Volume 14, Number 6
November/December 1998
Programs Fostering "Emotional Intelligence" Show Promise
Some practitioners see critical needs being met by social and emotional curriculum
by Michael Sadowski
Acting out, fighting, racial and other slurs, bullying, willful disruption of learning. Many teachers are faced with problem behaviors like these at one time or another: some face them virtually every day. And as every teacher knows, the educational costs of these behaviors can be tremendous.
Debby Collins, principal of the K-5 Plymouth School in Monrovia, CA, says that until recently most of her staff believed lack of discipline was a serious impediment to learning in their classrooms. Collins recalls several teachers' comments:
- "Kids don't know how to cooperate or act nicely toward each other."
- "There is far too much acting-out behavior."
- "What's killing us, keeping us from being the best we can be, is a lack of discipline."
This is an excerpt from the Harvard Education Letter. Subscribers can click here to continue reading this article.