September 18, 2003

For more information about CASEL, SEL, and this listserv, including how to subscribe or unsubscribe, please see the end of this message. We encourage you to share this information with others on your e-mail list. If your e-mail does not support html formatting, you can read this issue on our web site at: www.CASEL.org/e-news-sept03.htm, or request a text-only version from Cynthia Coleman at: colemanc@uic.edu.

In This Issue

• Spotlight on Research:  Prevention that works; effective ways to develop responsible behavior: the importance of social cognition and emotion
• Spotlight on Practice:  Building relationships
• Policy Perspectives: Dangerous schools
• CASEL Up-Close: SEL impacts on school climate and cognitive functioning; building school-family-community partnerships; CASEL co-sponsored conference

Coming Up Next Month... Promoting SEL in the middle and high school grades

From the Executive Director’s Desk

Building Relationships

The September issue of Educational Leadership, the flagship publication of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), focuses on the importance of building relationships to enhance students’ academic achievement and personal success. Also, Catherine Gewertz has written an excellent article in the September 3, 2003 issue of Education Week on this topic. According to the article, “Research shows that when schools pay attention to students’ social and emotional development, children do better academically.” Nothing could be more appropriate for the beginning of the school year. Without effective relationships schools cannot be productive places for learning. Positive relationships of all kinds are needed—between teachers and students, within peer groups, among school staff members themselves, and between the school, the community, and parents.

A growing body of research highlights the importance of these many types of relationships for student learning and success in school. We also know that the opposite of positive and effective relationships—for example, bullying within peer groups—can have a lasting negative impact on both individual students and school climate. Teachers College Press will soon publish an edited CASEL volume titled Building Academic Success on Social and Emotional Learning: What Does the Research Say? (Zins, Weissberg, Wang, & Walberg, 2004). It  shares important information about leading social and emotional learning programs that benefit children’s academic performance and social behavior.  In addition, this newsletter issue briefly summarizes several recent articles on this topic. 

How to build effective relationships? To a great extent, that’s a main item on CASEL’s agenda. As we at CASEL focus increasingly on translating scientific research on social and emotional learning into effective school programming, one of our main goals will be to provide practical answers and user-friendly tools for practitioners. To learn more, please visit our web site: www.CASEL.org. And stay tuned to this e-newsletter.

— Roger Weissberg

Spotlight on Research

What Works in Prevention

In the August issue of “CASEL Connections” we highlighted two articles by CASEL Leadership Team members in the recent special issue of American Psychologist titled “Prevention That Works for Children and Youth.” This month we relate key findings from another article in that issue, “What Works in Prevention: Principles of Effective Prevention Programs,” by Maury Nation and colleagues. The authors reviewed other reviews of programs that focused on substance abuse, risky sexual behavior, school failure, juvenile delinquency, and violence. They identified nine characteristics consistently associated with effective prevention programs. According to the article, effective programs:

• Were comprehensive meaning they provided multiple interventions in multiple settings;
• Included varied teaching methods that emphasized active, skills-based approaches, in contrast to information-only approaches;
• Provided sufficient dosage in terms of quantity and quality of program hours;
• Were theory-driven, based on scientific justification;
• Provided opportunities for positive relationships;
• Were appropriately timed, being implemented before risky behaviors developed;
• Were socioculturally relevant, such that they addressed community norms and cultural beliefs;
• Included outcome evaluation;
• Involved well-trained staff.

Responsible Behavior: The Importance of Social Cognition and Emotion

Some school-based programs emphasize telling students how to behave and what values they should hold; they also rely heavily on external rewards and punishments to shape this behavior. There is scant evidence that such approaches work. In contrast, effective programs help students develop moral reasoning skills that enable them to act responsibly as a result of taking into account the needs, thoughts, and feelings of others. The more effective programs also motivate students to behave responsibly for intrinsic reasons, not to get an external reward. 

In the latest issue of School Psychology Quarterly, George Bear and colleagues discuss the research linking particular aspects of effective programming to responsible behavior. They underscore that if schools want to help students behave responsibly over the long haul, certain social and cognitive factors need to be addressed. In particular, according to the research summarized by the authors, the four essentials for responsible behavior are:

• Perceiving the need to exhibit positive behavior or inhibit antisocial behavior. This depends on students having the skills to correctly interpret social and emotional cues, anticipate consequences of their behavior, and take the perspective of others;
• Determining what one ought to do, factoring in the emotional needs and welfare of others;
• Deciding to act or not in accordance with one’s moral reasoning;
• Acting in accordance with one’s moral convictions and intentions.

In addition, the  emotions of empathy, guilt, and, to some extent, even shame have been shown to increase the likelihood of responsible behavior. Anticipated feelings of guilt or shame help people to avoid acting in socially or morally reprehensible ways and to treat others more kindly and fairly. It is especially important for schools to help students develop empathy. The authors discuss how one CASEL Select Program, Caring School Comm unity, promotes these key elements of moral reasoning (School Psychology Quarterly, 18(2), 140-157).

Spotlight on Practice

Building Classroom Relationships

The September issue of Educational Leadership is devoted to the subject of building classroom relationships, and it includes a wealth of practical ideas. Key points from just two of the many worthwhile articles include:

“The Key to Classroom Management”: In this article Robert and Jana Marzano stress that classroom relationships form the cornerstone of classroom management and define the characteristics of effective student-teacher relationships. The authors report and discuss research showing that positive relationships result when teachers:

• Exercise firm leadership. For example, teachers can provide clear purpose and strong guidance regarding both academics and student behavior by establishing clear behavioral expectations and learning goals and consequences for student behavior; 
• Model and encourage cooperation. Some examples include showing concern for students’ needs and opinions, taking a personal interest in students, and engaging students in setting their own learning objectives and goals;
• Are aware of students with special needs and use different techniques to meet those needs.

In his article “Hearts and Minds” Steven Wolk emphasizes the interdependence of “heart and mind.” He says teachers can nurture both by:

• Developing classroom community. This could include activities such as debate and discussion, class murals, drama and role plays, and interactive games;
• Getting to know students. For example, teachers can have students write autobiographies, create picture books, or just make time to talk with each student, one-on-one;
• Using an inquiry-based curriculum. By this the authors mean connecting the curriculum to students’ lives in culturally relevant ways, also connecting classroom learning to the students’ worlds and the world at large.

Relationship Building Activities

Looking for a new activity to help foster a sense of community? Try one of these gathering activities, from Educators for Social Responsibility (ESR)

• Something Beautiful: Ask each person to tell about something interesting or beautiful that he or she has seen lately and how that made them feel. Before the next person speaks, however, he or she must paraphrase what the previous student said. You can begin by modeling the activity.
• Name Game with Motion: Have the group form a circle. Ask students to say their names and make a gesture that goes with their name. After each person says his or her name and makes a gesture, everyone in the group repeats the name and the gesture. Model the activity first, then go around the circle.

Good communication skills are essential for forming and maintaining relationships. The Four-Fold Youth Development web site has several good sample activities for improving communication skills. You can access a PDF file with these activities at: http://www.fourh.purdue.edu/fourfold/resources/pdfs/com_act.pdf

Soundbites

There are two types of education... One should teach us how to make a living, and the other how to live. 
—John Adams

Policy Perspectives

Persistently Dangerous Schools

The No Child Left Behind Act requires states to adopt policies whereby students attending “persistently dangerous schools” can transfer to safe schools. The Education Comm ission of the States has examined and analyzed 43 adopted or proposed policies related to this provision. You can read about how your state has defined “persistently dangerous” and its school transfer criteria, as well as trends across states, in a recent ECS issue brief at this link: www.ecs.org/ecsmain.asppage=/html/issue.aspissueid=195

CASEL Up-Close—Work and Projects

SEL and Academics...Hand in Hand

Here’s an article we are very proud of, and one that many of you will find useful as you explain the SEL-academics link to teaching staff, school board members, and parents. In the back-to-school issue (September 3, 2003) of Education Week, SEL practitioners give first-hand accounts of the difference SEL has made in their schools and classrooms, and researchers explain the relationship between social and emotional factors and academic achievement. The article includes interviews with CASEL Leadership Team members Mark Greenberg and Roger Weissberg , along with Mary Tavegia , the principal of a  “CASEL collaborating site” school in Illinois . You can read the article at: www.edweek.org/ew/ewstory.cfm?slug=01Social.h23&keywords=hand%20in%20hand

Building Parent-School- Comm unity Partnerships

CASEL Leadership Team Co-Chair Maurice Elias , Executive Director Roger P. Weissberg, and senior staff member Eva Patrikakou are authors of an article titled “Parent-School- Comm unity Partnerships in Secondary Schools” that appears In the September 2003 issue of the PTA magazine Our Children. The article offers suggestions for projects and workshops that foster meaningful home-school partnerships to support children’s social and emotional growth. You can read it at: www.pta.org/parentinvolvement/helpchild/partnerships.asp

Illinois Conference: Working Together for Student Success

A key issue that many of us grapple with is that of integration of SEL programming and concepts into other aspects of the school day and school functioning. CASEL is currently studying this type of integration in many schools we work with, and we're also co-sponsoring an Illinois conference that addresses the issue. The conference is titled Working Together for Student Success: What Families and Schools Can Do to Promote Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning. It will be held October 24, 2003 in Tinley Park and is designed for education, community, and parent leaders, as well as advocates and policy makers who would like to learn more, and be part of, exciting developments and key Illinois initiatives for: (a) social, emotional, and academic learning, (b) community schools, (c) after-school enrichment opportunities, and (d) school-family partnerships; and their effective integration. Visit our web site at: www.CASEL.org/workingtogether.htm for more information.

What Is SEL?

Social and emotional learning (SEL) is the process of developing fundamental social and emotional competencies or skills in children and creating caring and supportive school climate. A large number of school-based programs and practices are designed to do this. Many evidence-based school programs that focus on positive youth development, prevention, service-learning, and character education can be considered SEL. They work to develop students’ social and emotional competencies and create ways to nurture and support students. The resources in this e-newsletter cover a wide range of topics that fall under the umbrella of school-based SEL programming.