Social & Emotional Learning and Critical Perspectives on SEL Related Initiatives

"Mindful Schools was founded in 2007 as a program of a single school in Oakland CA. Today, it is a not-for-profit training organization with online and in-person courses, content, and a network of mindful educators spanning all 50 U.S. states and 100+ countries."...

For more, visit: http://www.mindfulschools.org/ 

"If you asked Jason, a lighting designer at a high-end architecture firm, whether his emotions impact his work, he’d laugh. He’d tell you that what matters is his ability to turn a client’s vision for their office building into a design that is practical and aesthetically pleasing. His feelings have nothing to do with it.

Ask Jason’s coworkers and you’ll hear a different story. They’ll tell you that his work with clients and coworkers is inconsistent. If he’s in a good mood, all goes well. But when he is angry or frustrated, his interactions suffer. He doesn’t listen well and he shows contempt for the client’s suggestions. Inevitably, clients reject his initial designs because he didn’t accurately incorporate their wishes. And, his coworkers know to avoid him when he is in a bad mood.

Clearly, that designer’s failure to identify his feelings and how they influence his behavior hurts his work performance. What he lacks is emotional self-awareness.

What is Emotional Self-Awareness?

Emotional self-awareness is the ability to recognize and understand your emotions and how they impact your behavior. You know how you feel and why you feel that way. And, you can see how your feelings help or hurt what you do. You also have an accurate sense of how other people see you. Emotional self-awareness is different than cognitive self-awareness which focuses on your thoughts and ideas rather than your feelings.

Emotional self-awareness is one of twelve competencies (learned and learnable skills) in my model of emotional intelligence. Jason isn’t emotionally self-aware now, but he could develop that awareness. Emotional intelligence also includes competencies related to managing your emotions, awareness of others, and managing relationships.

Why Does Emotional Self-Awareness Matter?

This designer’s situation shows that without being able to recognize your feelings, you can’t control them. Lack of such awareness also gets in the way of sensing the emotions of others, of empathy. It’s hard to maintain a positive outlook or influence others if you don’t know how you feel. According to research from Cornell University, a high level of skill with the Emotional Self-Awareness competency predicts your overall success at work. Research done by Korn Ferry Hay Group found that 92% of leaders skilled at the Emotional Self-Awareness competency had high energy and high performance teams. In contrast, leaders with low self-awareness created negative climates at work.

You Can Develop Emotional Self-Awareness

Recognizing your feelings and their influence on your actions is a skill you can develop just like you can build your swimming or tennis technique. And, as with different levels of those activities, noticing your feelings isn’t something you do once and then have forever. It is something that takes attention and practice to develop, and then daily attention to maintain, just like mindfulness.

A key tool for building self-awareness is tuning in to your body. When you’re terrified or furious, your heart pounds at a much faster rate than when you’re calm. You might break out into a light sweat or breathe more rapidly. Or your shoulder muscles may tighten.

Noticing your feelings and their influence on your actions takes attention and practice to develop, and then daily attention to maintain, just like mindfulness.

My colleague Richard Davidson from the University of Wisconsin’s Center for Healthy Minds explains that we each have a map of our body in our brains. The part of our brain called the insula has specific cells that relate to different organs in our body. Groups of cells in the insula are tuned into our heart, lungs, and other organs. Neuroscientists call our capacity for sensing our heart rate, muscle tension, and other bodily signals interoception. The insula passes along signals from our body to areas of our brain that decide the importance of those signals and what to do with the information."

Try This Guided Meditation

Part of practicing mindfulness meditation is being aware of your breath in the moment. You can use a body scan to strengthen your ability to notice changes in your breath and other parts of your body that accompany emotions. I created several guided audio exercises for a conversation I had with Professor Davidson in Develop a Healthy Mind, or you can use this body scan practice:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZIeyPyfG3I 

Try this exercise when you’re not feeling any strong emotions. Notice the different sensations you feel. Then, watch a scary movie or a real tear-jerker. Stop the film just after a frightening or sad section and try the body scan again. What differences do you notice in your breath, muscle tension, and heart rate between the scan you did when you were calm and the scan you did after an emotionally arousing scene in the film? At the end of a stressful day at work, before you head home, take a few minutes to scan your body. Do you notice any of the same physical signals that were present when you scanned your body after the film?"

Daniel Goleman has a new series of primers on emotional self-awareness and other emotional intelligence competencies. The series begins with a Primer on Emotional Self-Awareness

http://www.mindful.org/emotionally-self-aware/ 

"Engaged Teaching is a practical approach to teaching and learning that improves social, emotional and academic outcomes, develops inclusive and respectful learning communities, and fosters a sense of meaning, purpose, and motivation in the classroom.

The practices and principles are designed to be integrated into any classroom and to transform and improve how we teach and how we engage with our students and colleagues. Whether we are veteran teachers or have just entered the field, in Engaged Teaching, we simply start where we are.

Cultivating our own authentic teaching practice is about each of us discovering our own unique gifts, building on our strengths, learning from others, and engaging in lifelong learning. It is about building on our best qualities, fostering meaningful and effective relationships with students, and connecting or reconnecting with our passion for teaching."...

For more, please click on title above or here:  http://passageworks.org/engaged-teaching/overview/#sthash.uvdRoSxQ.dpuf

"It's been a big few weeks for America, hasn’t it? From the heartbreak of the Charleston shootings to the landmark #LoveWins Supreme Court decision to the Girl Scouts donor dust-up, people everywhere are talking about prejudice.

While I’ve seen such a beautiful swell of love, support and compassion for all kinds of people all over my social media this past month, I’ve also talked to lots of moms who are wondering how to talk to kids about prejudice and racism. Because even as my kids help me pick out wedding presents for all our friends, prejudice most definitely still exists whether it’s because of the color of your skin or the country your family came from.

One of my favorite go-to tools for starting hard conversations with my kids is by reading books together. Reading a great story is an easy way for me to get my kids talking about concepts like open-mindedness, embracing people who are different from them, and fighting for the rights of people who have been marginalized. Even if marginalization is still a word that’s a little over their heads.
 

As you browse your bookstore or local library, here are a few tips we’ve found to be helpful when we’re looking for new titles:
 

1. Above all, make sure the story is good. Because even if the lesson is well-intentioned, your kids won’t pay attention if the book is boring.

2. Choose books with characters that are different than the people in your family. We’ve recently learned that only 3% of children’s books feature characters of color. That’s pretty astounding."... 

For full post, click on title above or here: http://coolmompicks.com/blog/2015/07/07/12-childrens-book-help-talk-to-kids-about-prejudice/ 

"As a child in Kansas schools following the 1995 bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City, I sat with classmates in an awkward circle as we discussed our feelings about the event. What did this mean for us? Were we safe? Should we feel bad for feeling curious about how the bombing happened?

I would imagine classes all over the U.S. will have similar conversations about the Paris attacks this week.

Teachers around the country say such conversations are often necessary after these sorts of events, be they local or international. It's difficult for students to learn when their minds are focused on the snippets of scary images they absorbed while their parents watched the nightly news the day before. Such conversations are easier and more natural when students are accustomed to discussing their thoughts and experiences with their peers and teachers in a thoughtful way, they say.

Schools with existing social-emotional learning programs—through which teachers help students learn to identify, process, and regulate emotions—will have a head start in responding to events like the Paris attacks, supporters of such programs say. That's because those  programs often include a familiar format for discussing emotions and a time for open discussion. In Cleveland schools, teachers told me their social-emotional learning programs helped them discuss the police killing of 12-year-old Tamir Rice with students. In a poor part of south Los Angeles, a teacher said her students' restorative circle helped them process gang violence in their neighborhoods.

The same can be true for international events, social-emotional learning advocates say. The Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, for example, posted today about how schools that use its RULER social-emotional learning program can use its color-coded emotions chart to discuss Paris with students.

"It is important to be authentic and clear about your own feelings," the post says. "You can share with the class how difficult a weekend it was for you and how you kept thinking of the people in Paris and what feelings that raised. Identify and label your own feelings of sadness and anxiety."

The Harvard Graduate School for Education also tweeted out its guide for parents and teachers to discuss difficult events with children Monday.

The authors of the Yale post advise teachers to reassure their students of the following points:

• Events such as the terrorist attacks in Paris are very rare and unusual.
• Students are loved and cherished by their families and teachers.
• It is important to talk about what they are feeling if they are concerned.
• Their feelings are natural and normal in such a situation.
• In our country, we are trying to always be prepared for events like this by having drills and using technology to stay aware of what is happening.
• Adults in the community are trained to keep them safe and will always do their best to ensure that happens.
• Teachers and school leaders in their schools have a plan for any event that may happen and will keep them safe.
• There are many more good people in the world than bad and those people are working to make sure events such as this do not happen again.

What is the role of schools at times such as this? If you are a teacher, will you discuss the Paris attacks in your classroom?

##
 

For full post, click on title above or here: http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/rulesforengagement/2015/11/paris_attacks_social-emotional_learning_helps_students_process_big_events.html?cmp=soc-edit-tw 

Kindness is one of the most important character traits, but sometimes kids need an extra reminder about the best ways to be kind to others or why kindness matters. These books provide that reminder in creative and appealing ways. Happy reading!

For full post, click title above or here: http://www.buzzfeed.com/emeynardie/13-childrens-books-that-encourage-kindness-toward-26paw 

http://bit.ly/screen_time 

By Rebecca Alber (Edutopia) 

"Many of us have done it. After losing patience, we've become a bit snappy with a room full of students or raised our voices a level or two higher than we should have. It happens. The longer you teach, the more probable an incidence (or two) becomes.
 

Responsive, Not Reactive

Once a teacher loses it with a class or student, it takes some time to rebuild that feeling of safety and trust within those four walls, so it's wise to avoid heading in that direction early. If you are a new teacher, it's important to develop good habits around routinely using a calm and appropriate voice level with your students. (We've all heard the explosive teacher down the hall in another classroom. It's not pretty -- and far from conducive to learning.)"...

For full post, click on title above or here: 
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/the-power-keeping-cool-rebecca-alber