St. Mary School's Vice Principal Jennifer Gentes, Principal Emilie Wolfe, and Lisa Cowell, a teacher who plays a significant role in the specialized classroom program, pose for a picture in one of the classrooms dedicated to the program on April 1, 2025. (Kenneth Cheung/ battlefordsNOW staff)

By Kenneth Cheung

EDUCATION SUCCESS

‘Children are our future’: St. Mary School shows early success in Sask. specialized classroom pilot

Apr 2, 2025 | 2:01 PM

“When we first started, we had a little boy who was dysregulated often,” said Jennifer Gentes, vice-principal at St. Mary School in North Battleford.

“He walked in, we had a meditation on the whiteboard, and he just laid down, and he was there for two or three minutes taking his deep breath, and then he got up and he went back to class.

“So it was like, wow, he didn’t disrupt anyone else. He did what he needed to do, and then he went back and he was able to learn.”

That moment, Gentes said, captures the essence of a new approach to student support being piloted at the school.

St. Mary, a Catholic elementary school offering Pre-K to Grade 7 education, is one of eight schools across Saskatchewan participating in a specialized classroom pilot project launched in January 2024. The initiative, supported by the province, is designed to assist students with additional behavioural and emotional needs through early intervention, relationship-building, and structured support.

LITTERED NEEDLES

Needle sightings typical during spring thaw, says city fire chief

4h ago

Raiders trail series 3-2

Raiders feed off Art Hauser crowd for clutch game five win

15h ago

Funding technology

"It would be difficult": Police chief says body-worn cameras not in near future

23h ago

Emilie Wolfe, principal and lead on the initiative, said the school’s Connections program includes two full-time teachers, one educational assistant and a school-wide strategy to reduce classroom disruptions and improve student well-being.

“Each school is unique, so we had to make sure that it fits our demographic and supports our students,” she said.

“There was a need here at St. Mary’s for that structural behaviour support to help the students succeed in school.”

The program is structured around three goals set by the Ministry of Education: creating improved school experiences for students requiring additional support, enhancing learning environments for all students, and reducing classroom interruptions and stress for both students and staff.

At a Battlefords Chamber of Commerce luncheon earlier this year, then-Minister of Education Jeremy Cockrill praised St. Mary’s leadership.

“When I’m down in Regina, [and] I visited most of them in the province. These guys have the best one here,” he said.

Early results appear to back that up.

“We’re 25 per cent fewer classroom disruptions already in the year, with 12.5 per cent improved self regulation and engagement,” Wolfe said.

A central feature of the program is a daily one-on-one check-in between students and Connections staff.

“Ninety per cent of students saying the daily check-ins help them stay on track,” Wolfe said. “Those are the pieces where they come to us one on one, and we set the goal for the day.”

Connections staff monitor student behaviour through surveys, observations and structured reflection. The information helps shape individualized support on a daily basis.

“We collect a lot of data, so we go where the data tells us to go,” Wolfe said. “You have to be very flexible, right? It’s a very fast moving program, and each day is different.”

Currently, about 20 per cent of students at St. Mary are part of the program. According to school data, 36 per cent are on full individualized support plans, 48 per cent are being monitored, and 16 per cent have been removed from the program after demonstrating progress.

“It’s giving the children an opportunity to be heard and to maybe have that talk time, or maybe they need time just to fidget, or have that exercise, or maybe they’re hungry,” Wolfe said.

“So having these extra teachers be able to support them [students] in those ways, while the classroom teacher is supporting the rest of the class, enables us to help them [students] reach those goals and those needs.”

Gentes, who also teaches math in the Connections classroom, said the smaller class size has helped meet individual student needs.

“It’s a smaller class now and then I can meet that one on one need, right?” she said. “So before the student gets frustrated and may act out, you know, prior to this program, I’m able to check in on them and make sure that they have their needs met, and then I can teach them the actual math.”

The model also alleviates pressure on teachers in split-grade classrooms.

“They’re also split classrooms,” Wolfe said. “So Jennifer [Gentes]’s teaching Grade 6 and 5. So that’s two different curriculums, which takes a lot of stress off the teachers.”

Beyond academics, the Connections program focuses heavily on emotional regulation. Students use daily visual check-ins based on the Zones of Regulation, a framework that helps them identify how they’re feeling and what strategies can bring them back to a learning-ready state.

“We use GoZen, so the whole staff is involved in the same language with zones of the regulations,” Wolfe said. “Each staff member has a lanyard like this, and it has all of the meditations and pieces that the kids are learning.”

GoZen is a digital mental wellness tool designed for children aged seven to 15 dealing with mild to moderate anxiety. Through animated storytelling, it introduces strategies that make emotional learning accessible and engaging.

Staff also receive regular training in Therapeutic Crisis Intervention (TCI) and dedicate part of weekly staff meetings to share and refine classroom strategies.

“We dedicate some of our staff meeting time to teaching all the staff, all these different techniques that we use with the students,” Gentes said.

The consistency has helped students learn how to self-assess and regulate before rejoining their peers.

“We ask them what zone they are in, so if they’re green, then they’re good to go to learn,” Gentes said. “They’re starting to recognize more and more when they’re not ready to learn, and they usually just need a few minutes.”

Relationships with families are also a cornerstone of the program. Staff provide weekly reports and check-ins with caregivers to ensure consistent support across home and school.

“We give them regular updates. We provide them little report cards every week with a strategy idea,” Wolfe said. “One of our parents said she looks forward to the report card and strategy of the week because we work on it together at home.”

Students, who asked to remain anonymous, have also reported the strategies are helping them beyond the classroom.

One told Wolfe, “I know when I’m getting frustrated and can ask my teacher for a break.” Another added, “It’s helping my mental health and I use my strategies at dance.”

Looking ahead, the school is planning to expand the program into physical education and other unstructured areas like recess and transitions.

“We’re already looking into next year adding a physical education component,” Wolfe said. “Help them with those more unstructured periods and how to be engaged socially and emotionally in the gym even.”

She acknowledged the work is often emotionally taxing, but the impact is worth it.

“It’s a lot of mental work,” Wolfe said. “Their behaviours affect our behaviours, and our behaviours affect their behaviours.”

Teamwork, she said, is the key to making the program sustainable.

“They check their egos at the door. If they can’t help the student, they ask for help from another adult,” Wolfe said. “That teamwork has really been something that we’ve developed with this program.”

For Wolfe, the philosophy behind it all is simple.

“Children are our future, right? And it’s when they feel safe and supported and loved, then they thrive,” she said. “Programs like this and the schools need the support from the public to help these children reach their potential.”

—

Kenneth.Cheung@pattisonmedia.com