Originally republished in Australia in 2021 by Hawker Brownlow Education
Published in Australia 2025 by Grift Education.
This work is copyright. Apart from fair dealings for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review, or as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth), no part should be reproduced, transmitted, communicated or recorded, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.
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Code: AHA8791
ISBN: 9781923198791
Printed in Australia
Dedication
This book is dedicated to the well-being of children and to all adults who work with them.
Acknowledgments
A very special thank you to Michael Curl and Norma Vijeila, both practicing principals. Thanks also to Peg Conrad, Jesse Conrad, and Paula Nicolella for their support in turning the book into a finished product. And an extra special thanks to my husband, Tee Bowman, for his patience and support.
Also, a very special thanks to the team of consultants who helped me develop the training and vet the ideas in the book. These individuals were Michael Curl, Norma Vijeila, Chestin Auzenne-Curl, Rickey Frierson, Bethanie Tucker, Jim Littlejohn, Kim Ellis, Marye Jane Brockinton, DeShanna King, Jen Nehl, and Kirven Tillis.
Introduction
Basic
Review and Overview
of Emotional Poverty
This book is a follow-up to Emotional Poverty in All Demographics. That book examined the unregulated, unintegrated brain; calming techniques; what motivates good/healthy behaviors (compassion for self and others) and bad/ unhealthy behaviors (little compassion for self and others); why discipline works with some students and not others; why external environments that reinforce “less than” and “separate from” perceptions create more anger and violence; male brains and some of the issues with emotional processing; and the emotional noise in a classroom and how adults contribute to that noise.
The following are some basic concepts that were in Emotional Poverty:
1. All emotional wellness is based in safety and belonging.
2. It is difficult to change behavior. It is much easier to change the motivation for the behavior, which then changes the behavior.
3. The biggest difference between healthy (beneficial) and unhealthy (unbeneficial) behavior is compassion—for yourself and others.
4. Schools will always have consequences. It is the approach that needs to change.
5. The amygdala is mostly structured by the time you are three years old. It is restructured in adolescence.
6. At their base level, emotions are simple—you are either moving toward something or away from something. That is why it is not possible for the brain to be both angry and compassionate at the same time. Anger is an “away from” emotion that often results in attack. Compassion is a “moving toward” emotion that usually results in understanding.
7. To change a behavior or response, the behavior or response has to be named.
Please note: This approach does not see a difficult student/person as “bad” or “sick” but rather as someone who is injured. Emotional Poverty looks at how to approach a person so that everyone—both individuals and organizations—can function at a higher level of safety and belonging.
This book will pick up and add to the discussion by looking at:
How the limbic system “tells” emotions and stressors.
How the energy system of the body can be reset to lessen stress and calm students.
The development of adolescent brains.
How to develop the prefrontal cortex and build emotional muscle (resilience) in students.
How the hippocampus develops the stories of ourselves through coauthors and early childhood experiences that shape adult strengths and weaknesses.
Tools for adults who are stressed and have compassion fatigue or secondary traumatic stress.
How to work with angry, emotional parents and adults.
Disclaimer
This book looks at patterns and basic understandings. It does not explain every behavior/emotional reality. Not all of this information will apply to students in special education with a 504 or an IEP. The purpose of this book is to provide the language to name what educators are seeing and strategies to address some of those issues.
This book is for practitioners—not for psychologists. It is for individuals who work with children and adolescents and need a vocabulary and strategies for addressing emotional issues. Practitioners, unless they work in psychology or counseling, rarely get this information. My books on emotional poverty translate clinical research into understandings that can be used by practitioners. It is my hope that these books will give educators and other care providers the basic language for naming the emotional issues and provide strategies to address the behaviors.
The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.
–Ludwig Wittgenstein1
1The Limbic Center
The emotional center of the brain—the amygdala
1. How to watch body “tells” to determine emotional distress
2. How to use the energy systems of the body to reduce emotional distress
3. How to use these tools to keep your campus safer
As discussed in my first book on emotional poverty, when you have an “in your face” explosion, the reality is that you are witnessing an unregulated and unintegrated brain. Before any kind of rational discussion can be had, it is important to allow time for the blood flow to return to the cortex of the brain where thoughts are. When the brain “explodes,” the blood flow in the brain goes to the brain stem (the survival center of the brain) and leaves the cortex (where the thoughts are). It is not possible for the brain to understand a conversation until the blood flow returns to the cortex.
As you will remember from the hand model—using the hand to represent the brain—your palm is the brain stem (involuntary and motivational systems), your thumb is the amygdala, the area around it is the hippocampus (together the amygdala and hippocampus make up the limbic or emotional center of the
brain), and the cortex is the top of the brain where thoughts are. The two middle fingers are the prefrontal cortex, which is the regulator of the brain.
Because your brain is connected to the rest of your body, the limbic system of your body most accurately reflects what you are feeling. The cortex (your thoughts) can represent what you think you should say or what is socially acceptable, but your body often “tells” what your true stressors and feelings are. Because the limbic system reacts to your feelings without the intervention of thought, it is the most accurate “tell.”
Your limbic system has three choices: freeze, take flight, or fight. When something happens in your environment, you will respond in one of these three ways. The automatic first choice is freeze. The second is flight. And the last is fight.
Promoting a Safer Building—Being Able to Read the Signals That the Emotional Part of the Brain Is Emitting
Emotions are processed much faster than thought (200–5,000 times faster), and they are processed before thought is processed. The body’s response is immediate because the brain—the limbic system—wants to keep the rest of your body from danger; it wants to keep you safe.
Educators can watch students’ bodies to get early indicators of where the student is emotionally—often before the student is aware.
Joe Navarro was an FBI agent for many years, and in his book, What Every Body Is Saying, he identifies a discomfort-detecting and pacifying approach to understanding emotional responses. These responses come from the limbic system and are accurate “tells” about the level of comfort/discomfort the individual is experiencing. Navarro used this system to help law enforcement officials identify the truth in many cases. However, he is very careful to say that there is no one way to identify the truth and that no system is totally accurate.
