Schools, Parents, and Social and Emotional Learning

Ten Things You Can Do with Your School

1. Focus on the value of learning. Take some time each day to ask what your child learned in school. Don’t focus just on math, English, and social studies. Ask how your child gets along with other students and how he or she feels about school. Learning is for life, not just school. Talk about what you yourself may have learned in the course of a day.
2. Focus on creating a positive learning environment at home. Make regular times and provide a quiet, well-lit place for homework. Limit the amount of TV. Decide with your child about rules for dealing with interruptions such as phone calls or visitors. Make sure your home has plenty of books, magazines, and newspapers.
3. Set up a school bulletin board at home. Display the school calendar and other flyers from the school. Decide as a family which school events you will attend. Help your child get involved in interesting and worthwhile school activities.
4.  Listen when your child talks about school. Pay attention to what your child says about school. If your child is happy with his or her classroom and school activities, write or call the teacher to say thank you. If your child seems frustrated, bored, or lonely at school, call a teacher or counselor to see what can be done.
5. Help your child with homework. Don’t ever do homework for your child. But do help. Assist your child in setting priorities for schoolwork. For example, you can encourage your child to tackle the difficult assignments first while he or she has the most energy.
6. Take advantage of school meetings. Finding the time to attend school meetings can be a challenge. Many schools offer alternative times and places for parents to ask questions and discuss solutions to common problems. Often these meetings provide child care. Make these kinds of meetings a priority.
7. Volunteer at school. By volunteering in the classroom, you can better understand how to support your child’s learning at home. Try being a room parent, a chaperone at school functions, or a tutor. Even parents who work full-time can visit their child’s school at night or on weekends. Create opportunities if they do not exist.
8. Attend school activities. Whenever possible, attend your child’s plays, sports events, or science fairs. Your presence shows that your child’s interests and work are important to you. It can also give you a chance to meet other parents and school staff.
9.  Join or create a “Social and Emotional Learning Book Club.” In some communities parents have created book clubs to learn how they can encourage their children’s social and emotional development. This could be part of the PTA or PTO. It could also be something you do informally with friends or parents of your child’s classmates. (See the brief reading list included with this packet.)
10. Encourage good communication with the school. Good communication is basic to supporting your child’s education. Ask your child’s teacher to provide suggested home activities to support skills the children are learning at school. Ask for homework assignments that directly involve parents. An example might be students asking parents about their cultural background or work experiences.

Tips for Parents

By working together schools and parents can promote children’s social and emotional learning (SEL). SEL includes some key skills:

• Self-awareness—recognizing feelings and managing anger.
• Understanding others—developing empathy and taking the perspective of others.
• Making responsible decisions and following through. This includes considering long-term consequences of your actions for yourself and others.
• Understanding yourself—handling emotions, setting goals, and dealing with obstacles.
• Building healthy relationships—saying no to negative peer pressure and working to resolve conflicts constructively.

When young people master these skills, they are more likely to succeed in school and life. They become happier and more confident. They are better students, family members, friends, and workers. They are less prone to drug and alcohol use, depression, or violence. Social and emotional learning is like an insurance policy for a healthy, positive, successful life.

The Role of Parents

Long before children can say their first word or take their first step, they respond to the touch, tone of voice, and moods of their parents. This is the beginning of learning about emotions and relationships. It happens as naturally as their bodies grow and develop.

“Family life is our first school for emotional learning,” states author Daniel Goleman. In the family, he says, “we learn how to feel about ourselves and how others will react to our feelings.” This learning happens both through what parents say and do to their children and how they treat each other.

Some Key Points to Consider

• Children learn important lessons about emotions from their parents. When parents threaten or punish children for a display of emotion, children learn emotions are dangerous, to be held inside. This can lead in later life to depression or unchecked rage. When parents do not teach their children acceptable ways to express anger, the children may think it’s okay to strike out at others or have tantrums.
• Parents should think of themselves as “emotion coaches.” They can encourage their children to use feeling words, such as “I feel sad” or “That made me really angry” to express emotions.
• When children learn to express feelings and respect others, they become happier and healthier. Such children are less likely to have problems with depression, violence, or other mental health issues as they grow older.
• Many SEL programs for schools include activities for parents. When parents and students practice SEL skills at home, the effects are even greater. Children also come to see learning as a lifelong process, not something that stops when they leave school.
• Children want their parents to guide and teach them. A recent poll found that 86% of young people 10- 17 years old said their parents were very important influences on their lives. Only 22% said television, movies, and popular music were so important. No one can take the place of parents in raising caring, confident, capable children.

Books for Parents

All Kids Are Our Kids: What Communities Must Do To Raise Caring And Responsible Children and Adolescents, by Peter L. Benson. (Jossey-Bass, 1997). The author focuses on how to build developmental assets in young people based on support, empowerment, boundaries, constructive use of time, commitment to learning, positive values, social competencies, and positive identity.

Emotional Intelligence: Why it Can Matter More than IQ, by Daniel Goleman. (Bantam, 1994) This best-seller raised public awareness about the importance of emotions in healthy human development.

Emotionally Intelligent Parenting: How to Raise a Self-Disciplined, Responsible, Socially Skilled Child, by Maurice Elias, Steven Tobias, and Brian Friedlander. (Harmony Books, 1999) Parents can learn how to communicate with children on a deeper, more gratifying level and help them support their child’s development in relating to others.

The Heart of Parenting: Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child, by John Gottman. (Simon & Schuster, 1997) The author describes how parents can use an effective five-step process to become “Emotion Coaches” and teach their children how to express and manage emotions throughout their lives.

Raising Emotionally Intelligent Teenagers, by Maurice Elias, Stephen Tobias, and Brian Friedlander. (Random House, 2000) The authors explain creative, caring, and constructive ways to parent adolescents during these crucial years.

Raising a Thinking Child: Help Your Young Child To Resolve Everyday Conflicts and Get Along With Others: The “I Can Problem Solve” Program, by Myrna Shure. (Pocket Books, 1996) This book provides a step-by-step guide for teaching young children how to solve problems and resolve daily conflicts constructively.

Raising a Thinking Preteen, by Myrna Shure. (Henry Holt, 2000) In a follow-up to her best-selling book Raising a Thinking Child, Dr. Shure explains a program for resolving conflicts and developing critical thinking skills that can be used with 8-12-year-olds.

For more information contact: Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), University of Illinois at Chicago, Department of Psychology (MC 285), 1007 West Harrison St., Chicago, IL 60607. 312/413-1008. casel@uic.edu, www.CASEL.org