February 15, 2018

"Mindfulness: Strategies for Building Success and

Wellness in the 21st Century Workplace."

[The transcript you are about to view is a realtime

display of today's session. If you are receiving this

transcript after the session, it is only a rough draft of

this session and should not be considered a certified

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(CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication

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the proceedings.]

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Hello everyone, we will get

started, I am going to present the mindfulness Webinar.

Welcome to the fifth Webinar hosted by the HealthMatters

program in partnership with Project SEARCH and provided

by Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on

Developmental Disabilities and Health together we're

together for 45 minutes of presentation and 15 minutes

for question and answer.

Everyone is muted we have quite a large audience today.

For questions please use the question and answer chat box

to ask your questions.

I will read them out loud and Stephanie will answer the

question.

The Webinars are recorded and captioned and we will make

the recording and the transcript and the slides available

online after the Webinar.

So without any further ado, I am going to introduce this

Webinar "Mindfulness: Strategies for Building Success

and Wellness in the 21st Century Workforce."

This webinar will discuss the use of mindfulness

strategies for building success and wellness among people

with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD)

within their worksites. “Mindfulness tools” will be

reviewed for participants to incorporate with their

students and employees with IDD in the classroom or in

the workplace.

The presenter today is, Stefanie Patterson, Cape Cod,

Riverview School’s Project SEARCH Instructor. Stefanie

is a certified English and special education teacher and

has been in the field of education for over 20 years.

She is also a life-long yoga practitioner and is licensed

through Finding Inner Peace Yoga School and is a member

of the National Yoga Alliance & the Cape Cod Yoga

Association [CCYA] with specialty certifications in

pre/post-natal yoga, children/teen yoga and Mindfulness

Meditation.

Stephanie, are you ready?

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Hello.

I'm here.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Stephanie, we can hear you.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Hello everybody. I am

really honored to be offering this Webinar to you all

today.

As Jasmina has said, I am a special ed teacher, and I

work in Massachusetts at the Riverview School and at the

end the Webinar there will be resources and if you would

like to learn more about Riverview Schools, there is a

link there where you can find more information about

Riverview school and as well, my yoga in bloom

background.

So I would like to start our Webinar today with a

meditation.

A very simple meditation, I call it the anchor, so if

everybody, just wherever you are sitting right now, in

your space, just rest your feet on the ground, sitting up

nice and tall.

Reaching the top of the crown of your head upwards, and

just letting your hands fall.

Resting, your eyes closed, if you wish, or just gazing

downward.

Just beginning to find your breath.

Breathing in... and breathing out.

Breathing in... and breathing out.

Now, just taking that image of an anchor, an anchor helps

us feel strong, secure, safe, and calm.

So imagining that anchor just gently floating through the

ocean waters.

Just letting it fall down, through the water... and then

slowly, softly, gently landing on the ocean floor, in the

sand.

And just imagine that being your thoughts and your

feelings, just letting them float down and away...

scattering about, resting on the ocean floor, in the soft

sand.

And breathing... breathing in... and breathing out.

And if you do have those thoughts that keep creeping in,

just acknowledge, let them be, let them float, let them

rest in the sand.

Taking a nice deep breath in for your heart, filling your

heart and your lungs, and breathing out.

Floating, resting, softly, gently, and calm.

Just now beginning to see that anchor, just kind of

drifting through the sand, you're moving a little farther

away.

And we'll start coming back to our place here, noticing

your feet, pressing into the earth, taking one last deep

breath in before opening the eyes, and breathing out...

and then just come in, back to our space, and hopefully

you feel a little calmer and ready to go through some

slides with me about meditation.

So our next slide is kind of a look at the two words,

mindfulness and meditation.

Mindful is a general awareness of what's going on around

us, being mindful, and meditation is more a setting aside

of time taking time to relax and calm the mind like what

we just did in that anchor meditation.

The two terms certainly overlap in mindfulness meditation

which is one of the mindful forms of meditation.

So the next couple of slides are about two pioneers in

the field about mindfulness and meditation and this one

is Jon Kabat-Zinn and he began the mindfulness program

teaching people who were interested, as patients who

weren't responding to traditional treatment to find ways

of reducing stress and relaxing.

And then Herbert Benson, Dr. Benson is another pioneer in

the field in mind body medicine and research and has been

for our 40 years and he created the relaxation response,

which is a way of meditating, a way of calming the body

and setting aside time, focusing on repetition of a word

or phrase or even some sort of movement or activity so

that can be a form of meditation.

It can be a yoga class but even beyond that, it can be an

activity that you love like swimming or jogging or

knitting or running, that in itself can be a form of

meditation and helps the body relax and become centered

and calm.

So just looking in the next few slides, into the brain,

the brain is a fascinating organ, as we all know.

There are three main areas that when we talk about

mindfulness and medication that are affected, the

prefrontal cortex, prefrontal lobe, that is in planning

and organizing, and the amygdala connected to emotion

responses, and the other related to worse and fears.

So the current research, Richie Davidson is someone who

has done an extensive amount of research in this area in

terms of noting how meditation and mindfulness may change

your brain.

The actual gray matter in the prefrontal lobe, the

density of it would produce greater planning problem

solving emotional regulation, the size of the amygdala

reducing anxiety and fear, less stress disorders like

post-traumatic stress disorder.

So our young people with disabilities they encounter as

many of us know who work with students with disabilities,

they encounter many barriers in the workplace and some of

the disabilities that I put on this slide are the common

ones, autism, or attention deficit disorder where they

may have trouble focusing or attention to detail and

producing a lack of confidence or self-esteem and

executive functioning disorder, the problem solving your

memory comes into play, and our student that have

executive functioning challenges will have barrier that

translate into the workplace.

This slide shows a study that was done, mindfulness at

work and seven specific or distinct ways that mindfulness

improves your performance at work for students with

disabilities as well as all of us.

The picture in the slide is of a student I have who has

come a long way in terms of developing social skills, her

focus, her ability to create relationships with people,

so I loved this picture because it shows two people that

worked with her in the human resources department at Cape

Cod hospital here in Massachusetts, with a daily

mindfulness practice she was able to come out of her

shell and become a better listener and improve her focus

and let go of stress. A lot of these points on this

slide apply to her.

I would like to look at two examples of workplace

success.

Two examples of recent Project SEARCH graduates who were

interns here with me at Cape Cod, they are now successful

people leading empowered lives, and mindfulness has

helped them overcome barriers.

So our first -- basically my focus in these two

individuals are the words confidence and focus,

mindfulness and action showing how, through the practice,

I help them build more confidence and focus in their

lives.

Here is Justin, in the first slide, here he is making

panini, in his very first rotation here in occupational

health services, which is a set in the program where we

came struggling with all the things he needed to organize

on a daily basis, remembering his badge or his wallet

with his bus pass, or remembering to shave and right off

the bat he presented struggles in the executive functions

so we have what I call a mindfulness system, essentially

for him it was a bureau box, we found a really cool box

and he decorated it and it was his place where he put

every day, his bus pass, his wallet, his hospital badge,

his phone, his keys, whatever he needed for that day was

intentionally set in that box it was to raise his

awareness of these items that he needed them every day

and it was in the same place every day.

That helped with his confidence and he moved on to the

second rotation of the emergency center which built his

confidence he said there was no way he was going to work

in the emergency center so the fact that he tried this

rotation was a really big step for him in his confidence

and in his understanding his emotions, his feelings, his

self-awareness but he still had this negative mindset so

we implemented a daily mantra, which is a positive

thought and I'll talk a bit about this in a bit but his

was stand tall.

I realized when he was over stressed he would recoil in

and I taught him about this mantra and he would say it

and he would open his chest and say okay, I can do this.

Jasmina -- I'm not sure what happened.

Hello?

>>BETH MARKS: What's going on?

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: I'm not sure what

happened. Maybe I have a technical difficulty here.

Do you still see my slide?

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Yes, we see the slide.

You're on slide 14. Do you want to advance.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: I don't see anything on my

computer now.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Okay. I can advance for you.

Slide 15.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: The next slide would be

the third rotation; correct?

In his third rotation he was working, he found his

wheelhouse, his place in food services, he realized he

wanted to start finding a job here.

He had an interview to start off his rotation and right

away in his interview, he self-advocated, talked about

how he had certification so they were able to work with

his skills and it was very empowering for him to be able

to get to that step and he was making paninis he was

serving customers, he ran the cash register so he

definitely grew in that area and when was when we started

using the mindfulness practice, positive intention, goal

setting which was very empowering for him.

Again, this is a time when they start to graduate so he

was starting to feel a little nervous so setting these

goals was great and positive intentions was a great

activity for him.

The next slide is -- I'm working on tech issues here on

my computer.

The next slide is outcome.

He has a wonderful outcome, he is now working a 24-hour a

week job, actually two jobs in food services one in a

local Italian restaurant and a Local 4 star here in

Massachusetts and he lives in an apartment with a

roommate and he's just doing really well.

So he is what I would call a nice success story using

practices to help build his confidence.

The next slide.

The next slide is Katie, standing in one of her

departments.

Katie is someone who I really needed to build focus with.

She would -- again, similar to Justin where she needed

help with her planning, her organization. She would

often get distracted by different peer dramas. So I had

to work with her on her focus and the first thing we did

with her was work on her -- I'm just trying to get back

on to my -- back on here.

Excuse me for a second.

See if I can log back on.

For some reason my computer is shutting down. Just bear

with me for one second.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Do you want to just keep,

going off the slides?

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: The thing is, I don't have

the slides in front of me, so I'm just trying -- let me

just try one click thing and see if I can just log back

in maybe. I'm not sure why I got logged out.

Do you think that would work if I logged back in?

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Yeah.

Can you try? But I can read the slides, headings if you

--

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Yeah. I definitely know

my slides.

Mindful walking, I know that was the biggest thing that

we did with Katie right off the bat was being able to

teach her how to be aware of her surroundings and being

mindful of people around her and, keeping her chin up,

keeping her head up kind of thing, so that was a big part

of her first rotation was teaching her, which in a way

was a mantra.

Sorry. I was just trying to rejoin. I don't know why --

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Jasmina, go ahead and

advance that.

In her second rotation -- actually let me do this.

Okay.

In her second rotation, Katie worked in the nursing

department, and the big barrier, I guess, that Katie had

was that she had to go navigate through 4 different

departments.

It was a very busy hospital and we created this

mindfulness system for her and this was setting daily

reminders on her phone, which department she had to be at

and which day and also recording a time task list,

recording the time that she needed to do those jobs or

the time that it took her to do those jobs.

The third spot, the next slide, go ahead Jasmina, so

we're at the third rotation.

The third rotation Katie worked in the busy hustle and

bustle center and this is clearly where she developed

more independence. She was able to show a lot more calm

presence, professional interaction, she developed a nice

relationship with a housekeeper who was in the ER and

they worked on different strategies and talking about

life after school and graduation and it was really nice

to see her developing these relationships with coworker

when that was something that she struggled with peers in

the past, and like Justin, in her morning routine we did

a lot of positive retention and goal setting to plan,

like I said with Justin, they would be graduating and had

a lot of worry and concern about what was going to happen

next.

So her outcome -- next slide -- her outcome is a pretty

amazing thing, she is working 20 hours a week in a law

firm in downtown Boston, and both of the young people I'm

discussions here have support, they do live in-houses or

apartments with their friends, and the other neat thing

about Katie is throughout all the navigation of the

hospital and trying to set her timers and figure out a

lapse time how long it takes her to get to and from

places she is now able to take the T, which is a train

here in Boston, to work on her own.

So that is very exciting.

Next slide.

Just a quick review of the systems that I talked about, I

talked about mindfulness practices, such as mindfulness

system, like the bureau box or a timer, mantras, which

again I'll talk a little more about in a bit.

And I don't think I mentioned because when I had this

technical glitch, I didn't talk about the breathing

techniques, I worked with Katie quite a lot in teaching

deep breathing and techniques to slow down a little bit

and help with focus and of course the positive thinking

intentions.

Next slide.

There are the two confident and focused young people

working away.

And then the next slide.

This next slide has a list of other types of various

activities that I have used in the classroom as well,

right at the business site, so I just wanted to show you

some of those slides.

Those activities.

So this next slide, the peace corner.

Are we there?

Are we at the peace corner?

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Yes.

When you say next, I proceed, no problem.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: You're wonderful.

Thank you.

So the peace corner slide is just a little spot that

maybe you can create a little section of your office or

your classroom that might have a spot for some

inspirational items or a place that you can sit and get

centered, take a few moments sometimes it helps the

student to kind of go to that little section or that

little area, and we also, working in a hospital, we have

this beautiful meditation chapel that I bring to the

students attention that you need to take a break or need

a focus or recentering, to always go to that meditation

chapel.

Next slide, please.

The stay positive box.

So the stay positive box is something that I keep in the

classroom, every morning I put it out on the desk, and

the students may put a little note in there, a little

note of gratitude or a little note of kindness or

something that they did that they were proud of.

It's kind of a routine they developed to help them,

again, be mindful, be aware of their feelings, their

thoughts, be aware of the people around them and every so

often I'll pull them out and read them and talk and laugh

and go through all the different notes in the box.

Next slide, this is a former student of mine who was in

charge, I gave her the job of the in charge box and this

gave her a sense of leadership and confidence, as always

it's more empowering when our students or our interns

take ownership over something and teach it to others and

so I wanted to emphasize that, so she was my leader for

that.

Next slide.

The next slide is guided imagery, which is very similar

to what I just did with you all in the very beginning of

this Webinar, where we sort of created the image of the

anchor.

The image they would like to share with the students is

this worry tree idea, where my classroom is across the

street from the hospital, so the students have to walk to

work, so we have selected a worry tree along the route

where a student may pause there for a moment, and just

think about their worries, and thoughts that are kind of

those barriers that are just kind of getting in their way

of their success and send those thoughts and those

worries up to the tree where the wind and the water and

the air will take care of them.

So next slide.

Next slide is of a student of mine who uses the worry

tree very regularly.

He pauses there, and I have taught him to pause there for

about five seconds, I have him count, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and

he closes his eye and thinks about those worries and

sends them off.

And then the other picture of him, there he is working as

a confident self-assured young man in materials

management here in the hospital.

Next slide please.

Mandalas, coloring, books they leave around the classroom

if they are done with their work, I leave out these

mandala books to color, studies have shown that coloring

can provide stress receive and improve focus and

creative, and also a compliment.

Journaling, my students do have a journal prompt each day

however I always emphasize that that journal is a tool

you can use in your downtime if you have downtime and in

your departments, after work or at home, it's a

mindfulness tool, an awareness, a way to learn about your

thoughts and feelings and kind of get them out of your

mind and onto the page, the next slide is a student of

mine who uses the journal every day, to prompt on the

board or as a tool to help with stress I always try to

emphasize with our young people that sitting and writing

in a journal is professional.

It's a professional thing to do as opposed -- I try to

teach them other ways when they have to pass time rather

than suffering through their phone or looking at

Instagram or whatever the case may be, this tool is a

nice option to that.

Next slide, please.

Intention, I mentioned this a bit when I was talking a

little bit about my other students about positive

thinking and setting intention, something we did very

often in the morning to start the day, focus on the

positive, focus on gratitude, next slide.

And then in this slide, I have done, in the past,

different themes where each month has a theme and we kind

of focus our morning intentions, maybe the stay positive

box notes, the mantra that we might come up with on

whatever the theme may be, so February being love we

might focus on love and kindness, focusing on ways to be

kind in the workplace how you can show kindness.

That kind of thing.

Next slide.

Next slide is of a student who used this intention

setting regularly, every morning, he called it his happy

place, and every morning before he went to work he had to

stop and pause and just think about his family.

He is a really close-knit family and it was something

that really helped him before going off to his internship

to kind of think about the gratitude and love he has for

his family helped him be successful.

So the next slide is mantra, and I alluded to this a

little bit earlier when I talked about the mindful

walking with Katie, and the stand tall with Justin, a

mantra is a word or a statement or a sound that's

repeated frequently.

Typically you might hear a mantra in a meditation but we

can use it in our everyday lives as a way of positive

thinking, intention setting, or just kind of a catch

phrase or something quick that might snap you back to, oh

yes that's right I need to stand tall, or I need to

believe in myself.

Next slide.

I had a student who was very animated, loved to use his

hands. Loved to speak loudly.

Wonderful qualities in terms of being lively and just

really a joyful presence, but in the workplace, and in a

business meeting, we had to work on the quiet mind, quiet

body with him.

So certainly when he was in a rotation like over in the

OR we worked on that mantra, quiet mind, quiet body and

he reminded himself by using that to calm himself for

whatever task he has next.

The next slide is movement. These five poses here, these

are yoga poses, but they are really just stretches that

can be done in the classroom setting, before the students

go off to work to stretch and get energy moving.

Seated poses in the chair.

So the next slide here shows a student of mine who liked

these stretches, he is a student that really needs to be

on the move a lot.

So stretching in a yoga possession or just getting ready

before he started his day with a stretch of his arm or a

stretch of his legs really helped him to just kind of

feel more centered and ready to go and he works on his

flexibility all of the time. And he had always said, "My

goal is to be flexible both figuratively and literally."

He would say, "I have to learn how to be a more flexible

thinker." So that was a nice connection that we made.

Next slide is the touch stones.

A touch stone is just a small little object that you can

put in your pocket that can help you come back to your

center.

This little picture of some real stones that I have

collected out here on Cape Cod and there a couple of

little rocks there that are perfect for pocket size.

Often I will talk to students about finding something

that resonates with them.

Next slide.

We know as teachers, educators, as parents that the

stress balls are really good for students so that's why I

came up with the touch stone because a stress ball might

not be appropriate when they get in the workplace or

worksite.

So Alex found a blessings angel that he loved and he

would keep with him every day and take it with him and in

the picture where he is quietly resting and meditating he

does have the angel in his hand so that was a touch stone

that he would use appropriately.

He didn't pull it out during work or anything he just

kept it close to him as a way to bring him back to the

present moment especially when he was feeling anxious

about having to go off to graduate and work.

So the next slide is just some breathing techniques,

again, we did the anchor breath in the beginning, finding

the deep calm.

Of the next slide show rhythmic breathing.

Breathing in from the belly all the way up to the chest

and shoulders, and then exhaling or breathing out where

the chest contracts and the abdomen settles back so I

teeth them that breathing.

The next slide shows the exhale.

Reminding everyone that you have to exhale.

Sometimes we forget that we have to let all of that air

out and really let it out so sometimes I have to just

teach the exhale to students.

The next slide is another breathing technique they use,

called the flip not, or recycle breathing.

I have a student who has flip flop stickers all over her

journal because when she gets into a negative mindset the

flip flops remember her to breathe in, whatever that

negative mindset or thought is, and breathe in through

the heart, I say it recycles through the heart like a

composter then she breathes out and it turns into the

opposite feeling so if she starts off anxious and

worried, she will breathe in, thinking that, and flip

flop it and recycle into calm and confidence.

And finally with breathing techniques the next slide

shows an app, I know we all have our smart phones and

this calm iPhone app is a great tool for to practice

meditation, breathing techniques on our own, at home, and

so I give the students, obviously a digital app option in

these days.

It's realistic, and it has nice music in this app and you

don't have to purchase it, you can just get the free

version and it is very effective, I think.

The last couple of slides, the next slide shows some

different tools that I might use like chimes and bells to

indicate that the start of a class and meditation is

beginning.

The next slide is a talking piece, some students struggle

with talking and communicating and sometimes if I give

them an object that's a talking piece it will help them

with mindful turn taking and listening too.

The next slide shows the leader.

I talked a little bit about the leader with the stay

positive box I also used a leader in the worksite as

mentors both of the women in this picture worked in

radiology, and the young woman on the right, cat is

mentoring the other young woman Katie, you saw these two

in the slide show, so cat was teaching Katie some of the

skills that she learned when she worked there. And I was

alongside too just to keep -- if they had any questions

or just to keep the teaching going.

The next slide, mindful jobs.

So again, similar to a leader, a tool to use is having a

student in your classroom being in charge of something

like the stay positive box or the light keeper or leading

the meditation here is a picture of the student, the bell

ringer, ringing the Tibetan bell they have, and leading

the meditation.

And the last bit of -- the last tool is mindfulness

cards.

There are many things out there for mindfulness practice,

if you look at stores, look online, this perfect calm

deck is something that I use regularly, there are stories

or messages on the cards, you can make your own create

mantras or whatever the case may be.

And this final slide are some testimonies that I have

found through various conversation, through things that

students have written down through surveys I have done at

my school to determine how students and internals here at

Project SEARCH like the meditation.

And practice the pause, this next slide is kind of like a

mantra or even like a positive thinking intention,

something that we say a lot, we have adopted this a lot

this year at my site here at Cape Cod hospital is to just

practice the pause.

Pause before jumping into an assumption or an accusation

or a harsh reaction so that's something that I have

really started using and sometimes when we start the

conversation we have students jump in and say oh we have

got to practice the pause here.

The final three slides Jasmina are all resources, Web

sites, some of the books I have consulted, and like I

said, there is my Web site on their which is yoga in

bloom if you would ever like to get in touch with me

through Riverview school or through Project SEARCH, and

the very last slide is our questions.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Thank you very much

Stephanie, I already have several questions coming

through, so I will jump right in. And please feel free

to put the questions in the question and answer box, and

I will read them out loud for Stephanie.

One, the first questions, or a couple, come from Hillary,

what do you recommend for individuals for whom meditation

techniques could become compulsive, for example, some

make journaling excessively causing an anxiety problem

rather than anxiety reliever.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: That's a great question.

I think one of the things I would do if I encountered

that is talk with that student or that intern to try and

find some additional activity that can be done in

addition to the journaling or in addition to whatever

compulsive activities they want to do. So maybe adding

to their own personal tool kit as well as creating a

time.

I know that some students that I have worked with, at my

school, have journaling times.

Like their journal time is when they're at home.

My students here are boarding students my school is a

boarding school so when the students go back to the dorm

some of them have journaling time or some students even

have worry time like time where they have set aside where

they know at 3:30 to 3:45 or 3:30 to 4:00 that they're

going to -- that's their worry time or that's their

journal time and interns might just need those boundaries

to know you can only do that activity from this time to

this time, and then as well, like I said maybe trying to

build a tool kit so there are other activities that that

student resonates with.

Because clearly all of the activities they shared with

you all, not every student will resonate with those so

it's finding what works for that individual person.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Thanks Stephanie.

Another question comes from Karen: Can you give us some

examples of journaling prompts?

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Yes.

Just yesterday, on Valentine's day, we talked about

kindness and one of the prompts I put up on the board was

how -- why is being kind to others important, how can you

show kindness in the workplace, and the third part of

that is give specific examples of times that you showed

actual kindness.

So journal prompts might be something like that, or

today, the journal prompt today was list all of the

skills that you have learned in the following three

categories, what have you learned about interview skills,

job skills, and what have you learned about life skills.

So I will put up a big chart on the board and then we

might also talk about any workplace problems that might

be coming up, or challenges, you know, write about a

workplace challenge, that will drive the morning meeting

class discussion.

There is a nice Web site, I think it's called -- I think

if you Google journaling for self-discovery, that may

come up with this nice list of all different kinds of

journal prompts.

One of my favorites is if you could be an animal what

animal would you be and their responses are so

interesting.

You learn a lot about them, and their inner world, their

personality, I try to work with questions that help learn

about who they are as individuals and a little more of

the social, emotion piece.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Thank you Stephanie.

One of question, what types of disabilities did the

students have?

Just kind of an average, the majority of them?

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: For my students?

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Yes.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: I would say, the ones they

listed on that slide are the most prevalent ones they

have seen with my students so that would be, again,

autism, about 45 percent of our students are on the

autism spectrum, and ADD, and I have seen more and more

now. I have been teaching for a long time but more

students with anxiety and depression it just seems like

such an epidemic, that's why I think these mindful

practices can relationship help those students who are

anxious who feel they don't have any self-worth and they

can't do a job when in fact I see how capable they are

they just need to learn some skills to overcome.

And I do see students with a general intellectual type of

disability.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Thanks Stephanie.

Any other questions?

I do have a couple of comments to read.

People seem to be enjoying the presentation.

So Joanie said we enjoyed the topics giving us many ideas

and I'm liking the phrase practice to pause.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Good.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: And from Rosita, I like how

you can use nature, worry trees, worry box, feelings are

important topics, special box starts today, and Mandela

constructed time, relax time. So also another question:

In your internship, how do you explain and provide advice

to the individuals so that you are not condescending.

When you have to explain to be quiet how do you approach

that with the gentleman?

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: That's a good question.

That is something we came up with together, the more we

involve our young people in creating their own mantras,

their own decisions, their own pathways, the better, so

it doesn't come across as me teaching this thing, so we

talked about that together, as the two of us sitting

down, trying to come up with, what can we do to help you

when your arms are flailing and you're talking really

loud.

And his friend was someone who -- Justin, he used the

stand tall mantra -- so he was already familiar with this

mantra they started with Justin, who again, we talked

about it together, and sometimes it just, I think with

Justin it started with hey, sit up, sit up tall, hey

stand tall that would be a great mantra for you.

So I try to keep it, I try and really involve the young

person, the young adult in what would work for them and

what words, obviously you want to use words that they

would understand and they would embrace so that was

really important for me, to involve them.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Thank you Stephanie.

Any other questions?

We're going to -- I'm going to wait for a couple of

minutes just to see if there are any other comments or

questions that come through.

Thank you all.

I wanted to thank you Stephanie, and are thank you to all

of the attendees for keeping up with the technology, I

think we used some of your strategies today to combat the

stress.

Your computer just completely shut down on you, but I

think we managed to kind of pull it together.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Yes.

Wonderful.

Thank you.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: If there are no other

questions, attendees feel free to sign off, again, we

will make Stephanie's slides, this recording, and the

actual transcript available, and you will be e-mailed

when that becomes available on our Web site so you will

get her PowerPoints and all the resources. You don't

have to take notes on those you will be able to access

those that way.

Again, we're going to be here for a couple more minutes

but thank you all for attending and have a great rest of

the day.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Yes.

Thank you everyone.

And again, I apologize for the computer glitch but like

Jasmina said, we worked through it, so --

[ laughter ]

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: Sometimes you have to stay

calm.

[ laughter ]

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Yeah.

Oh my goodness.

>>JASMINA SISIRAK: All right. I don't think

we're getting any more questions, so we will sign off.

Thank you. Bye.

>>STEFANIE PATTERSON: Okay. Thank you. Bye.

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