In addition to academic achievement, children need social-emotional skills to develop healthy identities, manage their emotions, feel empathy for others, build relationships, set positive goals, and make responsible decisions. These skills are known as social and emotional learning, or SEL.
Teachers can support students’ SEL by fostering trusting relationships, coaching children on the spot, and demonstrating appropriate behaviors.
1. Create a Positive Environment
Social-emotional development is our interaction with others and the ways we express and regulate our emotions. It is important for all aspects of a child’s development and life, including academic achievement. Children need to be able to form positive relationships and trust that they are safe and valued. This can be accomplished through a supportive learning environment.
A positive learning environment goes beyond having posters on the wall that say “happy students, happy teachers”. It involves truly understanding and supporting your students’ needs, providing them with a structure they can navigate and learn from, and promoting their positive well-being and growth.
When a classroom has a supportive environment, students feel safe to take risks and challenge themselves. They also feel supported and cared for by their teachers. This helps them develop confidence and self-esteem, which is important for their overall success in school.
Creating a supportive learning environment is a complex process, and can be difficult to implement in high-stress situations. One way to create a positive learning environment is to establish clear expectations for behaviour and a consistent system of consequences. This will help to prevent frustration, anxiety, and stress for all parties. Another way to create a positive learning environment is by encouraging parental involvement, showing respect for parents’ cultures and languages, and offering a variety of opportunities for children to interact with peers in their age group.
It is also important to provide plenty of time for child-directed play, away from teacher-led instruction. This gives children the opportunity to express their curiosity and be creative in new ways, while developing important cognitive skills such as problem solving. It is important to recognize when children are displaying challenging behaviors and respond appropriately by teaching them healthy coping strategies.
A strong working environment is essential to a productive team. When employees are happy and healthy, they’re more likely to thrive in their jobs and be motivated to achieve company goals. Creating a positive workplace is an ongoing process, but the benefits are far-reaching. To get started, check out our WorkLife Guide for tips and resources on how to create a positive environment for your team.
2. Encourage Your Child to Talk About Their Feelings
Children who experience emotional well-being have a greater ability to focus and learn. As a result, they are better prepared to adapt to new situations and have positive relationships with others, which will help them to achieve academic success. To support your child’s social and emotional development, encourage them to talk about their feelings.
You are your child’s role model, so make sure to demonstrate different emotions and reactions in front of them and explain how you manage those feelings. As they get older, they will learn from you to recognise their own feelings and express them in a healthy way.
Talk to your children about their emotions throughout the day. For example, say things like “You look happy to have your snack!” or “That looks scary on the slides!” You can also use books that introduce and define emotions or play games that teach them about how they feel.
It is important to remember that it can be difficult for young children to verbalise their emotions, so try to avoid invalidating or dismissing the way they are feeling. This can cause children to believe that their emotions aren’t valid and may lead to self-esteem issues later on. Instead, try to find other ways for them to express their feelings – for example dancing or singing can be great outlets for emotion.
You can also talk about how your child’s favourite characters from movies and TV shows feel, as well as discussing the intended lessons of such titles as Inside Out, Frozen, Cars, Shrek, and Finding Nemo. Asking your child how they think the character feels, why they are acting in that way, and how they would feel themselves is a great opportunity to talk about emotions with them.
Children who hear their parents talking and being able to respond to them are more likely to develop the language skills that they need for school, which will help improve their reading and writing. If they are not able to communicate with their peers or teachers, it can have a negative impact on their learning and cause them to struggle in class.
3. Offer Positive Social-Emotional Opportunities
The social-emotional domain refers to the ability to develop positive relationships, understand and regulate emotions, and express emotions appropriately. It is associated with a range of positive outcomes, including school achievement and a child’s emotional well-being.
Social-emotional development changes with a child’s age and stage of life. For example, a newborn experiences social-emotional growth by learning to form secure attachments with family members. Toddlers learn to express their feelings and cooperate with others during play. They also begin to understand their own emotions, which helps them build self-regulation. As children progress through elementary school and adolescence, their social-emotional skills continue to improve as they become independent thinkers.
Parents play an important role in a child’s social-emotional growth. They can help them by fostering healthy relationships with siblings, family members, teachers, and other adults. They can also encourage the child to take on challenges and learn from mistakes. In addition, parents can provide their children with positive social-emotional activities, such as playing games that encourage following instructions. They can also use their own behavior as a model for the children to help them develop good habits.
For educators, there is a growing interest in social-emotional learning (SEL). This involves teaching kids the skills they need to thrive in school and in their daily lives, like how to deal with stress, make healthy choices, and get along with others. It is often rooted in the belief that when kids feel good, they are better able to focus on learning and are more likely to achieve success.
Teachers who incorporate SEL into their classrooms notice many benefits, including students who have better relationships with peers and teachers. They are also able to work more independently and have better problem-solving abilities, which can lead to improved grades. In fact, researchers have found that students who receive social-emotional instruction score higher on standardized tests than those who do not.
4. Encourage Your Child to Express Their Feelings
Kids experience feelings like frustration, anger, jealousy and fear but often lack the vocabulary to describe them. As a result, they communicate these emotions through their facial expressions, body language and behaviour. They also may express these feelings in physical, inappropriate or problematic ways.
Teaching children how to talk about their emotions provides them with an alternative to negative emotional expressions such as tantrums, defiance and aggression. Children who can express their emotions verbally are less likely to resort to these unhealthy coping skills and more likely to turn to positive emotional expressions like problem solving, sharing and empathy.
When talking with children about their emotions, use open body language and friendly facial expressions to show that you’re all ears and that they can share anything they want to with you. Bend down to their level and match them eye-to-eye. These strategies help them feel safe enough to open up.
Explain that everyone feels differently and there are lots of ways to deal with different feelings. This can be a difficult concept for young children, so it’s important to break it down into simple steps. For example, a child may feel angry because they didn’t get a chance to play with their friend or because someone took their favorite toy. Explain that it’s important to let people know how they’re feeling so they can find a solution together.
Help children learn to identify their own feelings by using a feelings chart or educational videos. You can also encourage this learning by asking them “How do you think you’re feeling right now?” and then naming their emotion with them.
When they’re able to correctly name their own emotions, praise them. This shows that it’s normal and acceptable to talk about your feelings and reinforces the behaviour so that they will continue doing so in the future.
Children aren’t born with the ability to recognize their own emotions – they learn them from adults and peers. As a result, it’s essential to provide young children with positive social and emotional experiences so that they can develop the necessary skills to make healthy choices throughout their life.
