding in a hoodie is shut down and needs energy: Mindful Movement, Shake It Out, a Sun Breath. The wrong tool for the state makes things worse, so students first learn to notice and name their state. Weather Report gives them the vocabulary. Affirmation rewrites the story they carry about themselves. Peer Cheer and Appreciation Circle build the belonging that makes it safe to not know yet. Hopes & Dreams and Intention Setting tie today's work to a future they want. These span the Somatic, Emotional, Relational, and Universal layers of the Human Intelligence framework. A student engages with their whole self, or not at all. BEST MOMENTS Beth's reframe of the only question that matters: from "what's wrong with you?" to "what's going on inside of you?""My job is not to teach math and literacy right now." Ilana on why regulation comes before content, every time.A guided Weather Report you can do along with the episode (unless you're driving).A student walks up to say: I was so anxious, I took three deep breaths, and now I feel better. The practices become theirs.The Hopes & Dreams wall: a North Star for the mundane days. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN How to tell whether a student is over-activated or shut down, and why the two need opposite toolsWhat fight, flight, freeze, and fawn each look like in a classroom, including the students who never cause a problemHow to guide Feel Your Roots, Weather Report, and Peer Cheer with any age groupHow to teach students the language of the nervous system so they can regulate without youHow to build a Hopes & Dreams wall and connect daily intentions back to itWhy your own regulation is the first classroom management tool you have EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 00:00 - Introduction: Student Disengagement & Trauma-Informed Care 01:12 - The Challenge of Classroom Behavior & Student Engagement 02:25 - What Disengagement & Disruptive Behavior Looks Like in Practice 05:36 - Mindset Shift: From "Problem Student" to Dysregulated Nervous System 07:09 - Understanding the Nervous System & The Window of Tolerance 08:25 - Hyperarousal Zone: Fight or Flight Responses 13:31 - Hypoarousal Zone: Freeze State & Internalizing Behaviors 16:03 - The Fourth F: Fawning & Appeasing Behaviors 19:30 - Mirror Neurons & Educator Self-Regulation 21:15 - The Human Intelligence Framework: 5 Layers of Engagement 24:51 - Somatic Intelligence: Decoding Signals & Modeling Self-Awareness 27:50 - Redefining Regulation & Building Interoception 29:46 - Grounding Practice: "Find Your Roots" Storytelling 32:00 - Energizing Mindful Movement & Tension Release Practices 35:12 - Emotional Intelligence: The Internal Weather Report 40:26 - Reframing Mindsets Through Student Affirmations 45:18 - Relational Intelligence: Peer-to-Peer Cheers & Community 51:16 - Universal Intelligence: The Hopes & Dreams Practice 55:36 - Holding Accountability: Daily Intention Setting 57:30 - Transforming Education & Breathe For Change Resources HASHTAGS #Education #ClassroomManagement #SocialEmotionalLearning #StudentEngagement #TeacherWellness #Belonging #BreatheForChange

  7. Sep 23

    Repair and Gratitude: The Two Skills That Make Connection Possible

    Somewhere in every school week there is a moment that never gets resolved. Two students stop speaking after recess. A comment from a colleague lands wrong and sits there for a month. Most of us were never taught what to do next, so we get past it as fast as possible.Avoiding conflict feels like keeping the peace. Dr. Ilana Nankin and Sam Levine make the case that it does the opposite. Every unspoken resentment becomes the lens through which the next interaction gets read, and the relationship erodes quietly. Escalation is no better, because no repair is possible from a nervous system in panic. The work happens in the stretch zone between the two, and it IS a teachable skill.It starts with a conversation: what does repair look like here, and what does it not look like? From there, the Peace Process gives students a route through conflict: name what actually happened before the story about it, name the feeling underneath the anger, name the need, make a request. I Hear You, I'm With You, and My Truth build the two halves of any repair, being heard and being able to hear. Gratitude does the rest. Peer Cheer and Shower of Acknowledgment train students to give appreciation and to receive it. All of it lives in the Relational Intelligence layer of the Human Intelligence framework.The harder question is the one the adult answers first. Nobody can make you feel anything, and owning that is the price of teaching it. Across a week, what is the ratio of correction to acknowledgment your students hear from you?If there is a repair conversation you have been avoiding, this is your invitation to have it. The relationship on the other side is what makes the work worth doing. BEST MOMENTS "Nobody can make you feel anything." Ilana on why "you made me feel" ends every repair before it starts.Sam asks a Google product leader which human skill students will need most. The answer breaks his heart a little.Forty emotion words on a pre-K wall by June, each one a photo of a real face in a real feeling.Why comfort-zone conflict avoidance and panic-zone escalation fail for the same reason, and what the stretch zone asks instead.The Shower of Acknowledgment, the practice Ilana says makes her cry every time. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN How to open the topic of repair with students by defining what it looks like and, more importantly, what it is notHow to separate what happened from the story about what happened, the first step of the Peace ProcessBuild emotional vocabulary that reaches the primary feeling underneath angerTeach the pause between a trigger and a response, and what to ask in itRun a Peer Cheer or a Shower of Acknowledgment, and teach students to receive oneTrack your own ratio of correction to acknowledgment across a weekEPISODE HIGHLIGHTS 00:00 - Intro & Highlight Teaser 01:14 - The Power of Connection in Education 03:10 - Navigating Disconnection and Isolation 04:44 - AI Technology vs. Human Connection 06:58 - Defining Relational Intelligence (RQ) 08:56 - The Importance of Relationship Repair 12:13 - The 3 Zones: Comfort, Stretch, and Panic 18:05 - Core Repair Practices: Hearing, Empathy, and Truth 19:24 - Step 1 of Repair: Separating Fact from Story 23:42 - Step 2 of Repair: Primary vs. Secondary Emotions 29:40 - Building Emotional Literacy (The Emotions Wall) 31:47 - Conflict De-escalation & Secondary Classroom Impact 37:37 - Relational Intelligence as a Core Life Skill 42:22 - The Second Pillar: The Power of Gratitude 45:57 - Practical Exercises: Shower of Acknowledgment 47:35 - How to Give and Receive Appreciation 50:22 - The 5:1 Positive-to-Negative Ratio (Gottman Research) 52:53 - Summary: Gratitude and Repair as Pillars of Connection 55:05 - Breathe for Change Master's Program & Outro HASHTAGS #Education #SocialEmotionalLearning #RelationalIntelligence #ConflictResolution #Belonging #BreatheForChange

  8. Sep 16

    Why Classroom Management Stops Working in Month Two

    By the second month of a school year, most classrooms look nothing like they did in September. The agreements have loosened, the routines have slipped, and behaviors are surfacing that no teacher preparation program ever covered. Nearly every educator moves through it privately convinced they are the only one. Most of us were handed exactly one tool for these moments: the consequence. Dr. Ilana Nankin and Sam Levine make the case that it is not simply ineffective, it is escalating. A student who is acting out is not choosing defiance. They are communicating with the only signal available to them, and a nervous system in fight, flight, or shutdown cannot be corrected into calm. What works instead is not softer, it is more structured. Consistency means rituals a student can predict, which for many children is the only reliable rhythm in their day. Safety means attending to the nervous system first, because a child who does not feel settled in their body cannot reach anything you prepared for them. Love means knowing who a student actually is and building from their gifts rather than scanning for what might go wrong. Underneath all three sits the question most classroom management advice skips: how is the adult in the room doing? Regulation travels in both directions, and Ilana and Sam are honest about the days they were the ones who walked in unsettled. Listeners come away with practices to put in place before the next hard moment arrives, including Feel Your Roots, guided in full, and 3 Collective Breaths, both from the Somatic Intelligence layer of the Human Intelligence framework. These are not just classroom tools. They are lifelong skills. For any educator in month two right now, quietly certain they are getting it wrong: they are not. This is simply the part of the year where the real work begins. Best Moments -The student on a three strike system, and what "strike one" teaches a child about himself -Ilana on the day she realized she had never once asked a child what was happening for him -Feel Your Roots, guided live, for anyone listening in a car or between classes -"Mr. Levine, you seem angry," and what a teacher does with feedback he was not ready to hear -Why a morning ritual with a singing bowl and a two word check in does more than any rule chart What You'll Learn -Why consequences escalate the behaviors they are meant to stop, and what to reach for instead -How to tell a hyper aroused nervous system from a shut down one, and what each one needs from you -How to build arrival and transition rituals that make a classroom feel predictable to a child whose life is not -How to teach regulation proactively, when students can actually hear it, rather than in the middle of a hard moment -How to catch the deficit stories you may be telling yourself about a student, and what changes when you swap them for strengths -How to model repair out loud when you are the one who is dysregulated Episode Highlights 00:00 - Intro: Consequences vs. Student Needs 01:16 - When Reality Sets In After the First Weeks of School 02:54 - The Gap in Teacher Prep & Behavior Management 06:17 - Rethinking Consequences: Lessons from Melvin & Javier 12:16 - The 3 Core Pillars: Consistency, Safety, and Love 16:15 - Creating Consistent Classroom Routines & Rituals 20:47 - The Science of the Nervous System: Fight vs. Flight 24:14 - Guided Somatic Practice: "Feel Your Roots" 26:38 - De-escalation & Understanding Hypo-Arousal (Shutdown) 31:40 - Co-Regulation: How Educator Energy Impacts Students 37:10 - Proactive Regulation & The 5 Intelligence Layers 42:40 - Leading with Radical Acceptance & Strengths-Based Teaching 47:16 - Focusing on Growth & Co-Creating Community Agreements 51:00 - Final Encouragement & Breathe for Change Resources #ClassroomManagement #TeacherWellness #Education

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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
18 Ratings

About

Breathe for Change Podcast is hosted by Dr. Ilana Nankin, co-founder of Breathe for Change. After certifying 20,000 educators and impacting millions of students, we're digging deeper into what really drives learning: Human Intelligence. Each week, we explore how educators can unleash the full human potential in themselves, their students, and their communities to transform education from the inside out.

Information

  • Creator
    Breathe for Change
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    40
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Breathe for Change
  • Show Website
    Breathe for Change Podcast

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