Preschool Teacher Training on Trauma and Resilience
Document
Description
Childhood traumatic experiences are a prevalent public health issue. Children exposed to trauma
often exhibit behaviors that make educating them challenging. Preschool teachers at a
southwestern United States preschool receive no training related to childhood trauma and
resilience. The purpose of this project was to educate preschool teachers on trauma and
resilience to improve attitude related to educating children with trauma. Following Arizona State
University Internal Review Board approval, preschool teachers were recruited from a non-profit
metropolitan preschool. Project included two pre-training questionnaires (Adult Resilience
Measure-Revised [ARM-R] and Attitudes Related to Trauma Informed Care scale [ARTIC]),
one two-hour training via Zoom on childhood trauma and resilience, and post-training ARTIC
questionnaire at two and six weeks. Seven teachers (n=7) participated in pre-training
questionnaires, and three of these teachers (n=3) participated in both post-training
questionnaires. All participating teachers were female and Caucasian. Average age of
participants was 49.43 years (SD=8.40, range 36-60), and experience average was 17.17 years
(SD=10.15, range 3-30). AMR-R average score was 72.29 (SD=8.28, range 61-83). Pre-training
ARTIC score average was 3.87 (SD=0.16). Post-training ARTIC scores at two weeks and six
weeks post-training were 3.65 (SD=0.22) and 3.86 (SD=0.25). Clinical significance included
improved teacher awareness of childhood trauma and improved ability to interact with children
exposed to trauma. Teachers exhibited high resilience scores. Additional research needed
related to further address educating preschool teachers related to trauma informed care, related to
building resilience in children, and related to the impact of teacher resilience on trauma informed
care.