Why Not Social and Emotional Learning?

Abstract

Social and emotional learning (SEL) has become an avant-garde term in the last few years. It is how people acquire and apply knowledge, attitudes, and skills to understand and control emotions. Incorporating the SEL perspective, teachers can not only help students set and achieve positive goals, but also help students understand how empathizing with others will allow them to establish and maintain positive relationships as well as aid them in making responsible decisions (City Year, n.d). SEL also touches a number of fields with which it is related: emotional intelligence, mindfulness, and the recently developed CEFR-CV (Common European Framework of Reference for Languages and its Companion Volume) concept of mediation. In this paper, two researchers from different countries (the USA and Spain) review the literature on SEL, give a bird’s eye view of the SEL situation in their countries, discuss its value in the classroom, and make recommendations for further study.

Presenters

Roslyn Billy
Assistant Professor, English Language Learners, Tennessee State University, Maryland, United States

Carmen Medina Garríguez
Principal, English, English Teacher, Official School of Languages, Antequera, Málaga, Spain

Details

Presentation Type

Paper Presentation in a Themed Session

Theme

Pedagogy and Curriculum

KEYWORDS

SEL, EI, Mindfulness, Mediation, Curriculum, Instruction