1.3 Social and Emotional Learning: Basic Choices

2. The Roots

For centuries, social and emotional learning has taken place in small groups such as the family, the neighborhood, and the classes. In these small groups, societies had the opportunity of transferring to children their social norms and values, skills, and habits of prosocial behaviour with low level of modification.

The fast and often unpredictable changes and complexities of actual societies highly impacted the status quo. Traditional values and vision are challenges so much that in some cases the liquid modernity is depicted as a crisis of social principles, ethical values, moral directions (LaBar & Cabeza, 2006). Difficulties in adult life could negatively impact the construction of a trust and healthy relationship with children and reduce the opportunity of learning adequate social and emotional skills. Positive child development is, in fact, threatened by unsupportive and unmeaningful relationships with adults. In extreme cases they could experience so negative feelings and emotions that they could arrive to think to have nothing to lose and take dramatic decisions.

What is highlighted by international warning is that mental health problems are arising: anxiety, depression, propensity to use addictive substances, breaking the rules, or criminal behavior. Providing opportunities for social and emotional learning is targeted as a crucial for coping with a variety of life situations since the consequences of social and emotional incompetence limit the future lives of young people. Consequently, adults and educators need to become aware of the importance of social and emotional learning and make all the efforts for providing environments where children and adolescents can experience care and acquire social and emotional competencies.

The school is of course a prominent place where social and emotional learning can be carried out. Educators are requested to be aware of children challenges, understand how complex it is growing in actual societies and become a protective factor that outweighs all these risks.