How important is social and emotional learning to “actual” learning?
Janine Teo
CEO @ Solve Education! | Tackling Women & Youth Unemployment with Tech | Board Member | Social Entrepreneur creating lasting business models for impact
Social and emotional learning was a foreign concept when I was growing up. My mum would focus on the school curriculum, with the goal of having good grades.
I remembered when I was 13 after a growth spurt, my mum had this brilliant idea of buying XXL shorts, even though my size was M at that point. The reasoning was that this pair of shorts will be able to last me 4 years to the end of secondary school. I felt embarrassed every time I wore the shorts for sports classes. The shorts were so big that they reached my knees, and I had to use pins to make them fit on my waist. I wonder if that is why I do not like sports - till today!
I reflect back on my education journey and my mental state:
My grades corresponded to my emotional wellness.
This is probably not surprising in hindsight.?
Fast-forward to today, social and emotional learning is trending. However, many still think that these topics are “woo woo”, due to the lack of measurable impact - and rightfully so.?
My team in Solve Education! analyzed over 2M data points and we found out that:?
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Group learners were 4x more likely to become Successful learners.
Our learners on our learning platform have the option to form groups to learn, and to support each other. We were pleasantly surprised that learners who learnt in the group showed much stronger learning outcomes!
We have since rolled out our youth ambassadors’ program. Our youth leaders formed learning communities to support each other in their education journey, this has been very well received.
Learners cannot learn effectively without being in the right mental space.
Now we know this, the next question is how do we do more.
Solve Education! is doing more work in this space - stay tuned! We would love to hear your thoughts too.
Love this perspective but from the perspective of a 1-8 Educator, the issue to solve is how to utilize SEL concepts to facilitate group and/or collaborative work for youth.
I work with leaders who believe there are better ways to grow | Executive & Leadership Coach
1 年Social and emotional learning is EVERYTHING! At least, that’s the coaching perspective. :) I was so happy when my yoga studio brought back my Inside Flow classes after our usual teacher relocated overseas. I attended my first class with the new teacher. I loved the subject (Inside Flow is wonderful). But the teacher made us feel like it was a military bootcamp, like we were doing it all wrong and even singled out one student who “wasn’t getting it”. I never went back.