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  1. It’s often said that schools don’t provide the life skills children really need as adults, but emotional education – or social emotional learning – is becoming much more popular. Arlo Laibowitz explores what it is and just how it benefits the younger members of our community. Traditionally, education focuses on three R’s: reading, writing, and arithmetic. But to become happy and caring individuals, those skills are not enough. Increasingly, there’s also attention to 'soft skills', most often called emotional education or social emotional learning (SEL). What exactly is social emotional learning (SEL)? Social emotional learning is the process through which students acquire and apply the knowledge, attitudes, and skills necessary to: understand and manage emotions (self-awareness) set and achieve positive goals (self-management) feel and show empathy to others (social awareness) establish and maintain positive relationships (relationship skills) make responsible decisions. .embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; } What does social emotional learning focus on? Self-Awareness trains the ability to focus on one's emotions, thoughts, and values, and how they influence behaviour. Also, it strengthens the capacity to assess one’s strengths and limitations, with confidence, optimism, and a ‘growth mindset’. Self-Management trains the skills to regulate emotions, thoughts, and behaviours in different situations: managing stress, controlling impulses, and motivating oneself. Social Awareness focuses on the ability to take the perspective and empathise with others. It enables the student to understand social and ethical norms. Relationships skills strengthen the students in their ability to establish and maintain healthy and rewarding relationships, to communicate clearly, listen mindfully, cooperate with others, negotiate conflict, and seek and offer help. Responsible decision making trains the capacity to make constructive choices about personal behaviour and social interactions based on ethics, safety, and social norms. How can it be used to help students? The three R’s of emotional education that are found in social emotional learning are focused on emotional literacy: Regulation, Reconstruction and Resilience: Students learn to regulate their emotions and alter them. Reconstruction of emotions enables emotionally healthy and positive responses. And when students are capable of balancing conflicting and competing emotions, they become calmer and more resilient. The reasons to adopt social emotional learning are these positive results: To overcome and manage emotions like fear, hatred, anger, and anxiety. To increase academic success, in test scores, grades, and attendance. To lower stress levels, and have more positive attitudes towards themselves, others, and tasks. To prevent harmful behaviors like drug use, violence, and bullying. And to provide students with the skills they will need in their future careers and lives. The skills taught through SEL help students, educators, and parents to cultivate more positive emotions. Education can be used as a tool to serve the greater good: students learn to sustain their well-being and happiness and care for themselves and others. In the shift from the traditional three R’s to the three R’s of emotional learning, students, schools, and parents, develop skills and competencies that enable them to lead more balanced, empathic, connected, and happier lives. ● Written by Arlo Laibowitz Arlo is a filmmaker, artist, lecturer, and intermittent practitioner of metta meditation and morning yoga. When not dreaming about impossible projects and making them happen in the most impractical ways possible, he journals, listens to jazz, or cuddles with his better half.
  2. A new book explains six keys to learning that can help anyone overcome barriers to success in school or in life. By Jill Suttie on behalf of Greater Good Science Center. Recently, a close friend’s niece was having trouble graduating from college. She needed to pass a math class to graduate but wouldn’t take it because she feared flunking it. A belief that she just wasn’t “good at math” was keeping her stuck in graduation limbo, unable to move on with her life. I know my friend’s niece isn’t the first person to be cowed by a math course or some other seemingly insurmountable barrier to success. Maybe someone gave you the message that you weren’t talented enough to succeed in a particular field; or you just didn’t have the confidence to persevere when you struggled. Now, a new book, Limitless Mind: Learn, Lead, and Live Without Barriers by Jo Boaler, explains what’s wrong with this attitude. Boaler, a Stanford University math professor, argues that people can learn just about anything once they understand how their brains work and how to support their own learning. Her book is a call to discard old notions of “giftedness” and to fully embrace the new science of the mind, thereby transforming schools, organizations, and workplaces into environments that support rather than limit success. The problem with talent “Millions of children, every year, start school excited about what they will learn, but quickly become disillusioned when they get the idea they are not as ‘smart’ as others,” writes Boaler. That’s because parents and teachers inadvertently give out the message that talent is inborn — you either have it or you don’t. As a math professor, Boaler has seen this firsthand. Many young adults enter her class anxious about math, and their fear about learning impacts their ability to learn. Retrain your brain and start learning again “The myth that our brains are fixed and that we simply don’t have the aptitude for certain topics is not only scientifically inaccurate; it's omnipresent and negatively impacts not only education, but many other events in our everyday lives,“ she writes. Even though the science of neuroplasticity – how our brains change in response to learning – suggests learning can take place at any age, this news has not made it into classrooms, she argues. Some of our misguided visions of talent have led to racist and sexist attitudes, she writes. For example, many girls get the message early on that math is for boys and that boys are better at it, interfering with their ability to succeed and leading to gender disparities in fields of study related to math. Similarly, people of color may also have to overcome stereotypes about fixed intelligence in order to thrive. How our minds help us learn Luckily, Boaler doesn’t stop at pointing out the problem but also provides tips to help anyone, whether they’re math-phobic or worried about other impediments to learning, to create a new mindset. 1. Understand that your brain is always changing “Every time we learn, our brain forms, strengthens, or connects neural pathways,” writes Boaler. This means that no one is stuck at birth with a limit on what they can learn. Instead, it’s the belief in giftedness and how that impacts the way teachers teach that actually hampers people’s learning. For example, when schools practice tracking – dividing students into different reading groups or math groups based on ability – it can produce worse results for students than keeping mixed-ability students together. As research from Teresa Iuculano and her colleagues has shown, the brains of people who have been labeled early on as “learning disabled” can be completely rewired after a short program involving one-on-one tutoring. 2. Learn to embrace struggle, mistakes and failure Students and teachers commonly believe that getting the right answer on a test shows that students are learning. But, as Boaler points out, it’s actually when students practice difficult things – problems just beyond their ability – that the brain works harder and imprints new knowledge. This also makes the knowledge more accessible later on. “The science of neuroplasticity – how our brains change in response to learning – suggests learning can take place at any age.” Practising what they can already do well actually hinders students’ learning; making mistakes helps them focus in on different ways of considering a problem, which helps strengthen learning. When teachers encourage students to struggle and students give themselves permission to make mistakes, it can be incredibly freeing for both. 3. Change your beliefs about your mind, and your brain will follow When you change your mind about yourself, it turns out that this will also change your body and brain. For example, researchers found that adults who had negative ideas about aging in their younger years – between 18 and 49 years old – were more likely to experience a cardiovascular event during the next 38 years, regardless of their initial age, heart health, race, or many other factors. The same is true for how you think about your learning. For example, if young kids learn that their success in school is tied to being smart rather than tied to effort, they may be less motivated to learn later on. 4. Try multiple approaches to learning Though it’s important to have a growth mindset for learning – a belief that knowledge isn’t fixed, but can be developed through effort and perseverance – it’s also important to try new learning strategies. Multi-dimensional approaches to teaching and learning work best because they engage many areas of the brain at once, and communication between different brain areas aids in learning. Even math proficiency can be enhanced by seemingly unrelated knowledge or skills – like verbal skills or finger perception (the ability to identify our fingers without looking at them). “The new discoveries about the working of the brain are revealing the need for a different approach to teaching that is more physical, multidimensional, and creative than the approaches that have been used in the past in most institutions of learning,” writes Boaler. “Practising what they can already do well actually hinders students’ learning; making mistakes helps them focus in on different ways of considering a problem, which helps strengthen learning.” In her own research, she found that this multi-pronged approach to teaching math – challenging students to consider problems using different strategies, like storytelling or visual art – was much more effective for learning, especially for girls, English language learners, and economically disadvantaged students. This suggests that approaching something you want to learn from multiple angles is better than just trying to get it “right.” 5. Aim for flexible thinking rather than speed Too often, teachers and learners think that being fast at something means you’re good at it. But, as research suggests, that’s not often the case. Trying to do something under pressure – such as a timed test – can cause stress, which compromises the working memory needed to recall important information. That’s why Boaler argues that giving students long problem sets to solve at home, or trying to measure math performance under timed conditions, is not useful. It could also unnecessarily discourage potential future math scholars who give up early because they think speed equals competency. Age shouldn't be a factor when it comes to new learning shutterstock/Monkey Business Images While some students thrive in timed tests and are adept at cramming for exams, it’s not likely their learning will stick, says Boaler. Instead, engaging with material in flexible ways over time is key to learning. 6. Try collaboration Schools that teach a growth mindset won’t necessarily help students learn better if there is not peer support for the idea – meaning, if students still buy into the myth of the gifted student. It’s crucial for schools to reinforce the idea that learning together is better than learning alone. As one study showed, working together instead of alone can make the difference between passing a difficult math class and giving up and failing the class. “An important change takes place when students work together and discover that everybody finds some or all of the work difficult,” writes Boaler. It reinforces the idea “that learning is a process and that obstacles are common.” Focusing on collaboration in the classroom — rather than trying to test students individually — also more closely resembles the work world, argues Boaler, and can help reduce the gender bias so often found in science-related subjects. In the case of my friend’s niece, she ended up drawing on the support of her aunt and connecting with a tutor who encouraged a growth mindset, taught her new strategies for problem solving, and helped reduce her math anxiety. Eventually, she took the math class and passed with flying colors. Her story is an important reminder that the obstacles to learning are often more a function of our approach than of our ability. As Boaler’s work — and that of countless others — suggests, our minds may be less limited than we think. ● Main image: shutterstock/Carlos David This article originally appeared on Greater Good, the online magazine of the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley. happiness.com is grateful to republish it with the kind permission of the Greater Good Science Center. greatergood.berkeley.edu
  3. Poverty, hunger, homelessness: human injustice is ever-present throughout the word, but what can we do about it? Sienna Saint-Cyr takes a looks at social justice... You don't need to be a caped crusader to make a difference. Everyday heroes wear jeans and T-shirts; nurse's uniforms and fluorescent jackets on the roadside. Social justice is something we all can do and benefit from. In the United States, black mothers teach their sons to behave in specific, respectful ways to reduce suspicion, violence and aggression from police officers. White mothers do not. In many parts of the world, girls do not have the same access to education as boys. Girls are married off while still children while their male counterparts are left alone to grow and mature. All over the world, some poor people barely survive the day while there are also billionaires in the same country who can’t imagine a life without gold. Social justice does not mean taking away privileges of one group; it means raising up those who don’t have those same privileges. While it’s important to mark days such as Human Rights Day and World Day of Social Injustice and spend time, effort, and perhaps money to end social injustice, the reality is it's a process that requires attention every day. What does social injustice mean? Social injustice can manifest itself in multiple ways: Poverty Lack of healthcare Hunger Unsafe living environments Unsafe food Dirty water Laws that target a particular group because of their identity Stricter application of the law to one group over another Social injustice: millions of kids live in poverty across the world Social injustice keeps people from being healthy and happy. It violates the idea that all individuals have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Injustice impacts people based on their race, religion, sexuality, economic status, gender, ethnicity and much more. Those who denounce social justice mistakenly believe marginalized groups will receive special treatment. For these people to do it, they loose something. They don’t realize that we are all only as strong as the weakest among us. “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” Martin Luther King Jr What people need and deserve are the basics. In life, that includes the things that keep us all fed, housed and educated, while granting us equal access and treatment under the law. Once those basic needs are met, we humans can pursue life in a multitude of ways. Sometimes with results none of us can imagine. Inventors, peace-keepers, religious leaders, politicians, teachers, writers and so many other things. All who contribute to society could rise out of the shadows of inequality and social injustice. We have no idea what we could accomplish if we grant everyone access to the same rights and basic needs. What does social justice look like? In a perfect world, everyone would see each other as equal and worthy regardless of their outward appearance or differing beliefs. Unfortunately, we don’t live in that world. We live in a messy place where everyone has an opinion and where everyone holds particular beliefs. Humans have to make our way through this world with choices based on those beliefs or their rejection of them. Because of this, a strong social safety net is necessary to protect the weakest among us. This system, in whatever form it takes in governments around the world, helps grant access to healthcare and education, job training and employment. It helps reduce the economic inequalities that can hold generations of families back by requiring a livable minimum wage, additional educational resources for communities with the greatest need and access to the right jobs. Homelessness: housing is a basic human right Social justice means supporting communities and organizations. Support within those communities who raise up the concerns and problems of marginalized groups to make those in power aware of their need. To fight for equality and justice, and to promote the participation of individuals who may feel powerless and voiceless otherwise. Why we all benefit from social justice Raising up a group of people who have been ill-treated, neglected, and forgotten by society or government does not take anything away from those with greater privilege. It places us all on equal footing. Recognizing social injustice forces us to recognize our inherent biases and decide whether we will reject or embrace them. It forces us to look at what we have in relation to those with much less and realize that maybe we have too much. "Recognizing social injustice forces us to recognize our inherent biases and decide whether we will reject or embrace them." Admitting social injustice that we do not personally experience is a difficult, personal task, but once done, allows us to better answer the question, “What will I do about it?” It gives us the chance to check our biases at the door and treat people the way we would want to be treated. Social justice for the victims of injustice? Access to the basics and the ability to pursue a life of happiness – without the guarantee, of course – allows people to move beyond their circumstances and improve it. This results in less strain on government safety nets. People can worry less about how to make it through another day with enough food and water or avoid harassment and can focus on bigger things, bolder thoughts and new ideas. When we allow all parts of our society to benefit equally, everyone contributes more to society as a whole. whether in business, legislatively, or simply by being a better person. If we’re poor, scared, or demoralized, our world becomes very narrow. When we are free from the strain of social injustice and inequality, the horizon becomes much broader and the opportunities greater. We all benefit. ● happiness.com | The fine art of being: learn, practise, share Are you a happiness.com member yet? Sign up free to: ■ enjoy our happiness magazine with practical life tips ■ share and support others in our happiness forum ■ self-develop with free online classes in our happiness Academy Resilience | Kindness | Courage Written by Sienna Saint-Cyr Sienna Saint-Cyr is an author, advocate, and the founder of SinCyr Publishing. She speaks at conventions, workshops, and for private gatherings on the importance of having a healthy body image, understanding enthusiastic consent, using sexuality to promote healing, navigating diverse or non-traditional relationships, having Complex PTSD, and more. Sienna loves sharing her journey of healing and finding happiness with her readers. Along with writing erotica and romance, Sienna speaks at conventions, workshops, and for private gatherings on such sex-positive topics as a healthy body image, using sexuality to promote healing, and navigating diverse or non-traditional relationships. She writes for several websites. Find out more.
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