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Promoting Mental Health in the Classroom

Four out of five students demonstrate positive mental health. Teachers can play an important role in promoting their students' mental health by promoting a positive school climate, helping students master social-emotional learning skills, and utilizing good classroom management practices.

A Positive School and Classroom Climate

A positive school and classroom climate encourages students to feel safe and connected to their school. The factors that produce a positive school climate include an emphasis on social and emotional safety, as well as physical safety, for all students; high expectations for achievement; high quality instruction; a sense of community; healthy peer norms; school-home partnerships; and collaboration and communication.

A positive school and classroom climate encourages students to feel safe and connected to their school.

Teachers can promote a positive climate in their classrooms by developing a caring and supportive environment, personalizing instructions to accommodate learning differences among students, providing status opportunities for students who are not popular (e.g., as assistants), and maintaining consistent and fair disciplinary practices.

The Center for Social and Emotional Learning [link]www.csee.net[link] provides information on assessing and improving school climate.

Social Emotional Learning

Social emotional learning skills are fundamental competencies that children need to master in order to recognize and manage emotions, develop caring and concern for others, establish positive relationships, make responsible decisions, and handle challenging situations constructively. Research has indicated that social emotional learning leads to improved academic outcomes, such as greater motivation to learn and commitment to school, increased time on schoolwork and mastery of subject matter, improved attendance, and improved grades and test scores.

Research has indicated that social emotional learning leads to improved academic outcomes

Among the skills that exemplify social and emotional learning are these:

• Self-awareness-the ability to accurately assess one's own feelings, values and strengths;
• Self-management-the ability to regulate one's emotions to handle stress, control impulses, and express emotions appropriately;
• Social awareness-the ability to empathetically put yourself in another person's shoes and recognize and appreciate similarities and differences;
• Relationship skills-the ability to establish and maintain healthy and rewarding relationships;
• Responsible decision-making-the ability to make ethical decisions that reflect one's own values and also demonstrate respect for others.

Social emotional learning is aligned with other educational movements, including character education, youth development, service learning, and positive behavior supports. To learn more about social emotional learning, visit the websites of the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning at the University of Illinois at Chicago http://www.casel.org/about/index.php.

Effective Classroom Management

When a student acts out, the teacher should remain calm, base her response on an understanding of the student's underlying motivation, and explain that the matter will be resolved by use of the consequences included in your posted rules.

Effective classroom management skills can defuse stressful situations with students and enhance social and emotional learning. Begin by posting a list of four to five simple, positive classroom rules with consequences for following or not following the rules. When a student acts out, the teacher should remain calm, base her response on an understanding of the student's underlying motivation, and explain that the matter will be resolved by use of the consequences included in your posted rules.

After an incident of misbehavior, the teacher should implement the logical consequences (e.g., loss of privileges), work with the student to (re)clarify what is acceptable behavior and plan together to avoid future problems. She should also explain the actions and their reasoning to parents, helping them to understand how they can support positive social and emotional learning at home.