Imagine what a classroom would look like if no one knew how to share, ask for what they wanted or calm themselves down when they were upset.
What if students couldn’t tell their teacher how they were feeling? What if students couldn’t cope with frustration or embarrassment when they made a mistake? There would be endless crying, arguments, and maybe even some toy-throwing, and not a lot of learning would take place as teachers constantly put out fires.
This is where social-emotional learning (SEL) comes in. We’re here to give you a peek into the classroom to help families understand what their children are learning through SEL.
What topics belong to social-emotional learning?
The Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL) defines social-emotional learning as the process through which all young people and adults acquire and apply the knowledge, skills, and attitudes to develop healthy identities, manage emotions and achieve personal and collective goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain supportive relationships, and make responsible and caring decisions.
This lengthy explanation essentially boils down to “how kids learn the skills they need to eventually function in society.” CASEL breaks down SEL into five core competencies, also known as the “CASEL 5.”
Self-awareness
Self-awareness can be thought of as children simply getting to know themselves. What do they like and dislike? How do certain scenarios make them feel, and how do they feel this in their bodies? What cultural or social identities are they a part of?
Self-management
Self-management includes concepts like self-regulation, goal-setting, and striving to meet those goals. Students learn how to regulate both positive and negative emotions so they can achieve what they set out to do.
Responsible Decision-making
Children learn to have autonomy in their own decision-making processes by first learning about cause and effect, then the positive and negative consequences of their actions. Through modeling and trial and error, they learn how to analyze and respond to social situations. Young children, in particular, will need lots of support with this, with parents and teachers gradually releasing that support as children grow and become more independent.
Relationship Skills
While you may think relationship skills come naturally, young children must learn how to form and maintain friendships. By building relationship skills, they learn how to interact and collaborate in diverse groups, resolve conflicts, and communicate effectively and respectfully with others. These relationship skills grow more and more important as children become teenagers and adults, where they must function in societies with others of all backgrounds.
Social Awareness
Social awareness can be thought of as learning the social norms for different settings, practicing perspective-taking, and developing a sense of justice and empathy for others. For instance, children might learn how they act in a classroom, which differs from how they might behave on the playground or at home, and why that is necessary.
What Does SEL Look Like in the Classroom?
Social-emotional programs use teacher-led activities to engage students in learning new emotional vocabulary and practicing SEL skills.
Teach a Strategy
For instance, many Second Step lessons involve teaching children a particular strategy, like counting to ten during timeswhen it’s challenging to be patient or searching for clues in a person’s facial expressions and body language to identify how they’re feeling. Students practice these skills regularly as a group. They are then challenged to use these same strategies as they work and play with their peers.
Utilize Targeted Read-alouds
Many teachers also utilize read-alouds to help children build a theory of mind, the concept that others may have experiences, beliefs, and desires that differ from their own. Studies show that picture books can serve as “mirrors, windows, and sliding glass doors” in which children see themselves and others in stories or are able to feel empathy for the characters in the story.
The RULER Approach from the Yale Child Study Center is a social-emotional program that regularly employs read-alouds as a teaching method; students across grade levels analyze how characters recognize, understand, label, express, and regulate their emotions, then learn to apply these positive strategies in their own lives. This approach also helps children build their understanding of emotions through the arts, as they create drawings, paintings, skits, etc., to convey meaning and process through feelings.
Teach Coping Through Modeling
Beyond targeted instruction, teachers also support students’ social interactions and emotional regulation as situations arise in the classroom. Through modeling, they help children use appropriate words or strategies to cope with issues like sharing, peer conflict, embarrassment, and disappointment. Showing students how to apply the strategies they have in these authentic situations is paramount in helping them eventually do this independently. This builds a strong foundation for creating the collaborative, respectful, and understanding communities we want to see in the future.
Who Benefits from Social-emotional Learning, and How?
Students
In short, everyone. Research demonstrates that SEL programs result in a wide array of benefits for students in all grade levels. In one study, using the Second Step curriculum in preschool positively affected Pre-K students’ pre-literacy and math skills, as well as school readiness into 1st grade.
Research shows that targeted SEL programs improve peer relationships and happiness among middle schoolers, particularly boys. A systematic review of 321 studies on SEL programs also reports improved academic outcomes and classroom climate, with reductions in emotional-behavioral problems and bullying. Some studies even report that implementing SEL interventions serves as a protective factor against later dropout rates, mental health issues, and bullying.
Educators
Social-emotional learning not only benefits students but also improves educators’ general well-being. Teachers who implement SEL in their classrooms report less job-related anxiety, better relationships with their students, and improved job satisfaction. Thus, SEL programs can serve as a mitigating factor for schools that are already losing teachers to burnout.
Engaging Families
Families benefit when there is clear communication about the specific social-emotional skills children are learning. Second Step’s curriculum, for instance, includes parent letters about the weekly SEL topics students are studying. Some research shows that curricula that guide parents on supporting social-emotional learning at home have greater benefits for students than those that don’t. Teachers can share these crucial documents in their Classroom News Feed to improve parent engagement and help children continue their social-emotional growth at home.
Selecting the Right SEL Program for the Classroom
A teacher can teach social-emotional learning explicitly or during day-to-day interactions. There are myriad options for a social-emotional curriculum that may address all core competencies or focus on a few.
A systematic review of preschool social-emotional intervention programs showed that Tools of the Mind, PATHS, Second Step, and the I Can Solve Program are particularly effective in reducing emotional-behavioral problems, improving executive functioning skills, and boosting academic performance.
CASEL encourages schools and community programs to be thoughtful about the social-emotional learning program that they choose to implement. Some programs are better as interventions for particular groups of children, while others are best implemented classwide. It’s also important to ensure that the chosen program addresses students’ experiences in culturally relevant ways; most studies have addressed American students’ responses to SEL programs, but there are gaps in the research addressing the benefits of the same programs in other parts of the world.
As schools and parents begin to recognize the benefits of social-emotional education for children, we hope that it becomes as valued a part of the learning day as any academic instruction. The evidence is clear: SEL programs not only improve children’s academic achievement by up to 11%, but pay off in dividends as they create more understanding, empathetic, self-aware members of our communities.
More Information on Common Social-Emotional Learning Curricula
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- Improving Classroom Climate and Student Success through Social-emotional Learning (SEL) - November 14, 2024
