The Social Emotional Gaps in Education- Tips From Real Teachers Like You (Part 2) [episode 33]

Hey, welcome. I’m so happy to be back here with you to talk about the gaps in education. And I mean, I guess I seem so happy. But I mean, this is actually a really tough subject, you know, these episodes, they’ve been diving in deep, we are seeing these problems in education. And it has not been easy. It has been so challenging. And today, we’re talking all about the social skills, the social emotional learning that we need to do in the classroom. Now, we’ve all seen behavior problems and social skills in the classroom, but even more since COVID. And everything that’s happened. And when you think about it, it really makes sense. Students were in and out of school overnight, without any preparation, some went back in and back out again, others were online for a very long period of time or had to some kids and some kids out in the whole world was just an unknown. We kind of all have this shared trauma around this pandemic. And it has affected everybody it is affected our students it is affected us as teachers, big time, it has affected our students parents, this has just not been a normal school experience for anyone over these last few years.

But today, we’re going to be talking about a couple things. So first, we’re going to just be talking about what we’re seeing, we’re going to normalize it, we’re going to see, oh, other people are seeing this too, it just helps us feel not alone. And then we’re also going to look at what we can do about it. Because it doesn’t help to just be like, Oh, it’s so hard. And I’m not going to do anything. It’s like okay, what are we going to do to navigate our way through this. So first, I’m going to share a few tips with you. And then we’re going to dive into what tons of classroom teachers are doing right now you’re going to get to hear some of their voices others I will read the comments on social media.

But first, I’m going to share my three tips with you. And two of them are actually the same from last week’s segment. So if you missed last week’s episode, be sure to check that out when you’re done listening to this one. The first two still apply this week too. And we’re going to talk about how they apply to social emotional skills as well. So the first one is recognize and accept the circumstances the way they are, right? We can’t change the fact that there are these learning gaps happening right now. So we need to be able to accept it and be like, Okay, this is how it is and normalize it and neutralize it. Because if you’re like oh my goodness, these kids can’t do this, and you just get frustrated and you think they shouldn’t be doing this and everything. We just need to be okay, this is this is how it is. This is normal. All the teachers everywhere are seeing this right now. So accept it, but also give yourself grace. Be like, okay, this isn’t my fault. This isn’t even their fault. This is just a challenging situation, we’re all in and we’re going to navigate it together. So accept it and give lots of grace. Number two is to look at growth versus where you feel like students should be. So in the past if students say lets you teach fourth grade or whatever, and they should be able to behave in a certain way and you’re like these fourth graders feel like they’re second graders or the second graders feel like they’re kindergarteners just be like okay, well this is how things are right now. And it’s not the same year as it was five years ago. Things are different now. There’s a phrase in coaching that is don’t should all over yourself and it’s like don’t if you keep saying should that doesn’t usually feel good. If you’re like it should be this way. It’s not this way, there’s just all this tension. This isn’t the same as it previously was, and that’s okay. So just remind yourself, it’s okay. Give yourself grace. If you’re feeling frustrated, it’s okay to feel that we’re going to feel that, but just acknowledge it and then remind yourself like, Oh, hey, it’s okay. This is how it is for everybody right now. And this is what we’re going to do about it. And the third thing is kind of what to do about it. So I believe can definitely help in classrooms right now is teaching social emotional learning.

And there are five pillars of social emotional learning. Now, I didn’t make these up. If you Google it, it’s all over the internet. But basically, the five pillars or core competencies are number one is self awareness. Number two is self management. Number three is making responsible decisions. Number four is relationship skills. And number five is social awareness. Self awareness is where students are focused inwardly to recognize emotions and how these affect their view of themselves and others. Self management is by understanding emotions and how they infect themselves and others, students can make their own goals to work towards. Making responsible decisions is where students can use past experiences and what they know about emotional responses to make responsible decisions affecting themselves and others. Relationship skills are using emotional awareness of themselves and others as well as empathy from other people situations, students can build relationships with others based on open communication. Ideally, these skills also help with conflict resolution and knowing when to ask for help. And social awareness is the ability to show empathy and to understand ideas and emotions from another person’s perspective, especially of those of another culture or background. So I’m not going to go in depth on these just saying the fact that teaching these is definitely going to help. But I’m not going to go in depth because we have so much to share from our audience. But it did share some really great ways to teach these skills on a previous episode of the podcast. It was episode number four, the five pillars of social emotional learning. So if you listen to that episode, I share some really great ways to teach each of these skills along with an activity and a book recommendation for each one. So be sure to check out that episode too.

But if you just want it all done for you, be sure to check out our incredible 36 weeks of social emotional learning resource. And if you are a member of Wife Teacher Mommy club, go make sure to download that one. Remember, you get access to everything. If you’re not in the club, you can purchase it individually. If you want to get your feet wet with our resources, it is a huge year long resource with daily activities for social emotional learning for the entire year, it is a huge resource. So it’s $28. Or you can join the club for just $29.99 a month. And actually a bit less because remember, last week, I just announced a secret discount for podcast listeners. So if you are not yet a member, you can get 10% off your first payment with the code podcast10. It’s my special little gift to you as listener, I really don’t like to discount the club because the value is absolutely there beyond like a million there’s so much there. But as a listener, you’ve been dedicating your time here listening to me. So I wanted to give you a special discount. Here’s what has been said about the 36 weeks of social emotional learning. So Melody T says, “I just started using this product and it is fantastic. I love how it lays everything out for you, including supplies and books videos to use that my students really love.” Then Jennifer L says, “I am so excited to use this pack of lessons with my students next school year. Such a great value and super important in any classroom. This will be easy to incorporate into my days. Thank you.”

Okay, so one last thing, before we dive into everybody else’s answers, I want to make sure that you not only are providing social emotional support for your students, but also get support for yourself. Not only did the kids go through a tough few years, so did we be sure to find that support for yourself too. It’s kind of like we all know that story about an airplane, and the oxygen mask and how you’re supposed to put on yourself before you put on your own child. And that’s like hard to wrap your mind around. But really, if you don’t take care of yourself, you can’t take care of others. So make sure that if you are struggling, if you have trauma from everything that’s been going on the last few years, figure out what you need, whether that’s therapy or reading self help books are taking time for true self care, not like toxic positivity, like just taking a bath or whatever but true soul searching and taking a moment to actually ask yourself, do you have the support you need? If you don’t like to answer that question, make sure you do something to find that support. One option is to join us in the club where we have that life coaching at no extra cost. But honestly, that’s not why I’m saying that. Just make sure that wherever it is you find that support.

Okay, on that note, I want to continue supporting you today by sharing answers from fellow teachers who are in the trenches with you in the classroom right now. So let’s dive deep into some of these. And these recordings came from my podcast inbox. I love connecting with listeners podcasting can be really one way when I’m talking to you I want to hear you talk back too so you can always send me a message at WTMpodcastinbox.com Okay, so the following teachers are telling us about what they’re seeing as far as social skills gaps, and what they are doing about it. So I hope as you listen to these recordings, you can see that you are not alone in all of these struggles. And you can also see what is helping other teachers, that just might be a good idea for you to. Okay, so let’s dive in. First, we’re going to start we’re going to hear from Andrea, “I work at a special purpose private school. So we get kids who, for one reason or another aren’t able to stay at their public school, either due to the school requesting they come to us or the parents. A lot of the students that I’ve gotten in the past two years have, because of COVID, they want to stay home with their parents, and they don’t want to be at school. And they learn very quickly on public school, that they can be unsafe or inappropriate towards the teacher and their peers, and they will get sent home. So a lot of what I do in the first couple of months of any new student coming to my classroom is working on getting them happy to be at school and getting them engaged in school and getting them finding rewarding things about schools so that they aren’t continuously trying to be sent home, so that they can work their way back to being at public school and wanting to be there and being safe there.”

Okay, next, we’re going to hear from Hillary and the sound of her recording is a little difficult to hear. So if you have the volume quiet, be sure to turn it up a little bit. But what she had to share was so good. So I still wanted to include it here. “So to talk about the SEL piece of things, our schools adopted the mood leader. So we do a lot of daily check ins with kids to see how they’re feeling. They’re increasingly doing a lot of talking about feelings to help the kids that need help, also starting this classroom so that kids have a space to calm down. Buddy classroom. We’re trying to do what we can to help our kids or teachers. We’re trying. Interesting, because we have a couple of new counselors starting this year, a lot of teachers. So it’s definitely going to be a challenging year, I think. I think we’re all in this together. Thank you.”

Okay, next, we’re going to hear from Chelsea. “We’re definitely seeing a gap there in social skills, especially for you know, your kiddos who started kindergarten during COVID year, they have not had, you know, a normal school year. And that’s huge. I think just utilizing really just a community time and is allowing anytime for group work or just time for engagements. Community time could just be, you know, where you circle up and you ask a question. And, you know, each kid just gets a little bit, you know, even if it’s just 30 seconds to answer that question just to get to know each other a little bit better, just to be a little bit more open and just share a little bit about themselves. I mean, we all feel better when we feel like the people around us know us and care about us. And then for your older kids, I know that I My sister was a teacher. And she did when she did took role, she would ask a question, a blanket question for all of the kids to answer. And instead of just saying here, they would answer that question. So it could be silly questions. Like I know, she said one time she asked, Do you put your like a sock on and then a shoe? Or do you do sock sock shoe shoe? So like, I mean, it could be silly things like that. Or if you could be an animal, what would it be or, you know, just anything like that. So instead of just saying here, when you say their name, they might say I want to be a tiger or you know, something like that. So those are just little ideas that can be easily implemented, to just really create that community time because there’s definitely a gap. Unfortunately for our kiddos and their social skills, so anything we can do to help them with that will make our lives easier as well.”

Okay, next we’re going to hear from Melissa. “So as a substitute, I can’t speak to this full heartedly or in depth, but I know that when I was substituting one time as a paraprofessional, I was at the resource room where students would come for extra reading extra math help XYZ. And they had just implemented twice a week or three times a week for specific students to come to the resource room, instead of math and reading help they had SEL time slot. So social emotional learning, where the adult would ask them questions or allow them to share their struggles, frustrations, concerns, all their emotions that they were feeling in a safe, safe place. And in that time, where the adult could address it at that time, or take notes to, you know, just have the counselor adddressed or the teacher for different concerns. But I thought that that was really cool, what they were offering, but again, I that’s pretty much as in depth as I can get, well, hopefully, maybe you have more people offering similar advice or looking at being able to look into that to provide more for everybody, with given that little snippet of information.”

Now let’s hear from Kayla. “So as like most of you, I’m seeing a big change in the social growth of the kids, as well as their independence. So I use whole brain teaching. And one of my favorite things to utilize, is, you’re still cool. And kids use it when their classmates have made a mistake. And they can also use help me. So you’re so cool is if a kid’s like up at the board, or I do it all the time. And they make a silly mistake or an error in what they’re working on or something they say, you know, as many kids are captured, they turn around and say You’re so cool. So they’re acknowledging that that kid made a mistake, but it is okay. And that brings down like the anxiety and the kids of, you know, my peers are watching me and whatever. And it kind of makes it easier to form relationships between their peers. And then help me is one of my other favorites in the classroom that I use to kind of build those social bonds, but also morale about you know, how they can do their work. So if a kid is up at the board and struggling, they kind of cup their hands like Come here. And they say help me and any of the kids understand what that child is trying to do on the board, run up to the board and try to explain to them they don’t they cannot do it for them. So they’re kind of building that independence, but also learning to go to their peers for that interaction to help before they go straight to an adult.”

We’re going to hear from Jen next. “Building in and explicitly teaching how to work with others has been something that’s been very important. Even with my own kids at home, I’ve had to even for my middle schooler, make some meetups with her friends, because they don’t seem to know how to do that anymore.”

Now we’re going to hear from Tori. “When it comes to addressing social emotional gaps, my school does a really great job of implementing what used to be PBIS, or Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports. And we have since switched to SEL or social emotional learning. And all students are getting access to these social emotional lessons in this curriculum, which is beneficial because they interact with different groups of kids throughout the day. So they have time and an environment to practice those skills. However, in my experience, what I am finding to be very frustrating and the bigger challenge is, we only have these kids for so many hours in a day. And when they go home, many of our students, unfortunately, are not working on social skills. They’re not interacting with their families. And we’re lacking the support from parents. So we’ve seen an uptick in behavioral concerns. So I think while we’re doing a great job at addressing the social emotional needs, we also need to be consistent in our expectations and our rewards and consequences.”

Now we’re going to hear from Amanda. “So being at the preschool level, this is kind of what I touched on in my last answer that this is really one of the biggest skills that we teach at this level is a social skills and being able to learn how to play with peers, but alongside them cooperate. So again, just really allowing time one time for these kids to be able to form those skills and not put a lot of pressure on them. Not Not how Having really much more expectations since COVID. And just understanding that a lot of these kids have not been out of their house in the past two years or so. So again, just giving them that extra time to learn how to play and be around peers, and separate from their parents, with some motivators or toys, or anything along those lines that really grasp their attention have been helpful for us to use in the past.”

Okay, next recording is Nicole. “One of the things I’ve done in the past with my class is run a little, kind of like a charm course, a manners class, and we practice that at lunch. And in the classroom. It’s one of the things that I tried when we finished up the science unit and had a little extra time in class.”

Okay, and the final recording I have for you is from Rosemary. “I teach sixth grade math, and we are in a middle school setting. I have seen so many different issues with students coming up from elementary school, who had virtual learning for a year, we’re North Carolina, so they dealt with Florence, but flooding, we just had so many obstacles that they’ve had to go through. So that led to gaps in their learning, as well as making a big impact on their social emotional skills. When these students came up to me from, from elementary school to middle school, they were very awkward with talking to each other, they just had a year of virtual learning, they have been in the house for a year with COVID issues going on. So we really focus on mindfulness in the mornings to get them relaxed and cleared minds and ready for school. And we also do a second step program. It’s online that our county follows. And it really pushes them to discuss issues and ask questions that they may have, due to all of these things that have gone on in the past few years. And I also set up my class and groups for everything. And we do stations every day. So I really push them working with each other than collaborating so that they can work on that talking piece. Some of them have a hard time with talking with others. And I really feel with partnering, they can kind of get out of that shell, especially if they have a friend that they’re closer with in that class. I’ve tried to pair them together as well. I don’t care if they talk a little off of topic as long as they are working on those social skills.”

Okay, I just want to say a big thank you to all these teachers who went on over to my podcast inbox and sent me a recording to help all of you, they had so many amazing tips and strategies and just sharing their stories. I love hearing stories from other teachers. And I hope you do too. I hope you learned something from listening to these teachers in their voices, sharing their experience. I think there’s just something so powerful about when we come together and we share.

Okay, so now I have social media responses. So I shared on my Wife Teacher Mommies Unite Facebook group, and on Instagram, I got some comments there. So I want to share some of those with you. Okay, so just like last week, some of these are going to be just what teachers are seeing and how they’re struggling. And I’m going to read these so you can see that you’re not alone if you’re feeling these things too. And then other responses will also have some amazing tips and strategies that teachers are using that I hope that you’ll be able to either take and apply in your own classroom or maybe it will spark a completely different idea or you know, kind of take it and make it your own. I hope that it helps you figure out how to address all these social emotional skills in your classroom.

Okay, so first Mandy P she says, “Honestly, where I am a title one school the greatest stressor for me is behavior. Sometimes I can’t even get to the academics because I am teaching manners, respect and how to follow directions.” And Wendy D said agreeing with Mandy, “Yes, I agree with this. Most kids don’t get any education while COVID shut down. Our second to third graders are reading on a first grade level. Behaviors are disrespect and refusal.” Morgan B said, “Emotional problem solving with peers being able to express their feelings apologizing, noticing that someone’s feelings are hurt, etc.” Marian W says there’s a large number of emotional issues with children today and the age is getting younger and younger. They are more dependent than independent. Melissa L says, enabled entitled unmotivated and lazy. This is what I’m seeing in my fourth grade classroom. I’m working harder than ever to meet all the learning needs with no additional support in my classroom. Tara says I swear kids just don’t know how to communicate with each other anymore. Kids don’t go play. I have third graders that have never played a simple card or board games. Mallory W says honestly I’ve seen a lot more diagnoses of OCD and other related disorders. I teach fourth grade so my students were in first grade when the pandemic hit. Some kids three in my own class haven’t been in school since kindergarten. They don’t know how to do basic things such as ask for help resolve a conflict with a friend or even problem solve when they have a simple problem. The first 20 days are crucial for relationships and setting up expectations. Tara J says, I teach sixth grade and this year the students are far more immature than the kids at the sixth grade level. I think it has a lot to do with being at home for so much time over the last two to three years. Academically, they are behind some but not as bad as last year students. They’re just socially behind an immature. I’m not saying it’s a bad thing. But being new to middle school it is showing quite a bit. Pam J says I am seeing an increase in bullying. This is a thorn in my side. Loriann S says I am seeing kids acting out aggressively. Drugs also have become a problem in the high school more so than last year. Carissa M says not realizing that they are making noises, not understanding why they can’t get up whenever they want and often do without realizing it. I am continually reminding students and explaining reasons. In second grade I am treating the lack of special cues and expectations as if they are in Kinder. Kayla L says so many IEPs at such a young age. Sadly with more IEPs there’s less and less classified help. Kim C says I teach sixth grade in a title one school and many of our kids have experienced a lot of trauma which can manifest in their behavior. It also can cause them to be anxious and sleep deprived. Lisa G says I have noticed that they are socially and emotionally young for their age. I’m meeting them where they are loving them but firm and trying to move them in a more age appropriate behaviors and reactions. And Lisa she said she teaches second grade. Nicholas H says well I’ve started trying to do would you rather questions with my students summon our downtime to get interesting conversations going. I love that idea. I think that’s super fun. Angela H says I have students that come with no language because their parents have chosen not to learn their language. This is shown socially because the students have no idea how to interact with their peers, the only place they have access to languages school. Sadly it is not reinforced at home. To address this at school we do a lot of social playtime. This is how students will learn language and how to interact appropriately. Amber W says I teach kindergarten; students come in with an increase in defiance, need for attention, trauma, etc. All these behaviors however, are the way of communicating their needs. I have been including a restorative justice circle every single day. This takes priority over math or reading sometimes, this coupled with intensive and targeted social stories social curriculum have helped me immensely in kindergarten, I am hoping to create an RTI team dedicated to behavior and should have it up and running by the end of the year. Amber, great job, you are doing awesome things to help meet these kids. Sarah S says I am seeing the students are having a tough time with cooperation. I do lots of cooperative activities to get them to interact with each other in small groups and model appropriate conversations and behaviors. Cheryl G says lots of students are lacking in oral language students who were learning at home were being told to read but no one was talking to them about what they were actually reading. They can’t talk about the emotions they’re feeling or how a book or song makes them feel. The isolation of COVID has also taken from them the ability to just play. They don’t remember how to make friends be a friend just run and play. Social Emotional Learning is a top priority in my classroom, making connections and building relationships. Maytell A says I am seeing that my students have the sweetest hearts and just want to do well. They are very chatty, which is a bit of a challenge but they show empathy and and genuinely care about one another. Jenny D says I too work in the title one district, the kids definitely don’t have stamina or even a school sense on how to behave. Maturity is lacking across all grade levels. The K to two crowd, especially this year, second graders has a hybrid year in K. So even their behavior is a bit much, while first grade had more of a normal year for K It was still interrupted by quarantining the learning and behavioral gaps are big. We are still trying to instill a sense of belonging in our building by using a house system across grades. This is year two of that so we shall see if it is working. We are also focusing on the seven mindsets for SEL to help students discover who they are and encourage them to grow year two for that too. We have really been trying to focus a lot on SEL social emotional learning, to help them settle enough to learn. And I love that and it’s nice that they are you know doing something they’re trying it and then they’re evaluating it and to see how well it’s working. Okay, Lisa P says in our classroom in school wide we focus a lot on building relationships with our students and communication with parents. We are also implementing more inclusivity and diversity within our classrooms. That’s always a great thing. Tracy D says we had an opening assembly the week of workdays and our motivational speaker was Matt ditch the textbook. He mentioned spending two minutes getting to know your students and also giving them the opportunity to talk with you one on one. I teach resource today I tried it and I want to tell you what a difference that made in my students attitudes and how they behaved for the rest of class time. I will do this every day. It does take about 10 minutes of my time, but it was well worth it. I love this tip, and I think it will be a great one for everyone to try. Okay, Minerva P says, I am an English as a Second Language teacher for grades K through fifth, I have an assistant who does push into the classrooms and I pull students out of the classroom, the growth of ESL students population is increasing and the resources are decreasing. I have 55 students and I am the teacher for all of them. Many students during the pandemic were on Zoom and attendance was inconsistent. The biggest problem I see now is attendance at certain grade levels and behavior management, I have taught for 30 years and I have never seen such an increase in negative emotional behaviors. I would hope we could do more for these students rather than let them sink or swim with the programming they have. Okay, next, Milani R says so many students behaviors have been unchecked for extended periods and parents know their children have social emotional issues and appear powerless. It seems overwhelming at times, we’ve used social emotional learning and character counts along with lots of nonverbal instruction without singling out individual behaviors. Sasha W says assume nothing teach everything. This has always been something I have said. But now more than ever, we can’t assume that students are where they need to be. That includes social emotional learning, I am planning for the first two to three, probably more like six weeks to be about who my students are, and getting to know each other and routines. And then Danielle J agrees with her. She says this is exactly it. The scary part I teach 10th Grade English and I can say the same thing. Those who have commented saying about the primary and elementary grades, therefore this quote, assume nothing teach everything is almost my foundation as well. The first two weeks of school I build classroom culture, I maintain my peace by allowing my room to be my sacred and Sanctuary. Building relationships is key to many of the discipline problems and establishing trust. I cannot teach English until all the other stuff is sorted. Therefore social emotional learning is a component of every lesson daily. Student voices for teens is also huge. My teens desperately want to still be kids. But society is for so many fears, trauma anxieties that many adults struggle with. So imagine teens trying to cope with all of this, especially in the inner city, and having to focus on a lesson for 90 plus minutes. It’s a process of learning not to stress because every day is a new day to figure it out and get it right. I love this. And I think that Sasha and Danielle’s quotes were great ones to end with today.

And I think just you know, remembering that you’re going to figure it out, remembering that these gaps are here. But we are going to work with these students, we love them. And teaching social emotional learning is a wonderful way to do that. Because that really does seem to be a pattern with all of these responses. So I hope you learned something from one of these amazing teachers, and that you saw that you aren’t alone, you found something you could use. The big thing is we aren’t alone, we’re all seeing these gaps. There’s nothing we can do to change it overnight. But we can help our students and our own children build these skills maybe even be better than ever as we educate them and work together. So for more on the podcast about teaching the social emotional skills, remember to check out episode four the podcast of the five pillars of social emotional learning. These pillars are incredible to teach the students to be able to kind of rework these skills. And then also on episode 28 with John Osborne, we talked a lot about mental toughness for teachers, but also about how when we learn these skills ourselves, we can pass them on to the next generation and create a legacy. So I would highly recommend those two episodes. And for those of you in Wife Teacher Mommy club, I hope you’re also taking advantage of our amazing 36 weeks of social emotional learning resource, kind of like how Daniela mentioned having daily social emotional learning practice is huge. And this resource does exactly that. And all the planning and everything is done for you. So if you’re already in the club, remember to grab that one it’s included and also attend the coaching calls for that basically social emotional learning component for yourself so you can learn skills and pass them on to the next generation and create that legacy. If you’re not in the club yet, don’t forget that special code for podcast listeners podcast10 will get you 10% off your first payment into the club. And again, there’s nothing super urgent about that just like I said last week, but the sooner you do it, the sooner you’ll be able to grab that social emotional learning resource, attend the coaching for yourself and I think you’ll see that it will make a huge difference in your life. Okay, so this is it for that two episodes segment talking about the educational gaps. So if you missed last week’s episode, be sure to listen to part one about the achievement gaps. We’re talking about the learning gaps in that one and this one we talked about the social emotional learning ones. That is it again if you found this episode helpful. Be sure to share it with a friend so they can utilize these tips and strategies as well. And I will talk to you soon.