We don't need another hero: Navigating and narrating trauma in the classroom
Author Identifier (ORCID)
Abstract
This chapter explores the transformative potential of an educator drawing from personal trauma to frame and support a trauma-informed Enabling classroom. This chapter uses storytelling and lived experience to reflect on the balance between vulnerability and professionalism when drawing from personal traumatic experience. It highlights the challenges of emotional regulation and maintaining boundaries whilst fostering emotional safety for students who have experienced trauma to flourish in a transitional space, without it becoming a trauma dump. This chapter journeys through the tension between authenticity, containment and self-awareness, sharing how an Enabling educator used her experiences not as confessions, but as a tool for empathy to stimulate learning and move students through challenging tasks. Through a ‘warts-and-all’ narrative, this not-always hero’s journey shows how collective trauma-informed pedagogy rooted in compassion, ethics and lived experience can build self-efficacy in the classroom.
Keywords
trauma-informed pedagogy, enabling education, lived experience, educator wellbeing, student self-efficacy, emotional safety
Document Type
Book Chapter
Date of Publication
1-1-2026
Publication Title
Trauma-Informed Teaching in Non Traditional Spaces: Stories, Scholarship and Strategies
Publisher
Taylor & Francis
School
Access and Equity
ISBN
[9781041313441, 9781041313458, 9781003778516]
Copyright
subscription content
First Page
40
Last Page
52
Recommended Citation
Jones, A. (2026). We don't need another hero: Navigating and narrating trauma in the classroom. In A. Maclaurin & A. Jones (Eds.), Trauma-informed teaching in non-traditional spaces: Stories, scholarship and strategies (pp. 40–52). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003778516-6