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How to Start the Day with a Morning Routine with Nikki Robertson

• Jennifer Hofferber - Special Education Teacher and Coach • Episode 175

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Today, we are diving into a critical topic that often goes unspoken: setting the stage for a successful school day right from the start. Mornings can be particularly challenging for many students, especially those who arrive at school unregulated due to various external factors such as tough mornings at home, stressful commutes, or sibling conflicts. As educators, it is our duty to create positive learning environments that help students transition smoothly into a day of learning and growth. I am thrilled to welcome Nikki Robertson from Teaching Autism to share her expertise on this topic.

  • Importance of the Start of the School Day
  • Arrival Routine Components
  • Significance of Breakfast
  • Morning Meetings
  • Building Relationships and Trust
  • Overcoming Challenges
     

Nikki shares invaluable insights into creating a nurturing and supportive morning routine for neurodiverse students. By focusing on the importance of the start of the day, Nikki emphasizes how a well-structured arrival routine, a nutritious breakfast, and engaging morning meetings can significantly impact students' readiness to learn.

She highlights the need for personalized interactions and the role of staff in building trusting relationships with students. Nikki also offers practical advice for overcoming common challenges teachers face when implementing morning routines, underscoring the importance of flexibility and individualized support. Her expertise and passion for special education provide listeners with actionable strategies to enhance their classroom environments and ensure a positive start to each school day.

Resources:

Morning Work Bundle includes my favorite morning work activities that I use as part of our morning work routine. 

Morning Meeting Blog link

Connect with Nikki:

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Instagram

Pinterest

TikTok

Hey special educator…Do you feel like you're just barely keeping your head above water? Like you're stuck in the same old routines, wondering how to make a bigger impact in your classroom? Well, I’ve got something special just for you. I’m excited to offer a unique opportunity to take your teaching to the next level.  I’m ready to step outside my district to offer individualized coaching calls designed to offer person

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Speaker 1:

Welcome back to Special Education for Beginners. I am thrilled to have you here as we explore a topic that is crucial yet often overlooked In fact, I cannot remember even talking about it on the podcast before and that is setting the stage for a successful school day. Right from the start. Mornings can be a challenging time for many of our students, who arrive at school unregulated due to factors beyond our control, be it a tough morning at home, a stressful commute, a fight with a sibling or simply a bad start to the day. We've all been there ourselves. But it is our responsibility as educators to create positive learning environments that welcome every student and help them transition into a day of learning and growth.

Speaker 1:

Today, I'm joined by Nikki Robertson from Teaching Autism, who brings a deep understanding of how critical those first interactions of the day are, and will share strategies on how we can support our students to recalibrate and start their school day positively. We'll dive into why those morning moments are especially pivotal for our students with autism and discuss actionable steps we can take to ensure our classrooms are nurturing and supportive from the moment our students walk through the door. Nikki's classroom has been used as a pilot for training other educators all around the world to help them set up their own autism classrooms. She creates curriculum resources that are used all around the world by thousands of teachers and students, and her blog, teaching Autism, has been awarded the number one best autism blog. I cannot wait for you to hear our conversation, thank you. Thank you so much for joining me today. Well, thank you for having me. So tell me exactly where you're from, because I love your accent.

Speaker 2:

Thank you. Originally I'm from Wales in the UK and there's a bit of Scottish thrown in there as well, and then I spent a lot of my time in America, so I have this accent. That's kind of now three different countries on the go. So it definitely throws people when they get to know me and one of the first questions I get now is where are you from? What's that voice? Do you live in the States? No, just back and forth, so I spend pretty much half my time there, half my time here, so going back and forth. I have a toddler, so it's interesting. But my work predominantly a lot of it now is US based, so I kind of pick up accents everywhere I go. It's quite interesting.

Speaker 1:

Well, I think it's so cool that we can connect as teachers over a whole ocean. It seems crazy and it's a reminder that, despite our differences and despite our distances, we're not alone in this experience and our struggles. So teachers everywhere face many of the same challenges, and it's wonderful how we can share strategies and support each other and making our global community feel just a little bit more connected and less isolated. So I'm excited for today's conversation because it's something that I've never discussed on the podcast before, and that is how to make mornings at school successful. But before we get started, would you share briefly about your experience and your journey within the field of special education?

Speaker 2:

Yep. So I started actually as an assistant. I was going to be a sports physiotherapist. I ended up working with a group of autistic children one summer and went in and switched my degrees straight away. I knew that my heart was with the autistic children in the school. I was very determined what school that was going to be, with much to my lecturer's frustration, and I started off as an assistant and quickly qualified on the job as a teacher. So we have a lot of great, great opportunities here where you can start as an assistant and you can train to become a teacher while you're working on the job. So it gives you a lot of real life experience and it gives you sort of like this extra edge where I felt like I always understood my assistants a little bit better because I was one before I became the teacher. So that was quite nice. Now I'm an autism specialist. So I've been that over 10 years.

Speaker 2:

I took about two years out for maternity and I had my son. I have worked with ages three to 19. Right now I'm specializing with the three to seven year olds. That's kind of where my heart lies, and I didn't think I would say that I started. My first students were 13 to 17 and I was determined that I was going to be that teacher for life. I didn't want to leave the teenagers, so I was very distressed when they moved me down to the babies, as we call them, because I had no personal experience with young children at all. So it was a huge change, but I absolutely loved it. They told me to give it a year and I think I didn't like it. I could go back to the teenagers and 10 years on I'm still with those three to seven year olds. It's my favorite age group. It's kind of like you get all the best and exciting and first things to do with them.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and then I was used as a sort of pilot pioneer with my classroom, my students, to train other teachers around the UK and then all across mainly the United States and we've done a bit in Canada and Australia and things.

Speaker 2:

So we started there where I was training other teachers and sharing our classroom, because our classroom was kind of the first of its kind really, and so we've traveled all around the world showing teachers how they can have this classroom while also meeting all the curriculum standards, just in a way that you don't really get taught when you go through teaching and degrees, you know, know they don't really they don't really help you about this sort of thing.

Speaker 2:

They throw lots of lovely textbooks at you and it's kind of like a lag. So we have been specializing in helping teachers set up their classrooms and and that's kind of where teaching autism was born. Then, when I realized that so many teachers across the world really wanted to know more about my classroom and the resources we were doing and things like that, so teaching autism was kind of born and it's been brilliant. I spent a lot of my time now supporting other teachers and helping them, you know, set up those classrooms and invite those children in and set up curriculums for them and stuff. So it's kind of like a dream job that I never want to wake up from.

Speaker 1:

Oh, that's amazing. I feel like the college aspect is missing so many pieces within their curriculum. They just need a full-on adjustment. So I am a crisis prevention trainer in my district, and one crucial component that we emphasize to teachers is that we can't control anyone's behavior but our own. So recognizing this is especially important. In the mornings, when students arrive at school, Many come with precipitating factors. You know challenges from home anxiety, a rough start to the day, spilled cereal, dogs lost you know so many of those things that we can't control that really influence their behavior and their day, and so, as educators, it's our job to provide the support that they need to recalibrate and start their day positively. So can you share why the start of the day is so crucial for students, especially those little ones who have autism?

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

So the start of the school day it's really important for, I think, all of our students, but I think our neurodivergent students it's just a little bit more important. It's the way that I try and phrase it to people because when they come in in the morning, a lot of parents may not have even had the time to give you a heads up with things that have been going on as well. So the way that they come in, that is going to be the way that's going to set the tone for the entire day and I think by giving them this morning meeting, that's kind of safe and predictable and structured and it's welcoming them into the classroom. It's that feel-good routine. It can really help them transition really smoothly into the classroom from wherever they've been, because a lot of my students don't they don't necessarily come from home. They may come from overnight residential stays, they may come from grandparents and I've had children who've been in foster care, so you never really know where they may be coming from sometimes as well. So I've always found it's really important to have this sort of greeting and structured meeting coming in, that they know Nikki's there and all my teachers are there and all my friends are there and I know what's going to happen. And you know they thrive on routine. They thrive on the for us that morning meeting. I've always found it to be a really essential part of the classroom environment for me and for our students as well, and I think it helps to reduce a lot of anxiety. It has helped to manage and minimize a lot of overwhelm and sensory overload that my students come in with.

Speaker 2:

I've had students who travel up to an hour each day because we are a specialized unit and into the classroom and so the bonus for those students is they come to a specialized unit and obviously the con is that they've had to travel an hour each day. So I think giving them that positive and welcoming atmosphere that morning meeting that they know what's going to happen. And also I see a lot of people like we don't know what goes on behind closed doors, we don't know what's going on at home, and so when me or my assistants greet at the door that day, that might be the first smile they've had. It might even be the first word that they've had. We don't know what these children's lives look like at home.

Speaker 2:

And so the morning routine I didn't have a great one the first few years and I've got to be honest, I didn't even see how important it could be the first two, three years until I realized I absolutely needed it. And then I was kicking myself that nobody had ever really offered me some training, especially like with my lecturers and stuff, and when I had done a lot of work experience and things, nobody had ever really told me about the importance of having that morning routine and how important it would be to my students and their mental health, their well-being and just meeting all of their other needs as well to make them sort of feel ready for the school day and just ready to learn and transition into that different environment. So I think having that solid morning meeting, especially for a lot of our neurodivergent students, it's going to pay off for the rest of the day because it does help prepare them for everything that lies ahead that day.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so can you share? You said having a well thought out routine can you share what some of those specific components that you have that you would include in your arrival routine to ensure that they're as effective as they possibly could be?

Speaker 2:

Yep. So one thing I learned was, especially when I moved from the teenagers down to the babies, as we fondly call them, was that the morning meeting it works for every age but you have to change it up a little bit, but the core, key components, they're always the same. So things like making it predictable, making it a really nice structured routine that you can kind of change the little activities up in there, but the key components that are going to be predictable, the routine is going to be the same, in the order that it happens, the length of time that it lasts. I'm a huge fan of visual supports, not just for neurodivergent students, for students of all abilities. I'm a huge believer in having those visual supports everywhere as much as possible. And also some accommodations that you're going to make for students, especially if this is going to be the first time that you introduce morning meeting or, of course, the first time your students will experience it. If you have littles coming in, like I do, who've never even, you know, maybe sat down before, never even been around, maybe other children before, because you know a lot of parents may not have had that opportunity. So having some accommodations ready and those can be things like fidget toys, it could be a member staff, it could be a sand timer, it could be flexible seating options. So, like for us, we sit in a circle in front of the interactive whiteboard and I actually have two students who OT have provided support chairs for to help them with their posture, to make them more comfortable. Because that was something else I never really took into account was that maybe students are struggling to sit because I'm not meeting their physical needs for sitting and we have an amazing occupational therapist and she came in and she assessed them and she had these amazing chairs that sort of helped them sit, more comfortable for them and that made a huge difference there. Like when she said that she felt that that was going to completely change the way that they were able to access more than meeting, I didn't quite believe her and then I was sort of left eating my words when the children would sit much better. Those chairs were so much better for them, they were so much more supportive. So even things like just recognizing if individual students need something a little extra, it could even just be that some students want to sit on the floor instead of sitting on chair and they want to get comfortable and I think, having that sort of groundwork, you can build upon.

Speaker 2:

A lot of people I speak to get worried when I say accommodations and offering these things and they think that I mean that that student is never going to be able to access morning meeting without those accommodations. But it's just a way to transition and I always say that students don't know what they're going to love until they can experience it and know that they love it. So if you're going to have a morning meeting that you know they will love, you just need them to be able to give you a chance. So accommodations can help with that as well.

Speaker 2:

I think greetings are really important and that's kind of a silent rule in my classroom is that all staff greet all students every single day, and staff have their own ways of doing that as well, and students have their own ways of doing it. I'm not overly fussy with how the greetings are done. I just want to make sure that every child is greeted by every member of staff and it's shown that you're know you're welcome here and you're safe here. And this is your classroom, this is our family, and I think those are really things that I think make a huge difference. I think that children pick up very quickly on who is there for them and who is in their corner and who is welcoming them and I'm a big believer of. Once you have that trust and that relationship, your classroom dynamic is going to change so much because those students now trust you. Big thing as part of that morning meeting. So trying to transition them, whether they come in by parents dropping off, whether they get walked in, whether they come in on buses, I think having the support system there to help them come from their transition point into the classroom, and just having a chance to sit and having something to eat and relax, I think those are really the main parts of what I use for the core planning of my morning meeting and then I just tweak some of those areas.

Speaker 2:

So I kind of have the same morning meeting that I've had for, I don't know, the last eight years. It's probably been the same but it's not exactly the same. There are little things that are slightly different each year depending on what children I have. Like some years I may have, you know, one three-year-old and five six and seven-year-olds, and then the next year I could have like four three-year-olds and one four, one five-year-old, so it does slightly change. But I think when I keep it predictable it does help my students to feel safe and they know what's coming next and that does help to reduce anxiety. Especially in the mornings I find that a lot of my students can arrive with a lot of anxiety through different things that have gone on at home.

Speaker 2:

So I find having that that same routine I know it can feel monotonous when you've been doing it for years on end, I know it really can, but it does pay off. So much because the students, it becomes second nature to you, it becomes second nature to them, it becomes second nature to your staff. So I do like to keep things the same and they come in with us and they are greeted at the classroom door by a member of staff and then they walk through our small hallway, they hang up their bags, they take off their coats, they come into class and then when they're in the classroom they have a choice where they can come and sit down at the table and they can have some breakfast, they can can have a drink, or sometimes they just go to sort of our calm down spot, which is just basically a little area in the corner of our classroom. It has a little like a little cubby of books that I like to lay out each morning, a bean bag. It's not our official calm down corner, but it's kind of our morning calm down corner because I know sometimes when I've had a rough morning, a busy morning, especially with a toddler at home, now when I arrive at work I just want to sit for five minutes and I just want some peace and a cup of tea.

Speaker 2:

And when I started to think about that same thing with my students, just giving them that chance to come in and maybe have some peace, I think I automatically started to include that in our morning meeting then because I realized not every child wants to come in and have breakfast, like they may have just eaten.

Speaker 2:

They may have just eaten breakfast on the way in. Unfortunately, it's not always the case for all of our students. Um, so breakfast is a very important part and a very key component of our morning meeting for my students and things. But I don't know. I'm just a huge believer that we we can't learn, we can't't focus, we can't pay attention if our needs aren't met. And that does include, you know, hunger and having access to food. So I think the most vital part for my morning meeting if I had to choose the top one would be to offer some form of breakfast and drink and then offering the option for a quiet area where, if you don't want to talk to anyone for 10 minutes, that's okay, I understand. That's okay if you need time without people for a second before we start our day.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's fascinating to hear how hunger can have such a profound impact on a student's ability to engage and to learn.

Speaker 1:

I think I learned that early in my career. Whenever a student was starting to have some type of meltdown, I'm like, would somebody feed him, somebody make sure that he isn't hungry? Because it kind of made it to where that was the thing that was keeping them from doing anything else and they didn't know to ask for food, they didn't recognize that they were hungry and that's why they were grumpy. So, yeah, I definitely think food and making sure that they're having a proper breakfast and, like you said, some kids have already had breakfast. They don't want to eat when they come in, they just want to sit and be quiet for a little bit and I think giving them those, making it uniquely specific to each kid I think that's important. So, moving from the physical to the social, can you describe the benefits of holding a morning meeting to further enhance the day's beginning and what specific benefits do they bring to the classroom atmosphere as far as that social and emotional piece?

Speaker 2:

So I think when you think of at home, when you all sit down at a table for dinner and you chat about the day I think that is kind of the aim that I wanted for our breakfast station as part of our morning meeting was I wanted the chance for children to experience the social side of sort of group eating. I wanted them not just to learn about you know appropriate social behaviors while they're eating and things like that, but also to be able to hold discussions, which my students are all. They all communicate via symbols. Right now I don't have any verbal communicators as yet, where there's a few who are trying really hard and their pre-verbal skills are coming on so so well. So I think that goes to show just how much breakfast time helps with their social skills as well, because we provide them with this opportunity where they can communicate about absolutely everything. There's no rules at our breakfast table, I mean apart from the obvious. So we've had to call down a few um gruesome topics and things like that, but overall there is sort of no limit. So our children can talk about their interests, about their hobbies, about their family, their friends, literally anything they want in the world, and they'll do this even with um symbols through communication strips. They will use devices and some are learning to start to use sounds and pre-verbal communication. And then we also we do a lot of sign language as well, so a lot of communicating that way. So that breakfast time I think that is the most important time for our social skills throughout the day, because I think that is the one time they have free reign to socialize however they want to, and I think that has made a huge difference in the communication that I've seen.

Speaker 2:

For a lot of them, a big part of our morning meeting is also feelings and not just how are you feeling, but we also do a lot of sort of discussions around feelings and I will pick a staff member every day which they love this and I give them a scenario and it'll be. You know, today I want you to be angry about something and I want you to discuss how that anger makes you feel and I want to discuss why you're angry and things like that, because I always want this opportunity to show students that no, no, feelings and emotions are negative, that they're not negative, they're just things that we're working through right now and we just need to learn to identify them, cope with them, find ways to manage them. So every day a staff member is given a different emotion and a different scenario and we all help to help them through that and process it and get back to a calm state. And I think that has been massive because there was no other sort of opportunity through our day to really focus on that opportunity through our day to really focus on that. So when I introduce it to our breakfast routine the kids think it's the best thing ever, especially when you know I'll sort of make staff be angry. They think that is the best thing ever but it's great because we're able to say, like how can you tell that she was angry? You know what was she doing before she told you she was angry and things like that. So it's really helped us to identify feelings and emotions on other people as well, which a lot of my students really struggled with at the start of school years. And it takes a few months but you do see the students really start to recognize and I think even with all of the different feelings and emotions activities that I do throughout the school year, nothing quite comes close to that role play that we do over breakfast and then we use that to open up for the discussion. So how are you feeling today and why do you feel that way? And it helps us get more of a glimpse into our students' lives at home as well and things that may be stressing them out in the mornings that we can find other ways to help them with.

Speaker 2:

So I've had students who are sat outside for 20 minutes before the day starts. So naturally when they come in they're quite impatient. They've been cooped up in a car for 20 minutes. That's on top of, you know, traveling to school sitting in traffic. So when they come in they just want to blow all that energy off. So we give them tasks and they come in and they help to set up breakfast and they help to make the toast and they help to set the table and we give them all these physical activities and it's only because of that morning meeting and the discussions around the breakfast table that we're able to get to the bottom of these things. So I think morning meeting really does have a huge impact on getting to know your students and finding out more about what they need from us to make them more successful in the classroom. And and the change in behaviors has been massive, especially like every year, I see it. And every year we start the year off quite rocky with a morning meeting with students who you know haven't done it before, and we see within a few months the difference in those social and emotional skills and how they're able to recognize them on ourselves, on each other, and I think that has really been a huge breakthrough is being able to recognize it on others, because we can take that into other areas.

Speaker 2:

So I used to have a student who struggled with other students not wanting to play with him, and he struggled very hard with that. He just wanted to be everyone's friend, he wanted to play with everyone and he couldn't always identify when someone was angry or frustrated or sad or just tired and wants to be left alone. So for him in particular, we did a lot of breakfast talks about things like that and scenarios and it did really help him to identify and he went from asking people like you need to play with me, come and play with me to do you feel in the mood to play today. And that was a huge change because if people said no, he wasn't taking it as this personal attack against himself anymore. He was taking it as oh, they just they're not in the mood to play today. That's okay.

Speaker 1:

So I think none of that would have been achieved without our morning meeting and our breakfast table talks as well yeah, it sounds like what you were doing was like from that movie Inside Out, where you're giving words to the emotions. I think that movie is so fascinating, so that is an awesome thing that you guys did at the breakfast table. So, in terms of specific activities, what are some routines or exercises you incorporate into your morning meeting that help to engage students and build relationships?

Speaker 2:

So I think it starts very much at the beginning with having a staff member greeting students at the door and I change that staff member every day to give them all the chance to connect with students on an individual basis. I want my students to feel comfortable with not every staff member as such, because I know it's impossible. I know not everyone likes everyone and that's okay. It's okay to not connect with some people, it's okay. But I want to give as many opportunities for my students to get to know staff and vice versa, so that they can find ways to feel comfortable with each other and as many safe adults as they can as well. So every day I have a member of staff on the door and having those individual greetings helps my students who may not be ready yet to look staff in the face. I have a lot of students who come in with fingers in their ears, heads down. They're just not ready yet. So having those different greetings, it takes away the pressure of the eye contact, of that facial contact. I think that's not. I think eye contact is talked about a lot, but I don't think the facial contact is talked about a lot either, where some children just don't want to even look at someone's face if they're not feeling regulated. Or even if they are regulated, they just don't want to look at someone's face right now. So providing these options takes away the pressures of the social greetings and then we can work on progressing that over time when they get more comfortable. So the first of the relationship building really starts right at the door. I want every child to come into this classroom and feel like this is a family. We can't control any other area of our students' lives, but we can control school. We can make sure that this is a safe place for them and not every child comes from a safe home and I think it's very important that we kind of remember that and we be that safe place for them and we help them thrive and we give them this feel good place where they matter and they're valued and their voice is valued. You know, even if they can't verbalize that yet, they can share their voice in other ways. So my students are very particular and they usually go to the same seat around the breakfast table and we have a color coded classroom. So typically they're color coded plates and bowls and things are ready there for them and around the table. Then teachers will. I call them teachers, my assistants. They're all teachers in my eyes. They will start conversations with the students and what I find at the start of the year is sometimes if I have new staff, they are a little bit nervous about what conversations to start as well. So I like to use some conversation prompts and I will put them on a little board and use that as prompts for my staff to start, and then, as time goes on, I'll have students ask other students those things to build the conversation skills there.

Speaker 2:

But to begin with, we really try and encourage the conversations between staff and children. We try and talk about hobbies and interests so that students can see staff as peers and people who have similar interests and things like that, because all of that helps build this trusting relationship where you're not seen as just a person who places demands on me. You're a person who likes to play Pokemon cards with me. You're a person who likes the same horror films as me. You're the person who likes the same music as me, and that makes a huge difference when children start to think of their teachers that way. Instead of that's a teacher who makes me do art, that's the teacher who makes me sit down to do my math work. It's a huge difference there. So we find that those conversations again around that breakfast table I know I keep going back to that breakfast table but it really does work on so many of these skills. That really does help to boost those relationships there and my staff will circle throughout that table throughout the week so that they get one-on-one time with children every single day, like they'll go through them all, and it's a time where there's no demands, there's no work, there's no pressure. It's just two humans getting to communicate back and forth and getting to know each other. So I think that is probably one of the most important activities. Then, when we move over to our circle time, which is where we do our interactive PowerPoint for morning meeting, staff will sit in between students and I actively encourage staff that when we're going through morning meeting for them to chat to the children as they see fit. And one of our favorite parts of morning meeting is we import all the photos well, not all the photos, but a lot of the photos of the children that have happened in the last month or so greeting for the day, and children can see pictures of themselves and staff will actively point out the things that they're doing and will celebrate the achievements that they see.

Speaker 2:

And I think if you've had a child who's had a rough day or, you know, a rough week, and maybe they've had a rough time with a certain member of staff as well, you know how sometimes you're stuck with the same member of staff for a day and you're not wanting to do anything, and so that member of staff becomes the witch, because they're the one who made you do your math and your literacy and your science and your art, so they're the witch today. So I always try to provide the next day that staff member to be a non-demanding staff member, so they get the chance to play and they get the chance to sit there and be like oh my gosh, look at you, you did this, you did that, you were climbing outside. That's so cool and I think having that positive interaction really helps them to realize that you know we're still friends. Whatever happened, we're still friends. This person still likes me, they still respect me. They've they've forgiven me for whatever it was that happened yesterday, and I think I think that makes such a huge difference.

Speaker 2:

So many people tell me like, oh, when something bad happens and you know, if there's an aggressive incident, that staff members shouldn't work with them for a week.

Speaker 2:

But the problem I found with that was that the further or the more time that they spent apart, the more awkward it was for both of them when they came back together.

Speaker 2:

I don't know.

Speaker 2:

I think throwing them back into it the next day and just making them a, a no demand member of staff for the day and getting to do the fun things with them and getting to compliment them and stuff like that, I think it helps not rebuild the relationship, because I don't think it damages it as such, but I think it gets them back into that comfort zone of the relationship quicker than.

Speaker 2:

Oh, you know, miss Nikki's avoided me for a week and I don't know what to say to her and then, you know, I don't know what to say to him because I haven't spoken to him for a week and it gets this awkward atmosphere. So I find having those opportunities where staff can sit and compliment and really take part in the meeting with them together, I find that has really helped to build the relationships, because all this morning meeting time it's either low demand or no demand, so it's literally it takes about, I would say 45 minutes to an hour in my classroom. That is literally how much I prioritize morning meeting and I think that one hour makes the biggest difference in my students connecting with staff and with other students as well.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, those are great strategies and I totally agree. I don't want one para to be the bad one. Who's always just doing the academics. I think switching them around is a brilliant idea. So for teachers who might struggle with morning meetings that aren't going as planned, what advice or tips can you offer to help them get back on track and maintain a positive and consistent start to the day?

Speaker 2:

I think it's okay to realize if something isn't working, it's okay to have a different plan and it's okay to switch things up as much as we kind of focus on. You know, it has to be the same, it has to be predictable, it has to be a routine. It's not necessarily this set in stone can't move thing. What I used to find was when teachers would come into my classroom and watch morning meeting, because this was actually one of the one of the things that everyone traveled to come and see was my morning meeting. It kind of took off and they would sit there and they would say this is lovely and you've done really well, but my kids would never do this. My kids can't do this. My kids aren't ready for this. And the problem is, like you, a lot of these teachers are coming in and seeing my finished product is. Like you, a lot of these teachers are coming in and seeing my, my finished product. They they were not coming in and seeing you know the first drug or the process. Yeah, yeah, they don't get to see that because obviously I'm not, I'm not out here showcasing the struggles, because it's not fair for me to showcase my students struggles, you know, everyone struggles and I would like to think that on my worst day someone wasn't recording me and using me as a teaching opportunity for someone else, and I feel quite strongly on that. It's a reason I don't share a whole lot about my students and videos and things like that, because a lot of my students do struggle every day with a lot of things and I don't want them or their family members to see their struggles and think that that's all they are. So I think when people say you know why, why doesn't my morning meeting run as smoothly as yours? It probably does. My morning meeting is not perfect. I know it sounds wonderful and it sounds brilliant and that I have no behaviors, there are still behaviors. There are still days that we switch things up and you know it's OK to do that. It's OK to individualize it for students.

Speaker 2:

So I had a student who he would not sit for anything, um at all and nothing, not even his interests, his hobbies, nothing. And when he came to us I was determined that our focus would be morning meeting, not work, not forcing him to sit for work, nothing like that. The focus was I want him to sit for morning meeting, because the most important thing to this little boy is that he starts to trust those around him and he starts to trust what he's going to sit for. And the main issue it appeared to come from was that in his last sitting, his last setting, he would be made to sit for up to 45 minutes at a time, working at three years old, and so he had this very negative relationship, understandably, with sitting down for anything. So I knew that for him, you know, trying to force him to sit anywhere it wasn't going to achieve anything, it wasn't going to get the progress we needed. So I wanted him to trust me and trust the staff in the classroom enough that he felt comfortable to come and sit with us.

Speaker 2:

So we started off where he was stood at the back of circle time with his arms in a sandpit, and he would pull the sand back and fall over his arms, and it had to be in the sandpit with all the toys. So we allowed it the first week and he lasted about half of the session. Um, which was progress. Like he attended breakfast. He was. He was stood in a sandpit off to the side, but he, he attended, and I could. The first day he gave us absolutely nothing, he didn't look over. He had zero interest in absolutely anything that was going on. By day two we could see that he was starting to look over. Like what are these people doing on this table? Like what are they, what are they actually doing over there? And by the second week we had progressed to to he would sit on a beanbag with a jug of sand and he played with the sand back and forth in his hands.

Speaker 2:

And by I think it was week six, we had him sat for the entire session without a single accommodation and enjoying and laughing, and he had no verbal speech. And it was during a morning meeting six months later that he said his first words and we were all blown away. There were a lot of tears and that was the first he ever spoke. And we phoned home and they had never heard him speak either. And we think it was just because he was so comfortable with morning meeting. He was so comfortable with the staff members, he had so much fun and I had the same slideshow every single day and one of our slides is days of the week and we have this days of the week song so what day is it? And as we played that, we turned to the students and we always used to choose a student to come up and click what day is it? And he turned around and he was like Monday and we were all like oh my goodness, like we all were like in tears and stuff for him. And he sat there and looked at us all as if we were absolutely bananas and just went Monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday, friday and we were like oh my goodness, like we were all about to pass out. We were phoning home like I was in tears, his mom was in tears, everyone was in tears and I think that goes to show that it was the right move to focus on that morning meeting other than work.

Speaker 2:

And by the end of the school year he was, he had achieved his IEP goals and way beyond. He went from. He went from working at a sort of three-year-old level to a nine and ten-year-old level and we unlocked all of this, this inner ability that he had hidden because he was so traumatized by being forced to work in a setting that wasn't right for him, with staff who maybe didn't quite understand what he needed. And you know, people would come in and we would use him a lot of the time to show how we used our adapted books and things, because he would make full sentences with them. He was brilliant. And they would sit there and say it must be so nice to have a child with no behaviors and no challenges. And we were like, if you could look back at the start of this school year with this student who was playing with sand and wouldn't even attend for breakfast. And I think I think that goes to show that morning meeting it's, it's so much more than just a morning meeting. And if you have a student who has a lot of challenges and isn't willing to cooperate, focus on morning meeting for anything else, because it does pay off. Those relationships do pay off and you can make, you can make allowances. You can have a child sit at the back of that morning meeting circle time with the sand timer. When that sand timer hits, they can go and they can come back. If they're at the back, they're not disturbing anyone.

Speaker 2:

And I kind of believe that if we over push and if we push them too much, too soon, you're going to have this huge negative experience that's going to be really hard to break. It's, like you know, the first time you go to the dentist if they take out 10 of your teeth. You're never going back to that dentist because that was absolutely horrific. I'm never going back to that man. He took 10 of my teeth out. He hurt me. Like it's this awful experience. And then that's when you have people who are terrified of the dentist and you hear that a lot people are terrified of the dentist because there's no relationship there. They just go in and they stick a needle and they take the teeth out, and so I kind of treat my classroom the same way.

Speaker 2:

I want this, this, I want this to be positive. I want them to look forward to these things and if that means sometimes we give allowances and we let them have a sensory break, it could be noise canceling headphones, which seems completely against the point of more than meeting if they're going to sit with noise canceling headphones on while I'm talking. But if they're sitting there, we're making progress and then we can start to ask them you know, can you, can you take them off just a second to answer this question? And we can build it up for things like that. And I think if we get down to that level and we build up slowly, you'll actually see progress quicker than if you try and force the same thing, like if you think that you're going to push too far.

Speaker 2:

Give them time, give them space, give them a movement. Break a wobbly chair, a drink, you know, maybe if they sit there with a bottle of water and they can just sort of refocus themselves Sometimes it can be, you know, something as little as giving them slippers and tapping their feet on the floor. Just a little bit of movement, and you will find that over time they do build that time up. They do start to realize, oh, this is actually really fun. So long as you do make a fun one, you know they'll start to enjoy it and their time it will increase with how long they're able to stay attuned to that task and pay attention and participate as well.

Speaker 1:

I think it's so good to hear you say that you struggled too and that's okay. That's part of it. Nothing is ever going to just be perfect and, like you said, it's still not even perfect for you. Every day is a challenge and you know different things are going to come up, but I think teachers need to hear that the struggle is okay. You're going to have tough times, but implementing it and the importance of it makes it all worth it. Yes, definitely pained. Who do resource? This might not be something that they plan for or implement themselves, but instead are going into a classroom or are having their paraprofessionals go into a classroom to help the student during morning meetings with a general education class, and so following the same steps, the same strategies, making sure that they feel comfortable, not pushing them too hard, too fast. I think all of those can be related to the resource setting as well.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, slow and steady wins the race. That's kind of what I live by, like don't overpush, don't go too fast, and we've got this. It might take six months, it's going to be slow, but once the children have got that skill, you know they've got it. It's there, it's achieved, it's just. It's just working that way and with three yearyear-olds they can be stubborn, but once they've got it they've got it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah Well, your story is amazing. And that little guy who spoke, I can't even. I mean I can't imagine, because I've been there and I've seen, you know when they have those breakthroughs. It's just, it's why we do what we do. And so, nikki, do you have a resource that you could share with the listeners to help them with getting started with their morning meetings?

Speaker 2:

Yep, so I have a whole bundle of things that we use as part of our morning work routine, which includes a lot of the prompts that we use during our breakfast time and then a lot of what we use in our one-to-one workstations that we go to straight after our morning greeting. It's very much based around a morning welcome session and ease them into the day while working on those one-to-one skills. And then I have a blog post that I'll send you that talks a little bit more about what our morning meeting interactive PowerPoint looks like and the skills that we work on doing our sort of morning circle time after breakfast time as well.

Speaker 1:

Well, great, I will link all of those in the show notes. So where can listeners find you if they want to learn more?

Speaker 2:

You all of those in the show notes, so where can listeners find you if they want to learn more? You can find me on pretty much everything under teaching autism. Instagram is probably where I'm most active. I also have a Facebook page. I have X, which I don't really use, and I've started on TikTok, which I am not a TikTok person.

Speaker 2:

So if you're looking for these amazing videos, do not don't come to me. It's just the basic videos that I'm amazing videos do not don't come to me. It's just the basic videos that I'm sharing information, so don't expect to be blown away. If you want a normal sort of teacher account on TikTok, I'm your person. If you want the fancy stuff, there are so many amazing people on there who are doing those dances and things. I just can't. It's not me and that's okay. That's a boundary. I know I have, and I also have a blog and an old podcast that I actually haven't touched for a few years that I'm hoping to kick start off again next year, where I think I have a few podcasts where I talk more about morning meeting and what that looks like as well.

Speaker 1:

Well, great well. Thank you so much, nikki, for sharing your insights and your strategies with us today. It's clear that the morning sets the tone for the entire day, and your expertise in creating a supportive and inclusive environment is invaluable, especially with students who have autism. So thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for having me.