On the final training session of the year as part of our ECT conference, we welcomed back Ellen Aindow, founder of &thrivenow and life coach to lead a session entitled ‘Building your toolkit for resilience and confidence’. This session educated GORSE SCITT trainees on key wellbeing strategies which will aid them immensely as they take their next steps into the classroom as Early Career Teachers, and beyond. Ellen’s delivery, based on her own experiences of teaching and as a life coach is incredibly powerful and impactful.

In the session, Ellen led the trainees to explore short and long-term methods to help reduce stress; including why good quality sleep is important for minimising stress and how we can prepare for a good night’s sleep. We also looked at which self-calming measures we already use and which we will be adding to our toolkit.

A key focus was discussing and reflecting on our ‘WHY’; when we are experiencing the more challenging days, it is useful to be able to reflect on why we chose to teach, what motivated us initially, and why we continue to strive for better practice to change the lives of our pupils.

Although naturally we want to give our all to teaching, Ellen explained that creating boundaries for ourselves is equally important. When we over stretch ourselves, we need to learn how to prioritise time to recharge. To end the session, we took part in a guided meditation workshop, which was a wonderful way to finish off what has been an intense but rewarding year for all. This is training that we will all come back to time and time again.

When we look after our own wellbeing, we have greater capacity to look after others.