Psyched About School

Our neighbors in Guilford County and Rockingham County are recovering from significant tornado damage that also impacted several of their schools.  We wanted to share some resources that may be useful for counselors, teachers, parents, family members and others who provide support to children following a natural disaster. This information from the National Association of School Psychologists provides a number of resources, including a printable fact sheet and information on helping students who may experience relocation as the result of a natural disaster. You can also find a Tip Sheet available in Spanish here .  There's even a section specific to tornadoes: "Tornadoes . Like earthquakes, tornadoes can bring mass destruction in a matter of minutes, and individuals typically have little time to prepare. Confusion and frustration often follow. Similar to a hurricane, people experience sensations during tornadoes that may generate coping challenges, and it can be ...

The findings from this recent research on how smartphones impact our thinking are both fascinating and alarming.  Researchers at three large universities collaborated on this project to measure how well people can finish tasks when their smartphones are nearby.  Their study included 548 participants (with an average age of 21) who were asked to complete tasks to measure working memory (i.e., the ability to hold on to and process information) and fluid intelligence (i.e., the ability to solve new or unfamiliar problems).  Participants were assigned to one of three groups, depending on cell phone location: desk, pocket/bag, or other room.  All participants were asked to make sure their phones were completely silent during the testing. After the testing was complete, the participants were asked how much they believed their smartphones affected their performance.  85.6% of the participants reported that their smartphones “neither helped nor hurt [their] perf...

In case you missed it, three of our W-S/FCS school psychologists - Amy Clay, Abby Flynn and Angela Smith - recently had the opportunity to be interviewed by Michael Bragg with the Winston-Salem Journal .  Our Director of Psychological Services, Dr. Corliss Thompson-Drew, also talked with Mr. Bragg.  You can access the Journal article here . We are always pleased to be able to shine a spotlight on the good work being done by our colleagues.  Mr. Bragg did a fantastic job investigating what is happening in other comparable school districts across the state, including Guilford and Charlotte-Mecklenburg.  Even WE were surprised to learn that W-S/FCS has one of the highest numbers of students per school psychologist.   Right now, each of your W-S/FCS School Psychologists is serving about 2,391 students across multiple schools, while the recommended ratio from our National Association of School Psychologists (NASP) is 1 psychologist for every 500 to 700 students....