February 2023 Resources

Relationship, Responsibility and Regulation:
Trauma-Invested Practices for Fostering Resilient Learners

Kristin Van Marter Sourers & Pete Hall (ASCD, 2019)

Drawing from their extensive experience working with schools, students, and families, the authors provide practical advice to help educators:

Create a culture of safety in which everyone feels valued, important, and capable of learning;

Understand the four areas of need–emotional, relational, physical, and control–that drive student behaviours and how to support these needs with interventions;

Understand what the trauma-invested practices look like in action through real scenarios that identify students’ unmet needs and suggest interventions to support students and their families; and

Develop deeper and different ways of thinking about their role in impacting students learning, attitudes, and futures. 

Online Study Guide Questions

A helpful online guide with reflective discussion questions for each chapter is available. This PDF is available as a resource to lead your staff in a book study focused on building practices that support all students as well as students impacted by trauma.

— Jenny Williams

A Burning in My Bones

Winn Collier (WaterBrook, 2022)

A Burning in My Bones, the authorized biography of Eugene Peterson, is a compelling read. Rather than aggrandizing the author of The Message, the biographer paints a picture of a passionate follower of Jesus who is fully human. The book traces Peterson’s early years and the formational role of both his small-town Montana childhood and his mother’s passionate Pentecostalism had on him and his unfolding desire to become a pastor. Peterson flourished in theological and biblical studies but turned away from academia to submit to a call to parish ministry.

The author paints a clear picture of a man who sought, first and foremost, the Kingdom of God, so much so that he often felt his work as a pastor (which he loved) pulled him away from a life of prayer, study, and writing with, about, and for God. Peterson’s humility and desire to serve the Kingdom are present throughout the book, including in the origins of The Message, which began as short, translated Bible passages for his parishioners struggling to understand the biblical text.

The book is deeply enriched with excerpts from Peterson’s journals and comments from his wife, Jan, and their three children. A Burning in My Bones is honest, well-written, and inspiring (I read it in three days over the Christmas break!).

— Dave Loewen