Forward-Facing® Professional Resilience


Book Description

A Mission To Help Others Heal. A mission to help others heal and regain productive lives is likely what led you to pursue a career in professional caregiving. But what happens when all the accumulated suffering and trauma that you have witnessed and the pain that you have experienced starts to cause problems in your own personal and professional life? Insidious and often steeped in shame, compassion fatigue burnout and traumatic stress are very real issues that members of the caregiving community are not only at risk for but will inevitably confront at some point in their careers. The key is not to fight against or run away from these consequences of caregiving, but to recognize their normalization, origination, and the applicable steps available to heal your existing stress and build resilience for the future. In Forward-Facing® Professional Resilience: Prevention and Resolution of Burnout, Toxic Stress and Compassion Fatigue, trauma and compassion fatigue expert Dr. J. Eric Gentry and medical director and practitioner of emergency medicine Dr. Jeffrey “Jim” Dietz combine over seventy years’ worth of experience treating patients and caregivers to present a two-part text that first examines the cause of compassion fatigue, followed by a proven, simple five-step solution for healing and a renewed sense of mission. Drawing from their Professional Resilience workshop that has been attended by over 100,000 international participants, Drs. Gentry and Dietz address these issues with their readers in ways that are candid, heartfelt, insightful, and most of all—filled with hope.




Forward-Facing® for Educators


Book Description

The evidence is undeniable: Educators are some of the hardest-working and underappreciated professionals on earth, a truth highlighted by the epidemic proportions of compassion fatigue and burnout occurring across the field. There’s no doubt that educators are purpose-driven, passionate helpers of children, families, and their communities, but with a never-ending list of responsibilities and reductions in many school resources year after year, the suffering and stress involved are fast outweighing the resilience reserves of so many. With Forward-Facing® for Educators: A Journey to Professional Resilience and Compassion Restoration, it doesn’t have to be that way. Co-written by long-time educators Cheryl Fuller and Rebecca Leimkuehler alongside trauma expert and Forward-Facing® Institute founder Dr. J. Eric Gentry, this book teaches and validates the distinct challenges of being an educator today, while putting the power of personal healing and restoration firmly back in your hands—where it belongs. Envision each school day characterized by physical and mental comfort no matter what happens, as you work and live in accordance with your values and goals, and enjoy social connections and self-care practices that nourish, support, and give you a deep sense of peace and fulfillment. These are the five skills offered by the Forward-Facing® process for professional resilience, and they have the potency to transform every facet of your career in education, personal journey, and mission to help children beginning today.




Forward-Facing Trauma Therapy


Book Description

In this groundbreaking book, trauma expert J. Eric Gentry builds upon the pioneering insights of such luminaries as neuroscientist Stephen Porges, Judith Herman and Bessel van der Kolk to introduce Forward-Facing Trauma Therapy (FFTT), the next evolutionary leap in the treatment of traumatic stress. Unlike many traditional psychotherapies, FFTT eschews the assumption that psychological problems are caused by our faulty perceptions and skewed thought processes. Instead, FFTT addresses trauma and its destructive symptomology at its sourceour overcharged autonomic nervous systems and hypervigilant threat response resulting from our adaptation to painful past experiences. Dr. Gentry provides a step-by-step guide for implementing a three-pronged methodology and explains how and why the techniques work so effectively. He also demonstrates how anyone experiencing stress can apply FFTT to achieve immediate change and an enduring sense of joy, self-worth, and personal integrity.




Forward-Facing(R) Freedom: Healing the Past, Transforming the Present, A Future on Purpose


Book Description

Internationally recognized trauma treatment expert Dr. J. Eric Gentry presents his three-step Forward-Facing(R) process for healing from toxic stress that you can start today, without needing to revisit the pains of the past. Freedom from and freedom to... It's an indisputable truth that we live in the safest, healthiest, and most advanced time period in history-yet we are sicker and more stressed out than ever. Technology and other modern-age advancements have connected us in unprecedented ways, but they also provide us with a 24/7-view to the world's problems. As stress-related physical and mental illnesses increase and suicide rates spike, we're a nation of people navigating not only the fears and uncertainties of our present but the experienced trauma of our childhoods-which informs our threat response in the here and now. Amidst all of this upheaval, we might ask ourselves: How can I find transformative healing and lasting resilience without escaping society altogether? It is possible to heal yourself, and this simple solution is one you can begin right now. Distilled from decades of neuroscience, psychotherapy, and evidence-based trauma treatment methods for immediate use by the everyday reader, Dr. Gentry's Forward-Facing(R) Freedom instantly gives you back control of your body and brain, without ever having to relive your traumatic stress. Imagine this scenario unfolding in your own life: Freedom from stress, anxiety, trauma, interpersonal conflicts and failed relationships, self-criticism, and even despair. All of it replaced with the freedom to-freedom to feel safe, peaceful, and in total physical and mental comfort; to experience boundless levels of joy and positive growth; to behave with intention and in alignment with your principles; and best of all, to have hope. In the style of pioneering, popular psychology works such as Bessel van der Kolk's The Body Keeps the Score and Bruce Perry's Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma that educate about trauma's physiological origins and how to override this instinctual response, Dr. Gentry's three-step Forward-Facing(R) process is poised to become the next touchstone in the neuropsychology field. Championing our innate capacities for overcoming a traumatic past, speaking truth to wellbeing over illness, and tapping into a well of intentionality and resilience to take on each day no matter what it may hold, Forward-Facing(R) Freedom offers a new kind of solution for toxic stress, one so desperately needed today. Here's what you'll learn as you adopt Forward-Facing(R) Freedom's practices in your own life: -Where stress really comes from-your nervous system as a means of survival-and techniques for mindful relaxation to release the stress and prevent more from accruing. -A deeper understanding of how the traumas of the past impact you today, and tools for replacing reactive thoughts and actions with intentional ones by defining your personal code of honor, mission in life, and vision for the future. -Simple methods for identifying and managing triggers to build resilience and foster post-traumatic growth, marked by better relationships and a new appreciation for life. It's time to take back control of your happiness and health- to face forward with these newfound abilities to heal your past, transform your present, and enjoy a future on purpose.




Making Thinking Visible


Book Description

A proven program for enhancing students' thinking and comprehension abilities Visible Thinking is a research-based approach to teaching thinking, begun at Harvard's Project Zero, that develops students' thinking dispositions, while at the same time deepening their understanding of the topics they study. Rather than a set of fixed lessons, Visible Thinking is a varied collection of practices, including thinking routines?small sets of questions or a short sequence of steps?as well as the documentation of student thinking. Using this process thinking becomes visible as the students' different viewpoints are expressed, documented, discussed and reflected upon. Helps direct student thinking and structure classroom discussion Can be applied with students at all grade levels and in all content areas Includes easy-to-implement classroom strategies The book also comes with a DVD of video clips featuring Visible Thinking in practice in different classrooms.










Forward-Facing(R) for Educators


Book Description

The evidence is undeniable: Educators are some of the hardest-working and underappreciated professionals on earth, a truth highlighted by the epidemic proportions of compassion fatigue and burnout occurring across the field. There's no doubt that educators are purpose-driven, passionate helpers of children, families, and their communities, but with a never-ending list of responsibilities and reductions in many school resources year after year, the suffering and stress involved are fast outweighing the resilience reserves of so many. With Forward-Facing(R) for Educators: A Journey to Professional Resilience and Compassion Restoration, it doesn't have to be that way. Co-written by long-time educators Cheryl Fuller and Rebecca Leimkuehler alongside trauma expert and Forward-Facing(R) Institute founder Dr. J. Eric Gentry, this book teaches and validates the distinct challenges of being an educator today, while putting the power of personal healing and restoration firmly back in your hands-where it belongs. Envision each school day characterized by physical and mental comfort no matter what happens, as you work and live in accordance with your values and goals, and enjoy social connections and self-care practices that nourish, support, and give you a deep sense of peace and fulfillment. These are the five skills offered by the Forward-Facing(R) process for professional resilience, and they have the potency to transform every facet of your career in education, personal journey, and mission to help children beginning today.







Fugitive Pedagogy


Book Description

A fresh portrayal of one of the architects of the African American intellectual tradition, whose faith in the subversive power of education will inspire teachers and learners today. Black education was a subversive act from its inception. African Americans pursued education through clandestine means, often in defiance of law and custom, even under threat of violence. They developed what Jarvis Givens calls a tradition of “fugitive pedagogy”—a theory and practice of Black education in America. The enslaved learned to read in spite of widespread prohibitions; newly emancipated people braved the dangers of integrating all-White schools and the hardships of building Black schools. Teachers developed covert instructional strategies, creative responses to the persistence of White opposition. From slavery through the Jim Crow era, Black people passed down this educational heritage. There is perhaps no better exemplar of this heritage than Carter G. Woodson—groundbreaking historian, founder of Black History Month, and legendary educator under Jim Crow. Givens shows that Woodson succeeded because of the world of Black teachers to which he belonged: Woodson’s first teachers were his formerly enslaved uncles; he himself taught for nearly thirty years; and he spent his life partnering with educators to transform the lives of Black students. Fugitive Pedagogy chronicles Woodson’s efforts to fight against the “mis-education of the Negro” by helping teachers and students to see themselves and their mission as set apart from an anti-Black world. Teachers, students, families, and communities worked together, using Woodson’s materials and methods as they fought for power in schools and continued the work of fugitive pedagogy. Forged in slavery, embodied by Woodson, this tradition of escape remains essential for teachers and students today.