As I mentioned in my reflection on
the EDUC560 course webinars are highly beneficial for teachers who are willing to
enhance their pedagogical repertoire through the knowledge of experts. I
witnessed this by attending a webinar presented by professor and former
director of clinical training in Department of Psychology at Rutgers University
Maurice J. Elias, and director of the center for Child & Family Development
in Morristown, New Jersey Steven E. Tobias who are also the authors of the book
titled Boost Emotional Intelligence in Students. Emotional intelligence also referred
to as EQ is the ability to manage one’s feelings and interact positively with
other people. Prof. Elias stressed the importance of EQ and said that it is one
of the most important issues students face, just like not being able to read
will present challenges to students, not being able to read people will present
them to challenges as well. EQ is very similar
to and is sometimes called Social-Emotional Learning, Social-Emotional and
Character Development, Social Skills Development, Cognitive-Behavioral Skill
Training…etc, which all aim to boost EQ.
Why should we focus on EQ?
Having high EQ is related to having a
sense of self, as well as the ability to have meaningful and rewarding
relationships with others. Just as IQ is important, not having EQ will result
in having a hard time listening, paying attention and working in groups in
class.
Accountability assessment or the test
our students take in schools will not prepare them for the tests of life. This
is the mission both Elias and Tobias aim for, to prepare students for life. Studies
show that emotional intelligence is correlated with career success and academic
skills. A Study done by Google identified seven soft skills referred to as
emotional intelligence skills to determine whether their employees are successful
they are: Value responsible, hard-working, can handle stress, can communicate clearly
and assertively, problem solving skills, resolve conflicts, and get along with
team members all being aspects of emotional intelligence. Many other studies
support that in order for our students to succeed emotional intelligence skills
are indispensable throughout the process of kindergarten to university and
later on career life.
Three primary EQ areas:
1. Area 1: Self-Awareness
and Self-Management: focuses on feeling and self-regulation.
2. Area 2: Social
Awareness and Relationship skills: deal with the ability to get along with other
people.
3. Area 3: Possible
Decision-Making and Problem Solving: is the capacity to deal with the obstacles
life throws at you in an ethically and morally responsible ways.
Techniques to build skills in these
areas:
1. Sample time
Frames and Lesson planning: for example if you have the whole you year you must
target all three areas of EQ, if not focus on only area 1 (more like a pre-requisite
for the next two areas) and either area 2 or area 3. Devoting some time to
practice skills of these areas in a necessity that will make your other instruction
more efficient. Conclude with a self-evaluation assessment of what was learned
and how to keep skill development going. Lesson can be 30 minutes long to as
much as you can take. Practice is key, working intensively helps students
internalize these skills.
2. The structure of
lessons: Skills we should focus on in our lessons:
EQ area 1 (Self-Awareness and Self-Management):
- Skill 1: Knowing your EQ strengths and challenges. Understand
and recognize the fact that even the most miserable child has emotional intelligence
strengths.
- Skill 2: Understanding your values and being your best
self.
- Skill 3: Thinking and talking about feelings.
- Skill 4: Recognizing negative self-talk and practicing
positive self-talk.
- Skill 5: Achieving and maintaining self-control.
EQ area 2 (Social Awareness and Relationship
skills):
- Skill 6: Anticipating and defusing trigger situation:
To be able to regulate emotions and be aware of the things that set you off. We
want students to understand what sets them off and learn how to manage those
thing when they happen or even avoid them.
- Skill 7: Assertive communication.
- Skill 8: Reading the social and emotional cues of
others.
- Skill 9: Playing our many social roles (communicating differently
with different people).
- Skill 10: Empathy (how people around you are feeling).
EQ area 3 (Possible Decision-Making and
Problem Solving): helping the kids have a problem solving strategy they can use
no matter the situation.
- Skill 11: Using the ESP problem solving process.
- Skill 12: Goal setting.
- Skill 13: Brainstorming.
- Skill 14: Anticipating Outcomes.
- Skill 15: Planning for success and overcoming obstacles.
While teaching those skills we have
to model them for our students.
Some skills to use in lessons while teaching
EQ skills:
1) Developing a
feelings vocabulary: to help your students define how they are feeling. You can
start by asking students “How many feeling do you think you experience in a
day, an afternoon, an hour or even at the same time?” to introduce the topic or start a discussion
about feelings in a sharing circle which will help in developing empathy and
communication skills.
2) Developing self-control:
Ask students what they do to calm themselves down and when is it important to
control strong feelings. Then show students techniques that will help them exercise
self-control (e.g breathing techniques)
From this webinar it was very obvious
that if we focus on emotional intelligence it will make is easier for us to
deal with students. In my opinion, when our students realize that we care about
how they feel they start trusting us more and become willing to listen to us
giving us the chance to instill in them more emotional intelligence skills.
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