Katy Singer

Katy Singer is an educational psychotherapist in schools. She supports children, staff, and parents to better understand children’s emotional barriers to learning and to notice behaviour as a communication in the classroom. Through a relational approach, she aims to support children to become less stuck and staff to feel supported. Her approach is the perfect fit for TroubleChutes, and the issues teachers are dealing with day to day.

Mental health and well-being are a major concern in schools at the moment. There seems to be a perfect storm of events in our society which have trickled down to and affect many children in our schools: the collective trauma of living through a global pandemic, the impact of social media on young, impressionable minds, the climate emergency, and the cost-of-living crisis affecting many families, to name but a few.

Teachers experience the fallout of this storm in the classroom when children use behaviour as a communication that something is wrong or is bothering them. Teachers might notice a child acting out physically and verbally or withdrawing themselves from the class. This behaviour can be tricky for teachers to make sense of, and they may feel at a loss as to how to help. 

The TroubleChutes songs will resonate with children and help them make sense of some of the emotions they are experiencing both at home and at school. Teachers also need a space to process the emotions they feel when supporting children in their classes. As part of the TroubleChutes’ mission to help children, teachers, and parents, Katy can provide bespoke reflective practice sessions as an add on to our package for schools.

Reflective Practice sessions are a planned space for teachers to use to share their concerns about the children in their care and the effect of the work on their own well-being and mental health. Teachers can discuss with a trained practitioner anything they have noticed about the behaviour of certain children in their classroom. The behaviour may have had an effect on the teacher and got under their skin. There will be a reason for this, and reflective practice helps to shed light on why that particular child or group of children has left the teacher with a feeling that is hard to understand.