Social and Emotional Learning (SEL): Key to Mental Health Promotion

SEL Research Group/ CASEL Update, July 2010

1

Social and Emotional Learning (SEL):

Key to Mental Health Promotion

Jean Hughes, RN, PhD

Professor, School of Nursing, Dalhousie University

Lead Researcher – SEAK Project

[email protected]

2 Social and Emotional Learning …Key Life Skills

SEL includes the knowledge, attitudes and skills necessary to: understand and manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, feel and show empathy for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, make responsible decisions. Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL)

3 SEL Competencies

Self-awareness Self-management Social awareness Relationship skills Responsible decision making

CASEL

4 SEL Skills Assist Mental Health Promotion:

Enhance capacity to take control

Foster individual resilience

Foster individual protective factors

5 Why are SEL skills so important?

Neuropsychological models argue that children’s neurological functioning affects:

the regulation of Strong emotions Social function Cognitive function Behavioural function

Riggs et al., 2006

6 Why are SEL skills so important?

Research shows that environmental stress during childhood & adolescence has substantial effects on the operation of the neuroendocrine system and that these effects are likely to have long term impact on both cognitive and social-emotional functioning

Shankoff, et al., 2009 in Bradshaw, et al., 2012

7 Why are SEL skills so important? Fortunately brain function and its behavioral outcomes

are malleable during these developmental stages.

Therefore interventions can assist when focused on: THE ENVIRONMENT - Strengthen children’s social–

ecologies (responsive parenting, caring & welcoming schools)

SEL SKILLS - support children’s development of Social & emotional regulation & coping abilities

Bradshaw, et al., 2012

8Do SEL interventions work… What does the evidence say?

Meta-analysis: 213 school-based, universal SEL

programs 270,034 students - kindergarten through

high school.

Durlak, et Al., 2011

9 Results:

Compared to controls, SEL participants demonstrated significant improvement in: social and emotional skills, attitudes, behavior, academic performance that reflected an 11-

percentile-point gain in achievement.

Durlak, et al., 2011

10 Key Findings

Classroom Teachers Only when school staff conduct the

intervention does academic performance improve significantly.


11 Key Findings

Program Implementation Quality The benefits of effective SEL programs are

reduced when schools do not adopt evidence-based programs do not implement these programs with fidelity.


12 Key Findings

Maximize the SEL and academic outcomes by combining:

support to school personnel who deliver evidence-based SEL programming

sound educational policy


13Best Evidence re SEL Programs…

Positive change in students’ developmental health and well-being are best achieved from programs that are:

Focused on social, cognitive and emotional processes

School based

Multi YearConduct Problem Prevention Research. (2010); Jones, et al., 2011


14 Best Evidence re SEL Programs…

Universal (whole school approach) builds common language (culture) generalizes competence – to other

courses, outside classroom/school


15 Best Evidence re SEL Programs Cont’d.

Provide: a manualized curriculum opportunities for practice Teacher/staff training

On-going mentoring/support

School Principal – program champion

16

Such Commitment Requires Policy Change

17 What type of policy is critical to sustain SEL?

Policies at many different levels (federal, provincial and local) play a key role in determining the priority that schools give to SEL in teacher preparation – B. Ed. Programs in the curriculum in assessing students’ learning of the basic

SEL competencies.

18 What type of policy is critical to sustain SEL?

Provincial learning standards a primary driver of curriculum and assessment.

Provinces are increasingly including SEL in their standards… but need to ensure: evidence-based programs implementation fidelity.

19 One SEL Program: PATHS

Promoting Alternative THinking Strategies

Kusche & Greenberg, 1994.

20 One SEL Program: PATHSPromoting Alternative THinking Strategies

Highly Ranked Evidence-Based SEL Program

Blueprints Project of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, University of Colorado Model Program – highest possible rating Only violence-prevention curriculum for

elementary-age children to achieve this rating

21

PATHS

National Dropout Prevention Center/Network Model Program – highest possible rating

Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) Select Program – highest possible rating

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Best Practices Program

22 PATHS

PATHS is rooted in developmental neuroscience showing that:

Children experience intense emotions before having the cognitive skills to verbalize and control emotions.

23 PATHS

The PATHS curriculum is centered on the ABCD model of development (affective/behaviour/cognitive/dynamic) arguing that:

affect, vocabulary, and cognition interact to create social and emotional competence

24 PATHSPromoting Alternative THinking Strategies

Elementary school-wide program Kindergarten – Grade 6

Manualized curriculum

Delivered by trained teachers two 20 minute lessons each week all year, every

year

25 Summary of key PATHS research findings

Compared to students from control schools, PATHS students show:

Enhanced Emotional Understanding

Enhanced Pro-social Behaviour better understand social problems and create

effective solutions reduced aggression and disruptiveness



Enhanced Cognitive Skills and Academic Performance

effective problem solving, thinking and planning skills, and controlled impulses

academic engagement



Enhanced Mental Health diminished internalizing problems such as

anxiety and sadness decreased externalizing problems such as

conduct disorder, Oppositional Deviance Disorder or ODD, hyperactivity, frustration


28

PATHS In Action

The SEAK Project: PATHS In Canada

Contact: Jean Hughes, RN, PhD, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada

[email protected]@dal.ca

Funded by the Public Health Agency of Canada


29

Socially and Emotional Aware Kids: The SEAK Team

Canadian Mental Health Assoc. Nova Scotia Division

◦Gail Gardiner – Executive Director CMHA NS Division

Dalhousie University

◦ Dr. Jean Hughes – Lead Researcher/ Principal

Investigator

◦ Dr. Sophie Jacques – Associate Researcher

◦ Dr. Noriyeh Rahbari – SEAK Research Coordinator

30

Our Project: SEAK

Socially and Emotionally Aware Kids

Vision: Socially and Emotionally Competent Children

in a Healthy Community.

Approach:

Based in Population Health & Health Promotion.

Core Intervention:Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies (PATHS)

31

SEAK – Objectives4 Years

Increase the social and emotional competence of children in project sites identified as having health inequalities .

Strengthen community capacity to integrate mental health promotion.

Increase community capacity for leadership, collaboration and accountability in population health innovation diffusion related to social and emotional learning.

32

SEAK – Objectives

Provide evidence to support the innovation and inform policy and service change over the long term.

Advance knowledge on population health innovation diffusion related to social and emotional learning.

33

PATHS Intervention Schools Receive the PATHS program (K- grade 6) 5 community sites (approx. 350 students/site)2 sites delivering PATHS (4yrs, 13 yrs)3 new sites – phase in PATHS

Wait-List schoolsWait-listed for 1-2 years and then receive PATHS

interventionAt least100 students/school

Total = 1700+ Students (numbers vary by site)

Project Sites: Nova Scotia, Manitoba and

Alberta

34

SEL ◦ During PATHS ◦ Long-term follow up after PATHS (SEL & Risk)

School◦ Climate◦ Discipline◦ Academics, school retention

Health - Obesity (BMI)Parent mental well-being Health service useEconomic Analysis (cost-benefit) of PATHS Quantitative and qualitative measures

Outcome indicators: Chosen to enhance buy-in from key stakeholders

35

Curriculum

Needs to be formally integrated into curriculum of Educational authority (provincial, national level)

Focus Build core skills to explore emotions and

relationships & focus on strengths rather than interventions to address specific problems (bullying/ suicide) that focus only on symptoms

Policy/Sustainability Issues Identified by SEAK Project

36

Financial Collaborations◦ Government

multiple sectors- education, health, recreation, justice, etc. Focus: cost-effectiveness

◦ Corporate Focus: PATHS builds desired employee skills

◦ Not for Profit, Foundations Focus: citizenship

Scale Up

Policy/Sustainability Issues Identified by SEAK Project

37

It really does take a village to raise a healthy child!

38


39 References Bradshaw, et al., Goldweber, A., Fishbein, D., Greenberg, M. (2012).

Infusing developmental neuroscience into school-based prevention interventions: Implications and future directions. Journal of Adolescent Health, 51: S41-S47.

Conduct Problem Prevention Research. (2010). The effects of a multiyear universal social-emotional learning program: The role of student and school characteristics. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. 78(2): 156-168.

Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL) http://www.casel.org/social-and-emotional-learning

Durlak, J. A., Weissberg, R. P., Dymnicki, A. B., Taylor, R. D. & Schellinger, K. B. (2011). The impact of enhancing students’ social and emotional learning: A meta-analysis of school-based universal interventions. Child Development, 82: 405–432.


40 References

Jones, S. Brown, J., Aber, J. L. (2011). Two-year impacts of a universal school-based social-emotional and literacy intervention: An experiment in translational developmental research. Child Development, 82(2): 533-554.

Kusche & Greenberg, 1994. The PATHS Curriculum. Seattle, WA: Developmental Research and Programs.

Riggs, N., Greenberg, M., Kusche, C., Pentz, M.A. (2006). The mediational role of neurocognition in the behavioural outcomes of a social-emotional prevention program in elementary school students: Effects of the PATHS curriculum. Prevention Science. 7(1): 91-102.

SEL Research Group (2010). The benefits of school-based social and emotional learning programs: Highlights from a forthcoming CASEL Report. Chicago: University of Illinois at Chicago SEL Research Group & The Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning.

http://www.casel.org/s/the-benefits-of-school-based-social-and-emotional-learning-programs.pdf

http://www.casel.org/s/the-benefits-of-school-based-social-and-emotional-learning-programs.pdf

Social and Emotional Learning (SEL): Key to Mental Health Promotion

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