Mar 6, 2007 11:15 AM
Colorful paper hearts adorn the wall of Laurie Bernstein’s office under the heading “I feel …” Each heart contains a handwritten word: scared, blue, embarrassed, misunderstood, worried, hurt, mad, curious, triumphant, brave.
These are some of the emotions that Bernstein, the 7th-grade guidance counselor, gingerly explores with kids every day at Robert Wagner JHS on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.
Bernstein relates how, in a counseling session of five girls one day, the discussion turns to families. One girl confides that she doesn’t like her stepfather and wishes that she and her mom could be on their own again.
That prompts another girl to volunteer that her grandma makes her mom sad. “Sometimes I get really angry at my grandma,” she says. “I’m nice on the outside, but I’m angry inside.”
Seizing on the comment, Bernstein asks the girls what they do when they have a feeling that they can’t express openly.
One girl says she punches a pillow. Another says she asks her mom for a ball of yarn, locks herself in her bedroom, and starts squeezing the yarn and throwing it at the wall.
Two of the girls say they write their feelings down.
“I rip up what I write immediately,” says one.
“Oh, I keep everything I write,” says the other. “When I get older, it will make me stronger.”
Easing the transition
From
age 10 to 14, children undergo tremendous social, emotional and
physical changes. It’s a time when academic performance often slumps as
puberty and social pressures interfere with learning. Mindful of that,
Bernstein has created a curriculum to foster character development and
help kids navigate the passage to adulthood.
"I try to do ‘guided’ counseling,” Bernstein explains. “I teach social and emotional growth. I don’t think modeling is enough. These are skills that have to be taught.”
Bernstein stays with the same 430 kids from 6th grade, as they adjust to middle school, to 8th grade, when she will take on the gargantuan task of helping each child apply for high school. Over the three years, she gets to know many of the kids better than any other adult in the school — providing the stable and trusting adult/child connection that young adolescents need.
“Laurie knows all of the kids and knows how to respond to each child,” says Hillary Finnegan, a collaborative team teacher at Wagner. “She doesn’t belittle their life situation. It’s acknowledged and recognized. That’s a big deal for that child.”
It’s in 7th grade that Bernstein has the most freedom to delve into the counseling part of the work. (An assistant principal takes primary responsibility for student discipline.) Bernstein sees 40 kids a week for mandated counseling, mostly in single-sex groups of four or five. She plans an activity for each session, but she lets the conversation go in unanticipated directions if the kids are opening up and going deep.
“Disclosing and expressing — that’s the goal ultimately,” says Bernstein, who worked for seven years in fashion before becoming a counselor at Wagner in 2002.
For her group sessions that week, she begins by showing folk singer Peter Yarrow’s “Don’t Laugh at Me” music video and starts the conversation by asking the kids how it made them feel.
Bernstein has two basic rules for the counseling groups: “We don’t share other people’s business outside the group,” and, “We are here to support each other.” Like all good counselors, she allows ample space for kids to explore their feelings while asking probing questions that encourage the kids to listen to and help one another.
‘Can’t be judgmental’
“As a counselor, you can’t be judgmental,” says UFT Guidance Counselor Chapter Leader Angela Reformato. “You want kids to come to the conclusion themselves. That’s the way you can change their way of thinking and way of behaving.”
Bernstein is quick to acknowledge when a kid takes an emotional risk. She commends them when they show insight into another classmate’s abilities or leanings, or when they are generous or forgiving. She does not tolerate discourtesy, dishonesty or meanness.
“Thank you for sharing,” she says with real feeling when a student steps out of his or her comfort zone.
“Kids, especially special ed kids, hold a lot of things in,” says Rachel Kramer, a special education teacher at Wagner. “They have a lot going on at home and outside school. To get their feelings out is very helpful.”
One day, Bernstein defuses a conflict among a group of girls triggered by gossip. After the girls tell their versions of the same story, the girl accused of betraying a friend’s confidence tearfully admits that her friendships with other girls are always short-lived. Bernstein doesn’t let her off the hook for her actions while showing her a way forward.
“You have the power to change that,” she says. “Your friends are telling you how to fix it. You need to fix it because it is hurting you.”
Following up on a complaint, Bernstein reprimands a boy for bullying a classmate. She pulls out the chancellor’s regulations to show him the suspension he could receive. When the boy crumples and shows genuine remorse, she brings in the girl so he can apologize to her and set things on a different footing. So adept is Bernstein at cutting to the heart of things that by the end the boy not only owns his behavior but tells the girl that it stemmed from his own insecurity.
“Laurie gets the why out of kids, not just that what they are doing is wrong,” observes Kramer, her colleague.
On Tuesdays after school, Bernstein holds a different kind of girls’ group. This one is voluntary, open to all grades, and more casual. “It’s really girl time,” she says. “I try to teach the girls the things I wish I had been taught when I was younger.”
Bernstein feeds the girls pizza and organizes activities to build their self-confidence and promote positive values.
She’s also run a bereavement group when the need arose.
Time an issue Bernstein says most counselors on most days have little time for counseling.
“A typical day can involve any number of crisis interventions from getting a child to a hospital that has been expressing suicidal thoughts to waiting until 5 or 6 at night for the city’s child welfare agency to come help a child we suspect is being abused,” she says. “Counselors are constantly called away from counseling groups as the work is often not valued and we are asked to help with disciplinary issues and paperwork.”
Teachers see Bernstein as an indispensable resource. They drop by to use her photocopying machine, lean on her to help kids process a disturbing incident, and ask her advice about how to manage particular students.
Every other month, Bernstein convenes a special teacher support group at lunch. She provides a big spread of food on a tablecloth and teaches stress reduction activities such as meditation and muscle relaxation.
“The teachers were resistant to it at first, but now they ask for it,” she says.
Explaining where she came up with the idea, Bernstein says, “I feel supported and I am supporting the children and the teachers are supporting the children, but who is supporting the teachers? It’s a small way to say ‘you’re appreciated.’”
Bernstein cultivates strong partnerships with parents, realizing that she counts on them to impose consequences for their kids’ bad behavior. When kids skip the morning tutoring sessions, parents get a call from her.
Visits from students — she never turns anyone away — swallow up whatever free moments remain in her day. The kids seek her out for advice, for help registering for basketball camp, for a calculator, for food when they come to school with no lunch, or simply for her company and attention.
A boy, uncomfortable sharing in group counseling, drops by Bernstein’s office during lunch and draws a new branch of his complicated family tree for her. (“I thought it would be a good way to get into other stuff,” says Bernstein of the activity.)
A girl shows Bernstein her new cheerleading moves and beams when Bernstein tells her how proud she is of her. (“She’s shuttling among family members and is in a constant state of feeling unconnected,” Bernstein explains. “She comes for lunch looking for a little bit of loving.”)