Social-Emotional Learning

In the Early Childhood years, social-emotional learning is critical for the way your child will begin to explore the world. To achieve academic success, children need to learn how to approach challenges, make positive decisions, manage big feelings, and create friendships. At Cook, we use Second Step, a research-based social-emotional learning curriculum, starting in Senior Kindergarten to develop children’s social and emotional skills. Your child will learn many practices to support their personal development, including growing mindset skills, managing emotions showing empathy and kindness, keeping themselves and others safe, and problem-solving. These skills will help your child grow both inside and outside of the school community.

As students advance into Lower School, a dedicated class time each week with the SEL teacher focuses on practical applications of SEL skills, such as self awareness, self management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making. Classroom teachers use classroom meetings as a way to remind, encourage and support students in learning and employing vital SEL skills throughout the week. As students learn SEL skills, they are more quickly able to adapt to their progressively more challenging academic pursuits in a shared community environment.

In Middle School SEL class, students continue to practice self awareness, self management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making. SEL class is also a time when we deliberately focus on our individual and collective identities and experiences, as seeing SEL through an inclusion lens helps us create an environment where harm can be proactively avoided and thoughtfully responded to. With the onset of puberty in Middle School, SEL skills are vital in creating a community where everyone can learn. The variability of adolescence and requirements of a challenging academic experience at Cook cannot co-exist without SEL support. As students leave our school after 8th Grade, they are prepared to approach life’s ups and downs with the flexibility required of our human experience and continued attention to SEL skills.