How Collaborative Work As Colleagues Enhances Our Overall Well-Being

This article is a republication from Issue 45 of Kindling.

We often think a beloved Waldorf school community consists only of the children we teach, all faculty/staff in designated classrooms, and Administrators/Board, the holding bodies of the school. In this well running of day to day, year to year activities, we may forget the importance of trust in our collegial relationships that ensures and supports our healthy well-being. How are these relationships strengthened and cultivated where positivity is centered? Where do we offer individual and shared insights in our daily meetings with each another that extends and needs to extend beyond our classrooms? And what do we do when these relationships are tested in unhealthy patterns or based on critical judgement? Our spiritual, physical, and mental well-being depends upon healthy communication and our work/home life balance. Many colleagues continue to share how mental well-being has become strained and stretched these last few years in teaching and within themselves.

As professional colleagues, our supportive weaving together forms the tapestry that is the essential foundation for a healthy Community. This growth, based on professional respect, enables confidence and healthy self-esteem for ourselves and for the children. The ability to listen and share professional insights as working colleagues will also foster the ability to continue professional learning that shapes the students when they too are in conflict. As adults, we can also lose awareness as to how this will eventually affect the children in our care if we ourselves feel unease. Facing any obstacles or challenges are important for our learning before mistrust settles in and takes hold physically and mentally.

All over the globe, a healthy Community procures our essential work towards supporting our physical and mental health, personally and with our work with young children. This ability to see the needs of one another is based and built upon genuine levels of trust and love. Collectively and with individual striving, intentions to deepen our knowledge in our work, for our colleagues and ourselves, is realized when we lead with open hearts. Seeing the individualities in one another, as we do with young children, fosters trusting harmony to support overall well-being. This healthy well-being is crucial as overwhelm circles our work today. Much needed balance in our lives outside of school strengthens our renewal which also supports of our overall mental health.

Trust is built between all in our work, stemming out of authentic interest and joy. Genuine interest will then form strong bonds. This is crucial in becoming role models to new teachers/educators and parents. Teacher/educator teams (Leads and Assistants) in every classroom also cultivate this model for positive communication to build upon, that allows for trusting spaces for truth to form honouring the work in the classroom and school. Collegial trust needs active ongoing work to stay in this positive space and to glean insights for when challenges occur. When challenges arise, they are important building blocks which can offer multiple learning opportunities for positive growth. All our lives outside of our school communities are busy, ever evolving as we strive to do our best to come to school every day with renewed energy.

Other ways to support Intentions/Attention in Collegial Care and Well-being include:

Taking time to develop personal/professional relationships through listening and real interest
Collectively cultivating care of the full school outside of your classroom
Creating opportunities to do work tasks with children throughout the day to model work, care, respect and kindness that ultimately shifts for forward growth
Spending time in nature through all seasons to breathe and take in essential elements to stay in balance
Working diligently to stay in the present and seek guidance from the spiritual realm in the belief systems you take solace in.

When trust is broken amongst colleagues, an inward space or closing off in some or all can take hold where teachers work only out of their classrooms with blinding focus. When this happens, we can allow unforeseen tensions to surface and grow. This can create opportunities for resentments to take hold and cause the once thriving community to wither. When difficulties arise and are not dealt with right away, tensions will build, and disrespect will surface. Mistrust, consciously or unconsciously, becomes the main focus. Communications will become blocked and guarded when this happens. Then anger, judgment, centered from fear, has the potential for illness to manifest and take hold. The positive leadership and energy of all will sustain any problems that ultimately will arise when difficulties appear. Through the due diligence and dedication to working with young children as Waldorf EC Educators, challenges and difficulties are worked through when they first surface before mistrust can settle. Finding new ways to meet all challenges through direct communication with one another will continue to build towards support and positivity. Growth is possible when we as colleagues, in order to strengthen community, face challenges together in every aspect of our day-to-day ongoing work positively as best as one can.

Do we take time to develop personal relationships with each other? We must cultivate deep interest in one another that is not superficial or in spaces of sympathy or antipathy. Our work together needs to stem from earnest sincerity. Before problems in communication escalate, have regular check-ins during your weekly meetings. Apologize for wrong-doings. Humility in deeds done well or could be improved upon will always allow for personal growth and true forgiveness. And when resentments and grudges are worked upon, the potential for joy and trust becomes heightened. All energies in this way support our well-being physically and mentally.

Grace in meeting all challenges and missteps along the way, deepens the commitments for our collective work and strengthens overall well-being. Stepping back to reflect and consider how we meet one another daily in and out of school, will only benefit the children we care for and educate that come to shape the world in ways yet unknown. As colleagues, the opportunity for strong, authentic, positive role models will expand outward. This deepening forges unforeseen future inspirations and support in all of our work together. In this grace,

hold these thoughts in every way how to be role models for each other.

For children, when big and small feelings occur, we address the moment right away and include the child who has been unkind. In these moments of stillness, equanimity can result and empower the children without any moralizing. We need to be present and model good intentions for all. This allows both children to move freely into a healing future space together, leaving the "what just happened” behind. We also can use this model for our collective work with each other as adults.

Taking care of one’s self is crucial in our work today.

Some additional questions to explore towards well-being in our work as Educators are:

How do you meet the “difficult” parent, colleague, and child?
How do you look at yourself when you are feeling reactive? Are you living in sympathy
and/or antipathy?
How do you cultivate empathy and enkindle true interest and trust?
If there is resistance to this work, what is at the root of the resistance?
How do you incorporate these concepts in parent evenings and parent education as bridge-building toward a more inclusive, equitable, and kind community?
Ask yourself, how can I self-audit my classroom and my interactions with parents, children, and colleagues?

When we as colleagues experience times of difficulties in communication, our work together to address conflicts will shift with direct one on one respectful communication with one another. Real growth comes from our mistakes and our abilities to see our place in any given situation - positive and negative. Time offers us so much when we take moments and space to meet every situation the best ways we can towards physical and mental well-being. Perfection is never the goal, but always working in ways that you demonstrate your best is. When we create spaces for our authentic sharing and struggles we will not get stuck in unmovable spaces of the mind. Tomorrow allows for us all to change/shift today what is needed for self-love, safety, and balance to create opportunities for us all to flourish.

Leslie Wetzonis Woolverton

For more than twenty years, Leslie has taught Waldorf Parent-Child and Nursery classes at Acorn Hill Waldorf Kindergarten & Nursery School located in Silver Spring, Maryland. Currently, Leslie is a member of the WECAN Early Childhood Research Group (Two recent WECAN Publications), and also works as a WECAN Site Visitor and Teacher Trainer for several Teaching Institutes in North America. As a third generation Anthroposophist, Leslie brings a broad scope of wisdom and knowledge to Waldorf Early Childhood Education from her own early childhood.

Now out of the classroom, Leslie loves her work with adults as a teacher trainer, mentor and evaluator, visiting many schools and new teachers across the country. Leslie is also a skilled textile artist and interior designer of close to forty years. Leslie enjoys writing and compiling early childhood stories that reflect the world in the interest of advancing inclusion, diversity, equity, and access by creating puppetry to bring classics, cultural tales and her own new stories to life. When not working, Leslie spends time with her family and friends at her beloved beach home in Chincoteague Island, Virginia.