SEL is about developing and using social and emotional skills in an appropriate manner.
The primary focus is to improve the students capacity to establish a safe and positive environment for self and others around them.
Socio Emotional Learning comprises of 5 domains namely
Self Awarenes: Gain insight about one's strengths & weaknesses in order to improve and adopt a growth mindset so that they remain goal oriented.
Self Management: It deals with managing emotions, controlling impulses and setting the right goals. By controlling reflexes they will be able to make mindful decisions instead of rushing in and later being unsatisfied by the choice made.
Social awareness: By being socially aware they learn to look at things through various perspectives that others would have. In turn this gives them opportunities to also be more empathetic while working with others and they learn to appreciate the diversity.
Relationship skills: Relationship is not only to be initiated but also to be maintained and and grown strongly. This requires effective communication among each other and will help to cooperate and find solutions to avoid conflicts.
Responsible decision making: Making a decision is one thing but one needs to also learn to be mindful of its consequences. This will help them to analyse the situation and make informed decisions.
In schools it is crucial to teach Socio emotional skills as it is a foundation to live a fulfilling life and thus earlier taught & leart the better quality of life. It also results in improved school and class climate. A classroom that has incorporated various aspects of Socio emotional learning provides opportunity to a positive and learning friendly classroom environment. They are able to better get along with peers. Afterall schools are smaller communities that provide hands-on learning experience to deal with the outside world.
Strategies to Implement Social-Emotional Learning
Help Students Identify their Self-Concept
The essential feature of SEL in the classroom would consist of student's self-concept and awareness. An individual's self-concept would relate to how they would perceive themselves. Can shape a person's self-concept through interactions with teachers, parents, and peers.
Introduce Positive Actions for Body and Mind
Students feel delighted about themselves once they complete positive actions successfully. Emphasizing positive physical and intellectual health representing emotional learning helps students establish good habits to achieve success.
Teaching Students to Manage their Emotions
Students must learn to handle their emotions and develop the habit of helping others and themselves. A belief in positive thoughts leading to positive action must be formed. Students would gain a sense of responsibility that helps in improving their self-concept and boosting their self-esteem.
Teach Empathy
One must treat others how they would want to be treated. Today, empathy plays a dominant role in the classroom's social-emotional learning. They must learn how to treat others with kindness and to pay respect. Student performance can be rewarded if they do well.
Teach Students to Face the Truth
Students can recognize their shortcomings through Social-emotional learning, which helps them to improve. Teachers can ask students to take responsibility for their actions and ask them to finish their assignments on time.
Help Students Practice Self-Improvement Strategies
Students can focus on self-improvement once they recognize their areas of improvement and can learn to take responsibility for their decisions. A growth mindset, or understanding that every individual is capable of learning new skills, plays an essential role in getting about how to implement SEL successfully.
Outcomes of SEL Implementation
Socio-emotional learning aids students in being more confident and creating kinder students who are in a better situation to face the outside world's stress.
Students focus more on their tasks than getting distracted and engaged in inappropriate activities.
They are seen to build more self-confidence through SEL and hence betterment in academics. They are seen to get better in reading achievement.
Socio-emotional learning enables them to manage and cope with anger rather than initiating violent actions.
SEL has been instilled with a greater sense of responsibility to be on time to school and reduced absenteeism.
Increase family bonding and a reduction in family conflict are seen, and increasing family bonding is cherished. Rise in favourable development in early childhood a rise in positive effect indicating a rise in self-esteem and physical health is observed.
The core SEL competencies enable student life to cope with the daily stresses of life and be more empathetic toward others. Most importantly, SEL aids in creating self-secure individuals with a sound knowledge of academics.
Tanvi Auradkar
( India )