Social and Emotional Learning

SEL - Empowering young minds and hearts!

Learning is facilitated or hindered by the social and emotional experiences of the learner It is known that learning, attention, memory, decision making, motivation and social functioning are affected by emotion. hence how one feels impacts what and how one learns

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Overview

Information on this page is provided by the innovator and has not been evaluated by HundrED.

Web presence

2023

Established

600

Children

8

Countries

Target group

Students basic

Updated

May 2024

With the changing landscape of society and the internet revolution, there are several aspects of wellbeing that has become concerning - resilience, lack of human connect, difficulty in emotional and self regulation, empathy, adaptability to name a few. If we want our students to grow into well adjusted beings who can thrive in the world today, it is important for schools to address these issues.

About the innovation

Why did you create this innovation?

Schools are change agents that shape the minds of all young persons in their care. The aim of of school education is to empower students with academic knowledge such that they can be functional and pursue their interests in life, meaningfully. Individuals need social and emotional skills to be well adjusted and functional young adults and this is where SEL curriculum comes in.

What does your innovation look like in practice?

Classroom sessions with each grade, covering topics in an age appropriate manner. Methods such as focus group discussions, role plays, interactive activities, student led experiential learning, audio visual aids, stories, worksheets, art and craft, reflection. As this is a school wide programme, it also involves inter grade collaboration among students and incorporates Peer Mentoring too. The curriculum for each grade focuses on 5 essential areas (such as....). 1 SEL class is scheduled for each grade in the week, with more need based sessions as applicable. As this often tends to be a sensitive space, since students are working on their emotions, school counsellors are also part of the SEL program and step into the classrooms to conduct some of the sessions. This enables students to have a safe space to express themselves.

How has it been spreading?

By empowering teachers to deliver the SEL curriculum and to also include important aspects of it in their own academic lessons. Based on some of the sessions conducted by school counsellors, pertinent feedback is shared with teachers, keeping confidentiality intact to enhance student wellbeing. Students also play a part to spread the SEL programme - this becomes a part of their conversations with their peers. Critical feedback from our sessions with the students often necessitates capacity building interventions with teachers and parents so that all stakeholders are on the same page and working with the students in a collaborative manner.

If I want to try it, what should I do?

Identify the areas of SEL that are applicable for students of a particular school through a needs based wellbeing assessment. These identified areas can then become the broad topics for discussion. It is important that each topic is designed for a grade keeping age appropriateness in mind and by including more activity based learning than lecture method.

Implementation steps

Need based Wellbeing Assessment

Each school has some specific concerns related to student wellbeing. These are often demographically/ socio-culturally determined. Hence at the beginning it is important to identify these concerns through a student wellbeing survey. An overall understanding of students’ wellbeing could be aggregated from self reports and feedback from parents, teachers and school counsellors

Designing the curriculum

Align these identified areas with the 5 major SEL components. It is important that each topic is designed for a grade age appropriately and by including more activity based learning than lecture method. For each subtopic, think of the objective – how will this topic help students of a grade? Then design the session flow – what areas do you want to cover. Add resources and methodology accordingly. Building a resource bank can enable you to be flexible with implementation of the curriculum.

SEL Budget

Prioritizing SEL by designating a separate budget for its development and implementation is essential. Procuring required resources, training and assessment needs can be fulfilled through this budget.

Training Teachers

It’s extremely important to carefully identify teachers who can implement SEL. As this is a sensitive space and involves teacher wellbeing, teachers who are well adjusted themselves and share a good rapport with students are able to deliver the SEL curriculum more efficiently. Teacher training involves making them familiar with the SEL curriculum for the grade that they have been assigned to. It is important to address their apprehensions if any. Few demo lessons will help teachers to be at ease

Partnering with Parents

Apart from parents being an integral part of the SEL curriculum at the needs identification phase, it is important to guide parents on how to address and reinforce certain aspects of SEL in the home and other social settings for better consolidation of the same among the students. Positive Parenting workshops can help to achieve this.

Whole School Implementation

There needs to be a dedicated lesson for each grade, every week for the implementation of the SEL curriculum. In certain cases, for more critical topics, we may sometimes need 2. Emerging concerns from SEL lessons, need to be incorporated in other academic lessons. For eg. if a particular grade shows difficulty in collaboration/empathy, it may help to for other lessons to build more group activities to enable students to work together. This can be a spiral curriculum to build continuity.

Effective Monitoring and Support

The School Head or an appropriate authority needs to monitor the implementation of the curriculum. In certain spaces where sensitive issues may emerge, the school counsellors can step into the classroom and address the same. Additionally, teachers implementing SEL need to be met with frequently to understand the progress and changes that need to be made, if any. Teachers wellbeing also needs to be prioritized in this space.

Assessment and Evaluation

Needs Assessment - social and behavioural issues in a particular cohort, eg. How many middle school students reported being bullied. Process Evaluation - whether SEL is being implemented in a planned way and the quality of the lessons. Outcome evaluation - what outcome results from implementation of the curriculum. Additionally students can be qualitatively assessed during the year to record the nature of work they have done in SEL and their progress. This must be shared with stakeholders.

Additional Support Systems

At Calcutta International School, SEL is more an approach rather than just a curriculum that is taught in the classroom. Hence various school events are also designed in a manner so as to be aligned with with the overall ethos and culture of the school. Moreover cross policy consistency enables us to prioritize SEL as part of holistic student development.