What We Lose When We Lose SEL
Social and emotional learning is a bridge to academic learning.
Angelica was a busy five-year-old in a Kindergarten classroom. Her little neighborhood public school was her first experience with schooling outside of her home. Both of her parents worked and she was lucky to have a network of family and friends to care for her for the first five years of her life. She was sturdy, giggly, and loved to play.
Angelica was supervised by family members and her ordinary day at home consisted of morning cartoons, independent play, afternoon tablet and cartoons, an independent dinner, and screen time until she fell asleep. She was an only child and her elderly grandparents loved her but often struggled to keep up with her games.
Social and emotional learning (SEL), for Angelica, was focused in Kindergarten. She arrived ready to hug teachers and friends, but unable to follow two-step directions (please line up and wait to enter the classroom; please sit down and cross your legs). She did not understand time boundaries and loved to be chased by exasperated teacher’s aides (okay, me) while taunting them (again, me) instead of returning to the classroom. She often hit and bit other children who did not immediately do what she commanded.
Luckily, Angelica’s teacher spent the previous twenty-five years in the classroom finding ways to help kids like Angelica enjoy school. She learned to return to class from recess so she could enjoy stories and activity bins. She found ways to share resources and make friends. She began using phrases like “please” and “thank you” to express her needs and gratitude instead of lashing out for attention. Who would ban this?
Most parents and teachers would applaud Angelica and her teacher for their success. Now, however, it seems that creating these social and emotional boundaries is becoming controversial. Some fear moving beyond “please and thank you” to learning to control anger and fear is overstepping the boundaries of a teacher-student relationship. Others, rightly so, think teachers have too much on their plates. How can they monitor social skills and behavior in addition to the myriad of other tasks required in a day?
The truth is, we have been doing it all along.
Imagine a theater teacher who doesn’t coach students to overcome stage fright. Or an English teacher who doesn’t offer speaking strategies before students participate in Socratic seminars. Imagine a science teacher who doesn’t prompt students to try again when a hypothesis fails.
We all know the results that will occur when a coaching staff declares there is, after all, and I in team (teiam?). Is it possible to legislate this kind of support?
Teachers, coaches, counselors, and mentors have guided students’ social and emotional growth in schools since schools began. Teachers are fleeing campuses in record numbers because the burden of this work is often far heavier than the grading, lesson planning, and joyful teaching we signed up to do. Students returned from the pandemic much like Angelica, loved and alive, but struggling to assimilate to school. I see it in my classroom every day.
Here is the list of questions I will pose to parents of high school students during Open House night, as I share the burden of preparing students socially and emotionally for their next steps in life:
- Can your student focus on a single academic task for twenty minutes without other “tabs” open on their computer or phone?
- When offered feedback, can your student process it and choose what to accept without being offended or emotionally drained?
- When facing time limits or deadlines, can your student make a plan and generally stick to it? When deadlines are unrealistic, can your student ask for help?
- Can your student hold a friendly conversation with a peer that is outside of their social circle?
- When your student is redirected from distractions or unproductive behavior, does your student hold grudges or become angry? If so, how do they work through those emotions?
This is the social and emotional work teachers do every day in a classroom to receive the best possible outcomes from students.
Banning these productive skills because a person is afraid of culture clashes or critical feedback will leave us with a generation of kids who cannot function in a cooperative workplace, higher education, or with peers in the world. I share these questions with families because transparency and teamwork are the keys to helping students grow.
I don’t want my students to think just like me, but instead, I want them to think, enjoy school, and have the skills to solve problems in the future.
