“We are in the midst of a revolution in educational thinking and practice. Scientific advances in a number of fields point to a similar argument – that how well students do in school can be determined by how well they are able to self-regulate.”

-Stuart Shanker

On October 19, 2012 Dr. Stuart Shanker addressed the audience of teachers gathered at the Marriott Pinnacle Hotel in Vancouver for the annual British Columbia Primary Teacher’s Association Conference.

He spoke to us about his five-domain model of self regulation which includes:

1. The Biological Domain: how you respond to stimuli at a biological level.

2. The Emotional Domain: how you deal with strong feelings

3. The Cognitive Domain: how you process, store and retrieve information.

4. The Social Domain: how you understand and respond to social cues.

5. The Prosocial Domain: how you demonstrate positive social skills like empathy.

Teachers need to help children move towards managing their own self-regulation. Successful selfregulators know how to:

1)Feel calm and alert and know what it feels like

2)Know the signs of stress and what causes it.

3) Have a desire to deal with those stressors.

4) Recognize stressors both inside and outside of the classroom.

5) Develop strategies to deal with stressors.

6) Be able to recover efficiently and effectively from stressors.

Teachers left the keynote inspired and interested to put his ideas to practice.