At Latonia Elementary, a school nestled in the Latonia neighborhood of the Northern Kentucky city of Covington, students enter Meredith Eyerman’s Kindergarten classroom with anticipation of the day ahead. Latonia, once a city home to one of the country’s most premier horse racing tracks, still captivates visitors with old trees whose branches hang over the sidewalks and the big front porches of brick homes that line the skinny streets.
Around 350 students come from this neighborhood and other areas of Covington to learn at LES, and with them, they bring different needs and experiences each and every day. That is one reason why Ms. Eyerman starts each morning with a mindfulness and relaxation activity. “I feel like it starts the day off on the right foot,” she said. She also has begun integrating intermittent, short brain breaks during instruction and uses breathing strategies to help the students throughout the day. “We count down and take about three belly breaths. It helps them refocus and get ready for the next exercise,” she explained. Ms. Eyerman is among many Northern Kentucky teachers who integrate pieces of Social Emotional Learning (SEL) into daily instruction, and with the pandemic looming as we enter a new year, educators are finding that students need SEL support now more than ever.
Background
In recent years, many schools and districts in Kentucky and across the United States have begun to examine and embrace elements of Social Emotional Learning. According to CASEL, “SEL is the process through which all young people and adults acquire and apply the knowledge, skills, and attitudes to develop healthy identities, manage emotions and achieve personal and collective goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain supportive relationships, and make responsible and caring decisions.”
While the term SEL and its implementation in the classroom is gaining steam, the concept can be dated back to ancient Greece. Greek philosopher Plato advocated for a comprehensive curriculum that included a balance of academics, art, physical education and education of character and moral judgement, according to Edutopia. John Dewey, a name that takes educators back to our Foundations courses in college, claimed in the 1930s that if an education does not provide a child with social competence, it is useless [1]. In the 1970s, child psychiatrist and Yale Professor Dr. James Comer blazed a trail with his method to improve academic performance which focused on building self-esteem and social skills. The success of this method proved a catalyst for the SEL movement in education, and soon, many other researchers were invested in this concept. By 1994, guidelines were provided by the newly created organization now called the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL). The group created the CASEL Framework, which continues to be a guiding force in integrating SEL in classroom instruction.
In Kentucky, a cadre of SEL specialists from the state’s educational cooperatives are working in collaboration with the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) and other agencies that support student SEL to develop an SEL framework. The framework is intended to help districts and schools with implementation of SEL. KDE has also compiled many resources for districts to use.
What it Looks Like in Schools
SEL is big. It can be so many things and be done in so many different ways. At its core, the focus is meeting kids’ social and emotional needs and supporting their emotional and social development alongside their academic growth. To some, this may seem like another item being added to the teachers’ plates. It is certainly already difficult enough to be responsible for the academic growth of every child - how on earth can teachers also be responsible for two other entire human capacities? That thought process is well understood and one in which many educators can empathize. However, the truth is, when implemented well, embedding SEL into your instruction makes the job easier, more enjoyable and makes you more effective. One Kentucky SEL Specialist said it best when she noted that SEL is not adding to the plate - it is the plate. Social Emotional Learning is the infrastructure through which academic connections are made.
Teachers don’t need to become experts in mental health; however, they can add some layers of foundational social and emotional competence to their classrooms that will give each student a better chance to meet his/her greatest potential as young people. When the need of the child necessitates support beyond the teachers’ foundational layers, it becomes time for the expertise of the school counselor or psychologist to support that child’s needs. As a teacher and principal, my goal of embedding SEL into academic instruction was to give my students the tools to be able to achieve their goals through successfully navigating their own feelings, relationships and career opportunities. I shared this sentiment with students and staff each day during the morning announcements by reminding them: My hope and dream for all of you today is that you gain the skills and knowledge you need to be happy, successful people who make this world a better place.
Getting Started
Like its academic counterpart, many schools choose to adopt an evidence-based program that is designed to support educators in implementing SEL. While that can be a great comprehensive approach, you don’t have to have a program to get started.
Educators who implement SEL in their classrooms design learning based on the 5 key competencies: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making. This may mean a teacher or counselor designing lessons that explicitly teach naming and regulating feelings, like a primary class that learns how to identify feeling upset and a breathing technique to calm down, or a high school class analyzing mixed emotions and discussing how different people can react differently to the same situation. The goal of these stand alone lessons is that they are revisited and reinforced enough to develop in the student a socially and/or emotionally informed action or response to use when needed.
Anything you do in your classroom to try to help your students’ social and emotional growth can be SEL. It can be a comprehensive, systematic approach. It can also be just a few thoughtful pieces you put in place to meet your students’ needs, like Ms. Eyerman did at Latonia Elementary. You don’t have to have it all figured out to start integrating SEL into your classroom; just pick a few things you can do that feel right and get started. Whether it’s trying morning meetings, creating SEL learning targets, declaring affirmations, starting a check-in routine, using an art-inspired self-esteem activity, or something else, it is our team’s goal that this month’s edition of teachNKY connects you with other educators, ideas and practices that will allow you to try something new that will improve student outcomes and elevate your classroom culture.
Until next time…keep growing the Bluegrass.
Jess
[1] Sikandar, Aliya. (2016). John Dewey and His Philosophy of Education. Journal of Education and Educational Development. 2. 191. 10.22555/joeed.v2i2.446.
