Reframing trauma-informed practices

Discussions of trauma-informed practices tend to focus on student behaviors and strategies for managing those behaviors, rather than the circumstances students are experiencing. Critical educators have expressed concern that a focus on trauma-informed practices lead teachers to view students from marginalized backgrounds with a deficit lens, assuming that they all have experienced trauma. Travis Wright suggests reframing trauma as messiness, which conveys that children’s lives are complex, that they are placed in difficult situations, and that the challenges are ongoing. Describing children’s lives as messy, instead of traumatic, enables educators to take a more expansive view of children’s experiences and potential trauma responses. Emotionally responsive teaching responds to the messiness of students’ lives by promoting healing relationships among students, teachers, and families that foster resilience and restoration.