Teachers' views on students' social and emotional skills

Abstract

The importance of social and emotional skills in schools contexts can be seen both in in research and in the National core curriculum for basic education in Finland. Considering the importance of social and emotional skills for students’ social, personal and academic development as well as the recent emphasis on these skills in Finnish education, the purpose of this study is to explore teachers’ experiences, views and practices in relation to students’ social and emotional learning. Social and emotional skills have a great impact on child’s development, success and future. How teachers view social and emotional skills have an effect on how they address them in their classrooms. Teachers’ ability to implement social and emotional skills education in classroom culture daily affect students’ social and emotional competence.

Considering the importance of social and emotional skills in students’ learning and development and the importance of teachers’ views in shaping their practices of addressing social and emotional skills, the following research questions were asked in this study: 1. What are teachers’ views about students’ social and emotional skills? 2. How do teachers address social and emotional skills for their students?

A survey design was employed as the research method in this study because it enables gathering the ideas of a large group of people about a topic or issue.

The study showed that social and emotional skills are considered to be important by participating teachers. Social and emotional skills were visible in classrooms and were addressed quite often in everyday life as well as with the help of different materials such as KiVa school -materials, Lions Quest and FRIENDS -materials for social and emotional education.