Chitty Chats with Stacy

James Moffett 

Stacy York Nation: [00:00:00] Hi friends. Welcome back to Chitty Chats with Stacey. Today's guest is the one and only James Moffat. Truly an unapologetic disruptor. Well played. Nice shirt today. I like it. Uh, for those of you who can't see us, my friend James is sitting in his car. And he's a principal. I'm going to let him introduce himself, but I also want you to share why you're sitting in your car while we do this interview. 

This is the life and times of education. So start with the introduction, then tell me what's 

going on. Yeah. So James Moffitt, I'm principal at Ferris Elementary School in Hutchinson, Kansas, which is about 45 minutes from Wichita, which is where I live. A building of about 335 kids, um, kids that we just love. 

Um, it's just amazing. The work that we get to do every single day. Um, and so I was [00:01:00] just talking to Stacey and one of the things I said was, this is the age of the principalship at this point and just being creative and thinking outside the box and just trying to meet kids needs is what it's all about. 

And so I'm actually leaving the high school because we were able to partner. Thanks to Meg Baldwin, who works in our building. Um, she had this idea of like, let's partner with the high school, because we have so many kids who come to school every single day, we know about dysregulation, but some of that dysregulation just comes from basic needs about being met. 

And so we have so many kids who come to school who have gotten two hours of sleep, one hour of sleep, no sleep at all. And, you know, one of those basic needs that has to be met before we can even talk about learning is sleep, right? Sleep and basic needs like food and water and all those things. And so we have so many kids who come to school every single day completely exhausted. 

And sometimes they will sleep for two to three hours. And I know for me, if I don't get enough sleep, I can be pretty, I'm definitely dysregulated for sure. And so just making sure that need is met before we can get to anything else. And so, we're partnering with our high school and they're actually making cots for us that we can, stackable [00:02:00] cots that we can use quickly when we need to, um, to give that kid that sleep that they need before they go back to class. 

So, um, in between trips, and so I wanted to sit and shitty chat with Stacey. 

I love this for a lot of reasons, James. You have this just beautiful energy about you and I know that this work has been a process for you. I know that it's been, my guess is early in your career you would not say sleep is where we need to go. 

James Moffett: No, I was not a trauma informed educator and I'd say that, um, I say I say it proudly, I just wasn't and I just, it was an ignorance on my part. I just didn't know, you know, and so, um, but definitely now, like, you know, it's, I'm going to talk about, we talk about all the time, relationships before content. Like that's, that's definitely true. 

But part of that relational safety that kids need to feel is just knowing that when they come into our building, that no matter what the need is, that we're going to work to make sure we can meet that, meet that need. 

Stacy York Nation: Yeah, I appreciate that. And I mentioned that. Because this is a journey. I know an educator that started, I [00:03:00] mean, especially those of us who've been in this business for a long time. 

We didn't have this in education even 20 years ago. Like it was just starting, right? So you, I sat in on one of your breakout sessions at one of the multiple times we've been together. Uh, and you have this amazing slide where you talk about trauma, where. Trauma Sensitive, Trauma Informed, Trauma Responsive, Trauma Invested. 

Talk a little bit about that journey because a lot of people that listen are like, how do I get there? How do I, 

James Moffett: what does this look like? And I do want to talk about that, but one of the things that I really also feel just as strongly about is, you know, that word trauma is a trigger for a lot of people. 

And I think if we talk about that process, and I call it a continuum, you know, being aware, being sensitive, being informed, responsive, and invested, like if I take the word trauma out of that completely, that process, that continuum could apply to anything, you know, any, any [00:04:00] change. And I think it's important for us to realize that. 

And the reason trauma is a trigger is because one, it has such a negative connotation for so many people. And I think it causes us to get into a space or some people to get into a space of. This is what's best for those kids or these kids, or, and I really want to stand strongly and say, like, we're talking about best practices for humans, not even just kids. 

We're talking about humans. This is best practice for the way that we collectively are in relationship with the people that we encounter every single day. And so when we talk about this, you know, I compared it to Dilt's nested levels of learning, and he gets into this whole theory about organizational change and the steps that, you know, are necessary for change. 

And it made sense to me to parallel that on this like trauma continuum, because the first step is we have to be aware and I think, you know, you just talked about 20 years ago, I think 20 years ago, I don't, I don't even think that most of us were able to say that I accept, or I'm aware of that there's people around me, people who don't always look the part, [00:05:00] the part, I use that in quotations, like, they don't look like they're hurting, but they're hurting. 

And so they don't look like their, their, their needs are being met, but their needs are being met. And so I think it's important that the first step is that we're aware that, you know, in a school setting that the kids that I work with every single day, the teachers I encounter every single day, the families in our buildings, the community that we lived in, we have to be aware that there's people who have gone through adversity or are currently even going through adversity, that they're dealing with hard shit. 

And I think that's, we have to accept that. And I think that's, that's the starting point. When we get to that starting point, it does begin to shift who you are as a person and how you approach the situations you're, you're dealing with every single day. After that, you know, I really felt like the next step was being trauma sensitive. 

And I think that was the, that was the first phrase I probably heard was like being trauma sensitive. Um, but I feel like in my opinion, this continuum, it's like a second step and being trauma sensitive means, yes, I see it. I'm aware of it, but it's about getting to that step of understanding or that step of empathy. 

of just like, I see [00:06:00] them, I understand the situation, and also I group myself in that as well, because we all, no matter what we look like, have gone through adversity as well. And so I think, and this is the part I usually spend more time talking about this step, because I feel like this is where schools or organizations kind of get into trouble, and I say that because You know, when we move on this journey, one thing that we can never get into is like getting into a space of pity and permissiveness. 

And so as I'm working on my understanding of my empathy, that does not come with pity and permissiveness. I never want us to get to a point where I'm looking at somebody and saying, I feel bad for them. I have pity for them because of their situation. Because what that leads us to is permissiveness where we say, hey, they may not be doing the things that I expect them to do, but you know what? 

They're having a hard time. So it's okay. I don't have any expectation of them. And I think that's a really bad place to be because I can still have expectations of you, but I think the more important part is that I come to you with a compassionate and a caring heart, and I sit [00:07:00] with you, not that I'm being judgmental or shameful or guilting you, but I sit with you in that space as a support to help you. 

I think that's really huge. And so I don't want to get into a space of pity and permissiveness, but at the same time we have people that we've all encountered in this work who go to the opposite extreme and they just get their assholes sometimes they get to this point of just being overly strict or like, I don't believe in that lovey dovey stuff like that. 

You know, like we're not here to coddle kids and we're not here for, you know, I don't want to coddle kids, but I want to support kids and I want to love kids. And so that step of being trauma sensitive, like it's about how you as a building, how do you calibrate what that really means? How do we really go from a place of understanding and empathy that doesn't lend itself to pity and permissiveness or, you know, making people feel judged or making people feel shamed? 

That's the hardest step I really feel like. And if I can get past that, then we get to this point of being, you know, trauma informed. And that's [00:08:00] where, like, people like you or people like Joe Brum or Meg Baldwin, all the people we know, like, that's where I'm going to grow in my understanding. That's where I'm going to, what podcasts can I listen to? 

What, um, what books can I read? What, you know, webinars can I attend? What conferences can I go to that are going to teach me application and practice and theory and all the things that are going to help me understand this work? Um, and then so when I get to that point of being trauma informed, the next step is probably the most important step. 

I gotta do something, right? I think we can all, Stacy, you know this, we know people who are really, really smart and they sit on their ass and don't do anything. I don't, I'm not that person, you're not that person. It's about, now that I know better, Maya Angelou talks about doing better. Well, to do better, I have to actually put something into place. 

I have to put some action into place. And so taking that theory that we're grounded in, thinking those, those, those applicable, applicable things that we can do and actually doing them and getting responsive means doing the work and like, just truly caring for people, loving people, meeting needs. And then [00:09:00] eventually we get to being trauma invested, which this is a lifestyle shift. 

This is a change. This has to be and then for me as a parent as well as a principal, like that was the hardest thing for me and I felt like a hypocrite for a while because I would go to a building and I would do these trauma informed things for other people's kids and then I go back to my own kids and I was just overly strict and the way that I was raised because that's what my parents knew to do. 

So that's what they did. And I have loving parents. I do. Um, but trauma investor just means I had to admit that I needed to do this for my own kids as well. My other relationships that I encounter all the time. So that's kind of the continuum, but yeah, I feel strongly about that. Well, I 

Stacy York Nation: appreciate it. So there's a lot of things I appreciate you about, about you, James, but I appreciate that you got super vulnerable when I listened to you about. 

The shift of doing this at work at school. And bringing it at home, right? When you start to just live this in your life, it becomes a lifestyle. It [00:10:00] very much like I can't go into the world anymore and not think about regulation, dysregulation. Oh, that person's struggling. And. I think trauma is a triggering word. 

And what I often say is trauma and resilience are two sides to the same coin. And one of the things we do in education is we spend a lot of time talking about trauma and not as much about resilience and that resilience, they both have to be present to make progress. And you talk a lot about the importance of holding expectations and that behavior has consequences. 

Yeah, for sure. You use the C word and a lot of, a lot of educators don't. So I just would love to hear your insight 

James Moffett: on that. Well, one, you know, the, when we talk about the C word, I think sometimes it gets into this semantics game. And I think sometimes we misuse the word consequence and the word punishment and we make them interchangeable and they're not. 

Like, there is, and I will stand boldly and say, there is no place for [00:11:00] punishment in schools because when I think about punishment, it's punitive, it's harsh, it's intent is to hurt or to harm. And so from that standpoint, like, there's not a place for punishment, but consequences, and I often put it with three things, like, we have to have accountability, structure, consequences. 

Love that. None of those words are bad words. Those are all good words. Good things. Those are all things that we all need. I think where we miss it sometimes is the way that we approach them. You know, like accountability. I could make that a bad thing if I do it without a heart for people. You know what I mean? 

I structure could be a bad thing if I'm not in relationship with people and they know my heart. And the same thing about consequences. So we have to have, and I don't care what organization your is, whether it's a school or whatever, accountability, structure and consequences are necessary components. Um, we have to have those as humans. 

That's another one of those. We don't often think of them as basic needs, but those truly are basic needs that we have to be successful. 

Stacy York Nation: Yeah. And it's part of life. Every action [00:12:00] has a consequence. Every behavior has a consequence, right? All now, I always give the example, like I love to speed and I got a lot of speeding tickets. 

Punishment does not cause me to change my behavior. Right. But consequence, right. Me being in the car with my kids, them witnessing all of that, that has a consequence. That is something where I'm like, Ooh, yeah. Way different when I have my kids versus 

James Moffett: me. Yeah. Consequences, influence, behavior, uh, punishment. 

Like what I feel like it does is it ruins relationship, you know, like, and, and people often, I feel like punishment doesn't teach. If anything, punishment teaches me to hate the person delivering the punishment. 

Stacy York Nation: Yeah, for real. So here's a question I have that I've asked all the administrators is, do staff need the same insight as you give to students? 

James Moffett: Yeah, I think, you know, in one of the, I talk a lot about mindset shifts, and one of the mindset shifts that I think is really, really important is, I should never be expecting something from a staff [00:13:00] member. I wouldn't be okay with my supervisor expecting it from me. In fact, I think I have on my badge here, and every teacher has something like this on their badge. 

It says, if you wouldn't accept it from your supervisor, don't dish it out to a kid. Our students are owed respect from you on day one. That's what will earn you their respect. And I think that's so important. It's a, it's a reciprocal process. Um, and that's something that I think about every single day. 

Like if the way that I'm treating a teacher, is this the way that I want them to? interact and behave and be relational with their kids. And it should line up. And I also think it's, you know, for a long time, um, we haven't always done that as educators. We haven't always, you know, expected the same thing from ourselves that we expect from our kids. 

And we have to get to that point. You know, when I throw around words like grace and respect, like to me, those are things that our kids deserve. Those are things that our kids, on day one, like I said, that's what they get for being in my presence. It's not something that they have to earn. You don't have to earn my grace. 

You don't have to earn my [00:14:00] respect. As a human, those are things that you are given. 

Stacy York Nation: Love that. So you had mentioned that you made the shift at school before you made it at home. I have a different experience. I discovered Bruce Perry in 2006 and I was pregnant and I was learning all this information. I was developing a brainstem and I was developing a nervous system and what ended up for me is living it at home and then applying it to other people. 

When you work this at your own house. When you look at the dysregulation in your children, which isn't, to me, it made parenting, it just made more sense. It made it easier in some ways because I'm like, Oh, my kids aren't out to get me. Like, they're just little humans who need this shift also. How has it changed? 

How has this work that is now a lifestyle, how has it changed your own 

James Moffett: parenting journey? I think just [00:15:00] the relate, I'm much more relational, you know, and one of the things, and there's so many parallels between work and home, but at work, one of the things I talk about is I never want to do something to somebody, For somebody, I want to do it with them. 

And so I think I have to look at parenting in the same sense. Like I want to do this with my children. I want to do this where we can have conversations about things that go wrong. Cause things do go wrong. Right? Like my fifth grader, she gets in trouble at school sometimes. And so as I'm driving home, because I got that email from the teacher, I'm, I'm processing, like, how can I approach this in a way? 

That it doesn't feel punitive, that it feels like this can be relational and we can have conversations about what happened. But also there's this sense of also being vulnerable. Like in me studying to my fifth grader, you know what, like I was a fifth grader once too. And I made poor choices too. I'm an adult, I still make poor choices. 

There's consequences for those choices and we have to work through those consequences and we figure it out. And so I think that's just that shift because I think [00:16:00] we all grew up in, in, in situations where there was punishment. We grew up in situations where the way that we, it was very fear based. And no, the thing I think that's so true about your story is, you know, and this is gonna sound weird. 

You remind me of my dad. When I say you remind me of my dad, I mean, my dad did 22 years in the army, retired Lieutenant Colonel, and he was the stereotype of that. You know what I mean? Like just that fear based. Like, this is my expectation, and you're gonna meet this expectation, and if you don't meet this expectation, here's the punishment, and you're gonna fear me and all the things. 

And again, I love my dad. And like, and as he's gotten older, as with most people as they get older, they learn better, they do better, like the conversations change. Like, he was what I needed, he's still what I need all the time. But um, I think it just made me be more relational and more, and definitely slower to respond. 

We spent a lot of time talking about reacting and responding. I definitely have shifted in my parenting to being a responder. and not always reactionary. Are there [00:17:00] times I still react? Yeah, I'm human, so I still make that mistake sometimes when I react. But even when I react, I think the difference is having those conversations afterwards where I can again be vulnerable and say, you know what, I didn't handle that the best way. 

I'm sure I made you feel this way by reacting the way that I did. I want to apologize for that, which there's so much power in apology. We know that with kids at school and kids at home, let's have a conversation. Let's try that again. And so I think that's been the biggest shift for me as a parent. Love that. 

Stacy York Nation: So you mentioned fear based. I think many of us grew up in fear based homes, right? And the opposite of fear based is love based. And so this whole component of love is the intervention. And I think the shift is really hard for a lot of people because we haven't always been loved. We haven't always been loved in the way that we're going to try to love our students, try to love our own children. 

And for me, having that moment with Dr. Perry while my child is being developed inside of me and then coming into the world, [00:18:00] breaks generational cycles. Right? And me being in the military as a person with all this information, breaks generational cycles. And I appreciate that, you know, we don't talk a lot about love. 

Educators love their kids! Educators love their kids and love really is the intervention. 

James Moffett: I love that you say that. I love love is the intervention. It's so true. And sadly, we live in a day and age where we have educators who are afraid to say that. So afraid to say, I love you to their kids. And you know, one of the things we say every single day is we love you. 

There's nothing you can do about it. I heard that years ago. I know I heard it in church. I'm sure I did, but it's one of the things we tell our kids every day. But I think it's just a good mindset to have because I need myself. our teachers, our staff, but also our kids to understand that your, my love for you is not based on your behavior. 

You know what, like you're going to mess up. I fully expect you to have those moments where you just make the wrong choice. You make a poor [00:19:00] decision. And in spite of that, I love you no matter what. Because if we can get to a point of our kids knowing that we love them no matter what, that that's where we get to that point of true relationship, true vulnerability. 

True reciprocal care, mutual respect, grace, all the things. If we're constantly living in an age of I'm afraid to mess up because of the fear that I have for what's going to happen and how that person's going to react, like we have kids who are more dysregulated because of that. Like that in itself causes dysregulation. 

We have to accept that. 

Stacy York Nation: 100%. Well, I appreciate you being a model for saying you love your kids, for saying you love, you're going to create a love based environment. You're going to have love based intervention. And love does not come without accountability. Love does not come without consequence. Love does not come with structure, without structure, right? 

Like those are important pieces of love. One of the misnomers I think about trauma informed education is that we let kids do whatever they [00:20:00] want. We let kids behave however they want, and I get a sense that that's not true 

James Moffett: at Ferris Elementary. No, I made a, I made a post, this has been years, but years ago, but I still stand by this. 

I am a Chaman for an educator, but I'm not a pusho. You know, me being, me being trauma informed does not mean that I go to school to be a punching bag, that I go to school to be disrespected, I go to school to, you know, that's not what that means. It means that I'm willing to do the hard work to forge a relationship with you so that you're less likely, we're less likely to have those moments. 

And it is, there's, there's consequences for behavior. And I think one of the things you said earlier in this is lots of people who are in this movement are afraid to talk about consequences. Because. I guess I don't really know the reason they're afraid to, but I think they just associate that consequence is the bad thing and it's not a bad thing. 

There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing bad about a consequence for a behavior. Um, but if the consequence isn't, [00:21:00] you know, Relatable. If the consequence isn't connected, if the consequence isn't, you know, something that's going to teach me, um, to do something different the next time, if there's not the conversation, we talk about Ross Green, Bruce Perry, all these people, and they get into collaborative problem solving the importance of, you know, a consequence being collaborative, you know, we, we do have to get away from like these unilateral decisions where, you know, this behavior happened and I'm going to tell you what you're going to do to learn from the behavior and correct the behavior. 

And that's how we get into the whole restorative work because it's more about collaboration and saying, you know, this is the what who's been affected by this and then how are we going to repair this and who I mean, who do we need to go make things right with that's that's really the work that we're doing and the direction that we need to be headed. 

Love that. 

Stacy York Nation: And I love the word repair. I often say consequence does not come without repair. Like there has to be repair in relationship. And it's been fun. I have a daughter who's almost 17. [00:22:00] She's a full blown teenager. I'm going to pay her 2 for telling the story because she's negotiated royalties. And one of the things that we do, I mean, we're in it. 

We're mom and a daughter. She's passionate. We have moments that are not great. They're dysregulated, right? And even yesterday she said, yeah, we got to repair mom. Let's do this. How do we repair this relationship? We had a fracture today. And having that language at 16, can you even imagine what that would have been like for our trajectory? 

And so I want to be clear that when we talk about repair, we're teaching kids that these relationships are valuable. And my guess is at Ferris Elementary, people who repair relationships are very much teaching that message. These relationships are valuable. 

James Moffett: That's always the goal, and like what you just said, that always stands out to me. 

We repair things that are valuable and important. You know what I mean? Like, think about this, there's some things that like, they break and I throw them [00:23:00] away because they're not important to me. I can go get another one. But a relationship is not like that. It should not be like that. When I, when I break or disconnect in a relationship, I'm invested enough in that relationship that I want to repair it. 

That's, that's important to me. That's necessary for me. And so when I keep saying Meg's name, Meg's somebody who's on our staff now who does incredible work and you know that. And like she's working with us as a staff on circles and at this point, we're just talking about just connection circles or community circles. 

We're not to the point of using circles for repair yet, but I'm excited for us to take that next step. And I know that that's coming. 

Stacy York Nation: Love that. I love that. So I have a couple last questions for you. Your principal life is your main hustle, but I know you've got some side hustles. People are going to listen to this and they're like, going to be like, I need James Moffitt's in my life. 

How do I get that? Your speaker, you do. Yeah. Yeah. How do people find you, 

James Moffett: James Moffitt? So on Twitter, so it's just at James Moffitt Jr. So don't forget the junior on [00:24:00] the end. And then on Facebook, um, I have a business page, just JM educational consulting, or you can just find me personally on Facebook and we can connect that way. 

I don't have websites or stuff like that. Like most of the business that I get to do is just. Word of mouth and social media. So that's kind of what I go by. But I do love getting out to other districts and other schools and presenting. I've been to places like New York and Florida and Colorado a couple times, Oklahoma. 

I love doing that work. And I just, one of the things that I most appreciate is there's people way smarter than me who work on the theory and the neuroscience and all those things that are really, really important. The thing that I love to focus on is the application. You know, like, how do we, in a building, I hear all these, I hear all this theory, it makes sense to me, how do I put that into action so my kids are benefiting? 

That's the work that I love to do and have conversations with. So, whether it's keynoting or whether it's, um, working with small groups of teachers, whether it's just PD after school or on a PD day, those are all things that I love to do. 

Stacy York Nation: I think that's a critical [00:25:00] component. So one of the things that I set out long time ago, when I started doing this whole speaking gig was people will leave my audience with things they can try the next day. 

Like, I'm going to give you the theory that supports it because that's important, but it's got to be applicable. It's got to be applicable, whether it's a script, whether it's the language, whether it's. You know, all the strategies that we list or how it really gets implemented and your work as a principal, you're changing culture, you're changing education, and one of the things I'll say is my guess is your teachers are happy working 

James Moffett: there. 

You know, that's one of the things that's important to me has always been, you know, if a teacher were to leave Ferris today. I never want them to say they're leaving because they don't have the support that they need. That will never be the reason somebody leaves because, you know, we've done some really dynamic things in the way that we structure just schedules and personnel that we have so people have accountability partners and people have coaches that they can refer to and coaches that they meet with every single week one on one.[00:26:00] 

Um, I think that's important, especially right now. And the one thing I always say is, this work is hard. You'll never hear me say this work is easy, this work is really hard, and after Christmas break there was like a month and a half stretch whereas the building, it was really really heavy, just because of the situation some of our kids were coming to school with and the baggage that they brought and the way that we took that on as a staff which was commendable and I would not want to work with the, this is the best staff I've ever had. 

I say that hands down. Um, but it's, the work is hard, and one of the things we talked about was the cost of connection, and it was really just that understanding of some of the reason it's so hard right now is because we spent four years really, really working on relationships and connecting with our community and making our people feel seen, valued, and heard, and now that they know that they're seen, valued, and heard, I think we're in an age of they trust it to a point of they share everything with us, which is good, and it's also bad, and it makes it really, really heavy for us. 

Stacy York Nation: [00:27:00] Okay, so we lacked the cost of connection, and you talked about that when you came back from Christmas. 

James Moffett: Yeah, I was just saying, you know, that cost of connection really means that we spent these four years, up until now, Really, really working on building relationships where when we have conversations with parents, they don't feel judged. 

They don't feel shame. They don't feel guilt. They truly feel that we are connected, not just to their kids, but to their whole core family and our community. And I think because of that, After Christmas break, there was just stuff happening with our kids that were happening at home. But because our families feel connected to us, they were sharing and they were sharing and they were sharing and we were taking it on and taking it on and taking it on. 

And it got us to a point of it was really, really heavy. And some of us sat in the room and we said, you know what? Like I've been in education for 20 years, 25 years, 30 years, whatever it is. Um, I've never felt a time where it's been this heavy. And we, what I love is us being able to collectively to have a conversation because we could have gone two ways with that. 

We could have easily gone down a really negative [00:28:00] path of, I can't do this, but we chose to take the high road and say, you know what, we are fortunate to be connected to our parents the way that we are, that they feel that they can trust us and share, and we feel the same way about our kids. And so that's been, yeah, the cost of connection is continually in my head since those conversations. 

Compassion fatigue is 

Stacy York Nation: real. Yeah, it is real. Well, I appreciate you James Moffitt. I love that we got this time together. I always feel thankful we get to share space. And what's so great about this is you're, you're cruising from an out of box idea. Like you're, you're putting into practice. Kids need sleep. 

I had to go pick up some cots. Oh, I partnered with the high school so that they could make the cots. Like the thing about Trauma Invested is it's not a one man show. Transcribed It is a whole community and I often tell people, you don't have to do this on your own and you're not doing it on your own. 

Like making pots, right? Talking to the high school and the high school kids are going to be super stoked [00:29:00] to do these things and serve little buddies. And so I just appreciate all that you are and the world changing stuff you're doing, James. Thanks for your time today. 

James Moffett: Thank you, Stacey. I love being with you. 

Yeah. Have a wonderful day. You too.