While preschool often serves as a child’s first foray into formal education, it also provides parents with an introduction to the many different essential aspects of their child’s education, including social-emotional learning. In addition to reading, math, and other academic topics, social-emotional learning (SEL) is a key component of a child’s education because it sets them up for success in an array of academic and life skills. According to the Collaborative for Social Emotional Learning (CASEL), SEL should teach self-awareness, self-management, responsible decision-making, relationship skills, and social awareness. These broad competencies help children develop a healthy self-esteem, learn how to get along well with others, and become successful members of a group or community.

Of course, this looks different in preschool than in elementary or secondary school. So what does it mean to receive social-emotional learning in preschool? In some programs, this might mean following a specific curriculum program. In this model, the teacher follows a guidebook throughout the year and sets aside allotted time each week to explicitly teach lessons. These lessons might involve songs, puppets, role plays, and follow-the-leader style games that work through different scenarios addressing social-emotional learning concepts. Setting aside the time to follow a specific curriculum means that children are guaranteed to receive instruction in SEL and come to expect it as part of their education.

SEL in a preschool class can also look like embedding concepts of the different competencies throughout the school day. For example, regular classroom routines with visual and verbal reminders and positive reinforcement for following the routines help children develop self-management and responsible decision-making. Similarly, teaching children how to successfully resolve a conflict with a classmate rather than punishing them will teach relationship skills and social awareness. Regularly discussing the feelings of characters in read-aloud books teaches both self-awareness and social awareness.

Both explicit instruction and a more integrated approach can successfully introduce young children to social-emotional learning concepts and set them up for success in elementary school. Parents should look for either approach in their child’s classroom.

Author: Jordan Shafer