Social Emotional Guide

Social Emotional Curriculum Guide

What is Social and Emotional Learning?

Social and Emotional Learning is a process for learning life skills, including how to deal with oneself, others and relationships, and work in an effective manner. Social and Emotional Learning helps students recognize their emotions and learn how to manage those feelings. It helps them develop sympathy and empathy for others, as well as maintain positive relationships. The important skills that Social and Emotional Learning target are self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making.

Relationships and emotional processes affect how and what we learn. By reducing misbehavior and the amount of time spent on classroom management, Social and Emotional Learning programs create more time for teaching and learning. They also strengthens students' relationships with their peers, families, and teachers. Caring teacher-student and student-student relationships foster students' commitment to school and promote academic success.

Numerous research reports show that Social and Emotional Learning can have a positive impact on students' academic performance. Students who learn in an environment that targets and develops their social and emotional competencies do better academically and feel happier. Social and emotional learning programs also reduce aggression and emotional distress among students, increase helping behaviors in school, and improve positive attitudes toward self and others (Durlak et al., 2011). It's the real way to bullyproof the classroom and enable students to feel happy, safe, and respected in school.

1. SELF-AWARENESS

What are my thoughts and feelings?
What causes those thoughts and feelings?
How can I express my thoughts and feelings respectfully?

2. SELF-MANAGEMENT

What different responses can I have to an event?
How can I respond to an event as constructively as possible?

3. SOCIAL AWARENESS

How can I better understand other people's thoughts and feelings?
How can I better understand why people feel and think the way they do?

4. RELATIONSHIP SKILLS

How can I adjust my actions so that my interactions with different people turn out well?
How can I communicate my expectations to other people?
How can I communicate with other people to understand and manage their expectations of me?

5. RESPONSIBLE DECISION MAKING

What consequences will my actions have on myself and others?
How do my choices align with my values?
How can I solve problems creatively?

The Responsive Classroom Approach

To teach social and emotional skills, I follow the Responsive Classroom approach. The Responsive Classroom approach is a widely used, research-backed social and emotional learning program that increases academic achievement, decreases problem behaviors, improves social skills, and leads to more high-quality instruction.

Guiding Principles
The Responsive Classroom approach is informed by the work of educational theorists and the experiences of exemplary classroom teachers. Seven principles guide this approach:

The social curriculum is as important as the academic curriculum.
How children learn is as important as what they learn: Process and content go hand in hand.
The greatest cognitive growth occurs through social interaction.
To be successful academically and socially, children need a set of social skills: cooperation, assertion, responsibility, empathy, and self-control.
Knowing the children we teach—individually, culturally, and developmentally—is as important as knowing the content we teach.
Knowing the families of the children we teach and working with them as partners is essential to children's education.
How the adults at school work together is as important as their individual competence: Lasting change begins with the adult community.

Classroom Practices
At the heart of the Responsive Classroom approach are ten classroom practices:

Morning Meeting—gathering as a whole class each morning to greet one another, share news, and warm up for the day ahead
Rule Creation—helping students create classroom rules that allow all class members to meet their learning goals
Interactive Modeling—teaching children to notice and internalize expected behaviors through a unique modeling technique
Positive Teacher Language—using words and tone to promote children’s active learning and self-discipline
Logical Consequences—responding to misbehavior in a way that respects children, guides them to recognize the effects of their actions, and helps them develop internal controls
Guided Discovery—introducing materials using a format that encourages creativity and responsibility
Academic Choice—increasing student motivation and learning by allowing students teacher-structured choices in their work
Classroom Organization—setting up the physical room in ways that encourage independence, cooperation, and productivity
Working With Families—inviting families’ insights and helping them understand the school’s teaching approaches
Collaborative Problem-Solving—using conferencing, role-playing, and other strategies to resolve problems with students

Targeted Social and Emotional Skills Lessons

Below are many social and emotional concepts that I aim to explicitly teach at the beginning of the school year and throughout by modeling, role-playing, and discussion. Instruction happens in mini lessons as well as informally throughout the day. Each skill will take a different amount of time to develop depending on the needs and abilities of students. We will also jump around to support the current climate of the classroom (someone has an anger meltdown, perfect time to learn about anger management, empathy, and problem solving). Once we touch upon each skill, we will reinforce and explore each of them in more depth throughout the year as challenges and situations come up.

Self Skills

Self Awareness and Management

Recognizing and understanding our own thoughts and feelings
How to express our thoughts and feelings respectfully by being kind and gentle
Choosing how to respond to an event with a purpose and end results in mind
Managing anger, frustration, and grumpiness in a constructive way
Knowing when you need a break and how to leave and reenter social and academic situations positively

Decision Making

Thinking things through and recognizing consequences in advance
Recognizing how actions affect self and others
Getting comfortable with apologizing and saying sorry genuinely
Making choices that align with your values
Thinking outside of the box and solving problems creatively

Group Skills

Turn-Taking

Ways to make sure everyone gets an equal chance to share
Building patience even though you're desperate to share
How to encourage the quiet kids to say more
How to prevent the "bulldozer" from taking over

Listening

What it looks, sounds, and feels like to really listen
Doing more than just "hearing" by being an active listener
How to recognize and understand other people's thoughts and feelings

Communication

Being mindful of volume
Words and phrases that promote a positive social experience
How to respectfully express disagreement or disapproval
Looking for and understanding non-verbal communication

Compromising

Recognizing divided groups: the 2 vs 1, the 2 vs 2, the 3 vs 2, and the dreaded 3 vs 1
Giving in gracefully and delaying gratification
Balancing what everyone wants so that no one feels left out

Managing a Group

Delegating responsibilities so that work gets done faster and everyone has a worthwhile role
How to communicate your expectations of others
How to manage people's expectations of you
Utilizing individual talents so that everyone shines and the work is creative
How to handle unhelpful group members

School Skills

Having a Fun and Safe Recess

Using the key practices of tagger's choice and safe tagging
Keeping a healthy balance of competition, fun, and safety
Welcoming newcomers and being inclusive
Disagreeing without being disagreeable and getting games to move on
How to deal with unwanted behavior
Everything you need to know about health and safety on the playground

Having an Enjoyable Lunch

Table etiquette and how to use manners effectively
Sitting with different people to expand your circle of friends and be inclusive
Having positive conversations at lunch while avoiding gossip and trouble
Making choices for a healthy diet that helps you feel better all day

Learning

The benefits of being an active learner and using school for your own life goals
Listening and engaging in discussion with a purpose
Sparking and pinpointing questions so that you get to the heart of your learning
Being active and asking for help when you need it from the right people
Being a teacher and explaining what you know to others in a way that helps them
Being bold, taking risks, and using failure as a tool for learning
Combatting forgetfulness, disorganization, and procrastination
What "doing your best work" looks and feels like to you
Keeping track of your learning by using sticky notes, journals, projects, and portfolios

Relationship Skills

Friendship

Engaging in activities and behaviors that build long lasting friendships
How to treat a friend when you disagree or disapprove without damaging the friendship
How to recognize the qualities of a bad friend and what to do about it

Acquaintances

Being friendly without having to be friends
The enduring value of helping others just because they need it
How to walk in someone else's shoes and understand why they think, feel, and act the way they do

Resolving Student-to-Student Problems

When 2-3 students get in a "fight" or argument, I pull them aside and have each student:

Explain what the other student did
Describe how it made you feel
State what you want

The other student then gets his or her turn, and I guide both of them toward a resolution. This format is an essential social problem-solving technique I use throughout the year. The goal is to encourage students to eventually use this strategy independently when conflicts come up.