Fix School Discipline Toolkit for Educators | Page 51

For example:
Students are taught positive interpersonal skills and
intrapersonal emotional intelligence using various
combinations of media, including videos, pictures and
text.
Lesson plans help students recognize and understand
a variety of emotions and their causes.
Administrators and parents further strengthen the key
competencies by questioning students and reinforcing
expected behavior. For example, a principal may walk
through the school and ask students what “focusing
attention” is and bulletin boards in common areas
may exhibit pictures modeling “focused attention”
and tips about how to “focus attention.”
Students are encouraged to keep a journal chronicling
events in their lives as well as their emotions
surrounding those events.
Students are empowered to resolve their own conflicts
through the use of peer mediation.40

Crunching the numbers: Does it work?

Other examples of demonstrated benefits include
improved graduation rates, reduced violence,
lowered substance abuse, and decreased teen suicide
attempts. 43

Where can I go for additional
information, resources and research?
Collaborative for Academic, Social and
Emotional Learning (CASEL)—an organization
providing funding, information, training and
research around Social and Emotional Learning—
www.casel.org
Good Behavior Game, one method for teaching
self-regulation and some social emotional
learning skills: http://goodbehaviorgame.org/
Second Step, one type of social emotional
learning curriculum, www.cfchildren.org/
second-step.aspx and www.nrepp.samhsa.
gov/ViewIntervention.aspx?id=66

An in-depth study found that students who receive
SEL instruction had more positive attitudes about
school and improved an average of 11 percentile
points on standardized achievement tests compared
to students who did not receive such instruction. 41
Positive Action, an evidence-based SEL approach
that promotes an interest in learning and encourages
cooperation among students, was found to have
reduced disruptive behaviors by 72% and suspensions
by 24%. Positive Action is based on the intuitive
philosophy that students feel good about themselves
when they engage in positive actions. In a rigorous
study, Positive Action reduced suspensions and grade
retention by 73% each.
Since implementing SEL, a school in Chicago has seen
great improvement in student achievement. Before
SEL programming, during the 2004-2005 school year,
38% of the students met or exceeded state standards.
By 2007-2008, 75% of the students met or exceeded
state standards. 42
40 CASEL SEL Stories, SEL Impacts on Students (Brooklyn), available at
www.casel.org.
41 Durlak, J.A. (2011), The Impact of Enhancing Students’ Social and
Emotional Learning: A Meta-Analysis of School-Based Universal Interventions, Child Development, 82(1), 405-432.
42 CASEL SEL Stories, Principal Leadership: A Key to Success (Chicago),

available at www.casel.org.
43 Zins, J.E. & Elias, M. (2008), Social Emotional Learning, Children’s
Needs III.

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