Maggie Kline - Brain-Changing Strategies to Trauma-Proof our Schools: A Heart-Centered Movement for Wiring Well-Being

This book leaves the reader informed, inspired, and, most importantly, empowered to immediately help and heal traumatized children who are struggling in school. Written in a straightforward and personable style, yet loaded with research-supported theory and practical application, this is one of the most comprehensive books on the subject of trauma and the education system available. There are only a handful of books that Id consider required reading for anyone interested in trauma within schools; this is one of them. The world is in the midst of a trauma-informed awakening. Educational policy change will eventually come. This book could be a driving force to that change.

Nathan Swaringen, LCSW, developer of Its About T.I.M.E. (Trauma Informed Movement in Education)

There have been a number of excellent books and articles addressing the profound need for trauma-informed education in our schools. Maggie Klines is among the most comprehensive, passionate, scientific, heartful, and clear. She speaks not only to addressing the needs of traumatized children but also goes to the heart of meeting the emotional needs of these challenged pupils. Maggie is able to hold together both the neurobiological and the experiential (by illustrating a wealth of effective exercises) that will help educators and parents learn tools to support their children in a way that can make their school experience more positive, and create the good, peaceful citizens we so need and want for our future societies.

Peter A. Levine, PhD, author of Waking the Tiger and Trauma and Memory and coauthor of Trauma-Proofing Your Kids and Trauma through a Childs Eyes

I have already been using the knowledge gained from Maggie Klines writings and implemented the suggested activities into my everyday interactions in the classroom. These concepts have deepened my self-awareness as an educator and helped me to create a safe space in which children thrive.

Novae C. Moser, teacher at The Discovery School of San Antonio

This amazing book is the answer to a prayer. It not only explains why so many of our students are challenging, but has clear, implementable techniques to help children gain control of their trauma-driven behaviors and heal their underlying wounds. Students living with toxic stress are in every school, frequently terrorizing the entire staff. Teachers are frustrated and feeling unsupported. Administrators are expected to be experts at dealing with difficult behavior, often blaming the teacher for not having better classroom management. With the understanding and methods so clearly laid out by a former teacher, we have a path to real healing for all of us!

Christine Kelly, EdD, president of the Teachers Association of Long Beach Unified School District

Maggie Kline has provided an effective resource for all administrators and teachers as they transition their schools toward trauma-informed attitudes and practices. She has structured an organized roadmap with sound research, practical tools, and strategies to guide educators through their journey to serve the students that need us the most. I highly recommend this book with its rich content.

Jim Sporleder, principal featured in Paper Tigers and coauthor, with Heather T. Forbes, LCSW, of The Trauma-Informed School

In schools, trauma is ubiquitous and solutions are scarce. Brain-Changing Strategies to Trauma-Proof Our Schools provides a rich framework for understanding how trauma impacts students. It also provides creative and dynamic activities to promote resiliency. These activities can be easily implemented by caring adults. This is a must-read for all school staff!

Katie Hartmann, licensed psychologist and specialist in school psychology

Maggie Klines child-centered PlayShops and her first book, Trauma through a Childs Eyes, have truly inspired me and my work with children and teens alike. They have especially influenced my approach to building resilience in refugee children. This new and wonderful book goes way beyond the first in providing a plethora of tools and strategies for trauma-proofing our schools, which is essential for the future of our children and our societies.

Carsten Moeller, teacher and therapist, Denmark

Maggie Kline has written an artful, robust, and revolutionary roadmap for serving educators, students, parents, clinical psychologists, and everyone who cares to contribute to an embodied social consciousness movement to make schools safer. The author, with her multicultural view, expertise, and compassionate commitment to reduce trauma symptoms, violence, and the marginalization of youth, provides us with a scope, depth, and integrity that is quite astonishing. We are being invited to implement the Eight Essentials of Healthy Attachment within the classroom to reverse the toxic effects of ACEs (Adverse Childhood Experiences). Unfortunately, social inequality makes schools an epicenter that triggers the emotional dysregulation in students. Brain-Changing Strategies to Trauma-Proof Our Schools will contribute to improve the mental health, well-being, and social emotional relationships through psycho-pedagogical education.

Snia Gomes, PhD, Somatic Experiencing International Faculty, Advanced Structural and Movement Rolfing Practitioner, and creator of SOMAEmbodiment Approach for Healing Trauma, Brazil

Brain-Changing Strategies to Trauma-Proof Our Schools goes a step beyond the typical social emotional learning activities and brief trauma-informed training that tends to look at trauma as a unified experience. This book is a wonderful resource for teachers, counselors, social workers, and administrators who are ready to develop a deeper understanding of trauma and appreciate the spectrum of traumatic experiences and their under-pinning in the brain and nervous system. Through the lens of Somatic Experiencing, the book provides a road map of strategies and tools to support our roles as adults in the school to: 1) be a safe relationship and coregulator with our most vulnerable, perplexing, and sometimes, downright aggravating students, 2) increase our own interoceptive awareness (Latin for looking inside to discover how our body is feeling), which promotes self-regulation and capacity for empathy, and 3) teach and practice interoceptive awareness in the classroom, counselors office, and school administration so that it can be employed during those pesky discipline referrals.

Kris Downing, LCSW, SEP, school licensed mental health professional

Never has Brain-Changing Strategies to Trauma-Proof Our Schools been more needed. In a time where children are facing increasing levels of toxic stress and trauma, Maggie Kline prepares us for the important walk with children to heal and attain long-term positive outcomes. It is a must-read in 2020 and beyond!

Jessica Trudeau, MPH, executive director of Momentous Institute, Dallas, Texas

Maggies book is a must-read. You will learn how to teach about resilience and the brain most importantly you learn about your own self. Brain-Changing Strategies to Trauma-Proof Our Schools is not only to help kids, because every adult has some situations still hurting and unsolved. You can easily use the exercises as a friend and tool to improve your life and your internal environment. When parents and educators become better regulated, they create a safe external environment for students to facilitate their development and self-regulation. For some children, school is the only safe place they have in life.

Monica Simionato, vice chair at the Foundation for Human Enrichment/SE Trauma Institute