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Four measures that can contribute to developmentaliy healthy schools
While educators intrinsically know how important social and emotional wellbeing is to the welfare of our young people, it is sometimes hard to keep this reality in focus as we deal with the press for school accountability and ever higher standards.
Yet students respond powerfully to being eared about well known, appreciated and seen for their assets rather than their deficits. When students are motivated and feel a sense of belonging, their learning improves. As the old saying goes, "Students often learn as much for a teacher as they learn from a teacher."
This was apparent to me from the day I first student taught in the under-resourced summer school at Camden High School in New Jersey, where students who had failed English class the year before dreaded receiving remediation. But these students responded eagerly to opportunities to create poetry and life narratives ihat revealed their strengths - and were willing to learn grammar, revise their work and sharpen writing skills in tlie cause of bping better understood.
It is why 1 have championed bringing social and emotional skills into both schools and the teacher education programs where I have worked and why I am co-chairing the National Commission on Social, Emotional and Academic Develojv ment. The commission has convened educators, governors, business people and community leaders to develop an agenda for the nation - one that can leverage the policies and supports needed to bring this important work to every school and district in the nation.
Social and emotional supports for students in school have frequently been called the "missing link" in education. Decades of research confirm that students' social, emotional, cognitive and academic development are deeply intertwined and vital for student learning. When we help students to engage productively with one another, understand themselves and how they think, and better handle the stresses and challenges in their lives, we prepare them for success now and in the future.
Robust Benefits
Well-implemented programs designed to foster sociid, emotional and academic development are associated with positive outcomes, ranging from better test scores and higher graduation rates to improved social behavior. Researchers who reviewed 213 programs focused on social, emotional and academic learning found these programs...