Restoring Relationships, Healing Trauma, and Creating Securely Attached Classrooms

Abstract

Our current educational system is modeled after the mass production of industrial factories, characterized by individualism, standardization, and competition. The industrial model, while efficient, largely disregards that learning is an interpersonal process. Social connection and emotional attunement activate our neurobiology for learning, while anxiety, isolation and stress inhibit those same processes. This is because our brains evolved to learn in the context of kinship groups often called tribes. This paper offers scientific support for creating classroom cultures of social cohesion which optimize students’ social, emotional and cognitive development. We will also present practical applications for teachers that can be used to create tribal classroom environments within the parameters of a modern standardized curriculum.