12 Ways to Help Students Feel Safe, Calm, and Regulated at School

February 6, 2025

As we navigate 2025 together, both teachers and students are feeling the impact of major change. How can you make your school and your classroom a safe, comfortable, and welcoming place for your students, even when they—and you—may be dealing with increased stress and anxiety?

As a longtime leader in inclusive education, we’re here to help. If you’re wondering where to start, we’ve gathered some practical ideas you can start using right away to help all learners feel safe, calm, and emotionally regulated at school. These tips from our expert authors are a great starting point for supporting all students, addressing big emotions, and making your classroom a place where everyone can learn and thrive.

Model safe behavior

One of the most important things you can do as a teacher is to model safe behavior for your students every day. You’ll make your learners feel more secure when you:

• Recognize your role in setting the tone
• Speak directly about safety as non-negotiable in your classroom
• Openly care for others
• Think carefully about the words you use
• Address bullying consistently
• Know when you need your own time-out

Adapted from The Re-Set Process by Dyane Lewis Carrere with Wynne Kinder

Play a quick game to get students regulated

Games can serve as wonderful trauma-sensitive techniques that can help us coach for student regulation. One suggestion is the Mime Game, demonstrated by trauma expert Ms. Jen Alexander in this short video. Use this at the beginning of class with students if they are restless and having difficulty showing they are ready to learn. You can also use it mid-lesson, particularly if students have been working in groups and need help down-regulating to an arousal state where they can focus and learn during instruction.

Adapted from Trauma-Sensitive Movements for the Classroom by Jen Alexander & Traci Ludwig

Do community-building exercises

Community building is a great way to show that diversity and disability are embraced and ensure that students feel connected to one another and to their teachers. To build community, emphasize that different students in the same classroom learn in different ways, and develop activities that help students learn more about each other. Try a community-building exercise like “Homework in a Bag,” in which each student brings one item that represents them and shares the item with a small group of other students. You might also start your morning meetings by asking each student to share something with the class.

Adapted from The Educator’s Handbook for Inclusive School Practices , by Julie Causton & Chelsea P. Tracy-Bronson

Teach the foundations of empathy

Empathy is critically important, now more than ever. Help students build awareness of others’ feelings and perspectives by teaching them the foundational 5 Steps to Cultivate Empathy:

• Watch and Listen: What is the other person saying, and what does their body language convey?
• Remember: When did you feel the same way?
• Imagine: How does the other person feel? How would you feel in that situation?
• Ask: Ask what the person is feeling.
• Show You Care: Let them know that you care through your words and actions.

See this blog post for 8 activities that can help promote empathy in your classroom.

Adapted from The Social‑Emotional Learning Toolbox by Kathy Perez

Create a “cool-down corner”

A cool-down corner is a designated space in the classroom where kids can go to take a short break and regulate their emotions when they are upset, angry, or having difficulty focusing on work. Instead of a “time-out” corner, make it a cozy, comfortable corner to which students can voluntarily retreat when they need a brief break from the stresses of class so they can reset and then be ready to work. Include items such as pillows, a bean bag chair, fidget items, stress balls, glitter jars, books about feelings, and “happy” posters. Introduce and share the cool-down corner with students before allowing them to use the space, and remind students often that this is NOT a time-out corner or a form of punishment.) Keep it to one student at a time and have a time limit of 5 minutes.

Conduct a positive thinking exercise

Help students focus on the good things in their lives with one or more of these exercises:

• List three to five things you have become good at because of hard work and practice.
• Write a paragraph about a good part of a school day you remember from this year.
• Write a paragraph about a time when you were a good friend.
• List three to five things you appreciate about a specific teacher or classmate.
• Write down a few activities you enjoy doing with a friend during recess or after school.
• List three to five things other kids your age need help with sometimes.
• Write a paragraph describing a fun day you had recently.

Adapted from Building Trauma-Sensitive Schools by Jen Alexander

Create safety maps with students

Provide students with a map of the classroom or school and ask them to identify places where they feel safe and unsafe physically and emotionally. Studying patterns that emerge by looking at safety maps from many students may provide insight into systemwide issues. You may also want to privately poll your students to see whether there are any movements or activities that make them feel uncomfortable or unsafe in your classroom.

Adapted from The Re-Set Process by Dyane Lewis Carrere with Wynne Kinder

Share anger management strategies

Helping children manage difficult emotions like anger can prevent these emotions from escalating into problems like bullying. During class discussions or lessons on emotions, you can present some simple, helpful anger management strategies to your students and encourage them to try them in the classroom and at home. This blog post shares 8 anger management strategies to teach students, adapted from the social-emotional learning curriculum Merrell’s Strong Kids .

Teach students to stand up for their peers

Bullying and harassment can be a deeply traumatic experience for any child—and the inaction and silence of their peers can hurt just as badly. (Read this compelling short article about the impact of The Silence of Others.)

Many bystanders are reluctant to intervene in a bullying situation because they fear they’ll be labeled a “tattletale.” It’s important to explicitly teach them the difference: A tattletale is someone who wants to get someone else in trouble, while an upstander is someone who wants to get a peer out of trouble or be a friend. It’s tough to erase the stigma associated with tattling, but it’s important work. Start by teaching and reinforcing the language regarding tattletales vs. upstanders, provide plenty of examples your students can relate to, and hang visual reminders in the classroom ( like this poster) to keep the message fresh in your students’ minds.

Adapted from Recognize, Respond, Report by Lori Ernsperger

Do quick regulation checks

Throughout the day, offer your students a “regulation check.”  Support student sharing if they have lingering emotions that an activity at school or an event at home or in the community might have caused. Consider giving your students a “moment of mindfulness”—it doesn’t take long to press the pause button and encourage students to spend a minute to do some quiet breathing to clear the mind. You can also use a brain break, such as a quick yoga move, a doodle break, or rock-paper-scissors, to help them burn off some energy and anxiety.

Talk about “What Went Well Today?”

End one or more days with a discussion about What Went Well Today. Encourage each person to list something specific they did to help that part of the day go well. If you prefer, ask each participant to write about What Went Well Today by using Ms. Jen’s Alexander’s What Went Well Today Download, which is one of the appendices from the book Building Trauma-Sensitive Schools . There are many things we already do well to support one another at school. Notice them and celebrate together.

Center student agency and empowerment

Trauma takes control away, and any trauma-sensitive approach must help every person in your school community realize, deepen, and actualize their power. This requires that adults stop trying to have all the answers. Instead, we need to understand how children actually experience their worlds, not just how we think they do, and honor students’ creative ideas for learning, growing, and healing. Youth can and should actively help lead healing-centered school transformation. How? Start by listening, deeply listening, to people—your staff, your students, and your families. Listening and learning are what must drive our actions and advocacy for change. It will take practice to get there, and that practice is much of the work.

From this post by Jen Alexander, author of Building Trauma-Sensitive Schools