On Emotional Intelligence technique...

By Imani Coaxum

One outcome of social emotional learning is emotional intelligence. This could mean how a student handles their emotions, specifically anger, in a healthy way- or it could simply be how a student recognizes an emotion they are currently feeling during the time of class.

Emotional literacy is an important component to social emotional learning outcomes because it will deliberate how a student will learn. For example, a student cannot focus on learning about addition, if they are angry in class. They will be distracted and not look past how they are feeling.

This need to teach students how to be deal with or explore their emotions have a significant role in how they learn. It is a characteristic that they can use outside of the classroom as well. It encourages student success and it decreases the chance of bullying by understanding how to behave with their peers.

Dr. Jie Zhang from the College at Brockport discussed her use of a scale in her college class. They receive a sheet of paper with 5 different numbers and colors and they are encouraged to rate themselves based on what emotion correlates with each number or color.

“This is the check in sheet, usually I use it in the very beginning of my class, every class, and I will give this out and my students know what they’re going to do. So, they rate themselves on a 1-5 scale.”

This process of “checking in” lets Dr. Zhang know what may be going on in her students’ minds and lives. A one rating means that students are doing fine, a three-rating meaning that things are okay, but they still have some things to take care of, and a five-rating meaning that they are having a bad day or a dilemma to tend to. If she notices that students may be struggling based on their rating, she will then try to speak to them outside of class to make sure everything is okay.

Before the introduction of this social emotional learning approach, educators were not encouraged to look too deep into their students’ lives outside of the classroom and the content learning. It was and still is solely based on teaching the content to the students and evaluating whether they understood it or not through exams and assignments.

Education is making a shift because now educators are encouraged to do so.

This use of a “rating chart” is just one way of encouraging emotional intelligence. This is a universal technique among education levels. For example, you can use this technique in a kindergarten class by having students draw a picture expressing how they are feeling in class.

For middle school, students can write a poem expressing their emotions at the moment and perform it in front of the class if they choose to. For high school and college students, an email system can be set up where students can send more personal emails expressing their emotions right before the start of class.

Either way it is used, students will feel more open to talk about what is going on in their lives and educators will have better access to providing the student the learning they need based on how that student is feeling.