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Welcome to Greater Good in Education! Explore our growing collection of 350+ practices related to social-emotional learning, character education, and mindfulness, drawn from the latest research.

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Find activities, practices, and tools to help you create happier, kinder, more equitable learning communities, drawn from research.

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Examples of Engaging Instruction to Increase Equity in Education

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Examples of Engaging Instruction to Increase Equity in Education

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Redlands Return to School- SEL/Behavior Support Toolbox.docx

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Sycamore Schools Healthy Back to School PBIS: Face-to-Face Classroom Expectations

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Middle School Expectations Example Video

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Middle School Expectations Example Video

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Multi Tier Systems Of Support Universal Design For Learning

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Redlands Teacher PD SEL March 31, April 1.pdf

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The version of the browser you are using is no longer supported. Please upgrade to a supported browser. Dismiss

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This website provides resources for CASEL on their framework and implementation of the 5 compentencies.

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Advancing Social and Emotional Learning - CASEL

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CASEL is helping make evidence-based social and emotional learning an integral part of education, preschool through high school.

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This organization is part of state CalHope Grant for SEL and has a variety of free SEL resources.

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Greater Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life

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Based at UC Berkeley, Greater Good reports on groundbreaking research into the roots of compassion, happiness, and altruism.

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Powerpoint for Connect PD Session

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Developing Asset-Based Approach to Teaching

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Developing Asset-Based Approach to Teaching

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Differentiated Instruction

Through this approach, which focuses on students' strengths, teachers can plan instruction that promotes a growth mindset.

Alan Ingram / Alamy Stock Photo

As educators welcomed students to the 2020-21 school year, they did so with great care and attention to their social and emotional needs. Now, as school routines become habits and students dive deeper into their learning, this message of hope and support must continue to be conveyed during instruction.

If students only hear of the gaps in their learning or that they have fallen behind, they will begin to act according to the low benchmark that has been set for their achievement. An asset-based approach to teaching is one that is grounded in what students can do rather than what they cannot do or areas of weakness. It is an embodiment of growth mindset in instruction.

3 Steps to Using an Asset-Based Approach to Teaching

1. Begin with a diagnostic learning activity that provides information about what students know and can do. A simple way to design a diagnostic learning activity that focuses on what students can do is to align the task to the skills or concepts from the previous grade level. Most standards are scaffolded from one grade level or course to the next. For example, in mathematics, this is known as coherence. In science, it can be seen through progressions of the Disciplinary Core Ideas (DCI). By looking at standards or intentionally identifying foundational skills or concepts in a curriculum document, teachers can quickly access this information.

For example, the following learning targets are based on English language arts standards:

Fifth grade: I can use the supporting details to determine the central idea.

Sixth grade: I can explain how supporting details are used to develop the central idea.

As a simple diagnostic, students read and annotate an article using text tags to identify key details and then use the tagged details to write the central idea. A sixth-grade teacher would review student work focused on the details that the students selected and how they were used to write the central idea, or the fifth-grade expectation.

With this information, the teacher can plan instruction to provide strategies for moving students from identifying the central idea to explaining how it is developed. Additional pathways are created for students who have this skill and need more practice or are ready to apply it in different ways.

2. Provide different learning pathways so that all students have the opportunity to meet high expectations. Time has always been precious in the classroom, and it feels even more so as learning this year takes place in remote or blended environments. A learning plan that can be used in these various settings may be strategically constructed so that all students are able to work toward high expectations from their starting point.

The learning plan begins with the diagnostic activity. The student can then choose or the teacher may select different pathways through the plan, with students completing a core set of learning activities aligned to the plan's learning target to ensure that they are all working toward high expectations.

Pathway A embeds instruction and review so that students build background knowledge and skills. For example, students create criteria for identifying important details. They use the criteria to identify details to tag that reveal the central idea.

Pathway B includes additional activities for student practice and application. For example, students use SEE (statement, evidence, explanation) as a cognitive routine for explaining the connection between the central idea statement and the evidence from text.

Pathway C provides activities for deepening understanding or applying learning in new ways. For example, students use SEE to evaluate a text that presents a different point of view.

Creating pathways will help eliminate endless review, repetitive tasks, and/or disengagement that can come from the one-size-fits-all approach to instruction. It communicates to the students that the teacher believes each of them is a unique but ready and able learner.

(Click here for a full example of a learning plan for a sixth grader with an asset-based approach to instruction.)

3. Provide feedback to students identifying what they can do and strategies for using their strengths to address areas of need. Embedded in each learning activity is a formative-assessment moment. These are tangible or observable evidence of student learning. In an asset-based approach to learning, they are used to provide students with feedback that includes three important pieces of information.

Strength: The evidence you selected clearly identifies the important information about the impact of the transcontinental railroad on different groups of people.

Need: The central idea is a summary statement of what is most important about the text. How can you say what is most important without rewriting all of the details?

Next step: Write the central idea for two or three paragraphs in your own words before writing the central idea for the entire text.

It is important to note that not all students need to receive the same feedback at the same time. The formative-assessment moment exists as an opportunity for students to receive the feedback they need when they need it. However, all students deserve specific and tailored feedback at some time during their learning.

When teachers begin to look at what students understand, know, and can do, it changes the way the teacher and their students approach learning. The teacher begins to leverage what students know as a means for moving learning forward. For students, small successes lead to larger ones and help develop belief in their own capability as well as the willingness to engage when learning becomes difficult. When students are made aware of how they can learn, they take another step toward being independent, self-regulated learners.

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3 Steps to Developing an Asset-Based Approach to Teaching

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Differentiated Instruction Through this approach, which focuses on students' strengths, teachers can plan instruction that promotes a growth mindset. Alan Ingram / Alamy Stock Photo As educators welcomed students to the 2020-21 school year, they did so with great care and attention to their social and emotional needs.

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Socially Distancing Greeting at the Door Ideas

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Socially Distancing Greeting at the Door Ideas

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No-Touch Greetings for Students

Greeting students in the morning is going to be especially important this fall with a pandemic hanging around. Welcoming students in the classroom is a great way to help students feel welcome and leave any problems they might have from home at the door. Teachers want schools to open safely this year. Social distance greetings for students can help with the transition from home to classroom.
Here are some no-touch social distance greetings you can do with your students:
How to Teach Distant Greetings

I would have students pick a greeting before they get to school to do at the door and an action for how to say goodbye. These activities should be quick. You can make a sign that has the actions that hangs on the wall by the door for a reminder. Hang posters and share other distance greeting activities to help students get in a routine of greeting each other. I recommend having a few actions and then changing the activities out every month to keep them engaged. Create your own or check out Teachers Pay Teachers for some great resources already made for teachers. Using Velcro will make it easy for teachers to change the greetings regularly.

Jack Hartmann has a wonderful song to help teach how to greet someone without touching and remind students how to stay 6 feet away from others in the classroom. Check it out! Thank you JACK!

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Social Distance Greetings for Students - Teacher's Brain Blog

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Greeting students in the morning is going to be especially important this fall with a pandemic hanging around. Welcoming students in the classroom is a great way to help students feel welcome and leave any problems they might have from home at the door. Teachers want schools to open safely this year.

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CASEL SEL 3 Signature Practices Playbook

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CASEL SEL 3 Signature Practices Playbook

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5 Minute Timer with Classical, Calm Music! Countdown Timer for Kids, Piano Instrumental Music!

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Returning to School During and After Crisis

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Every kid needs a champion | Rita Pierson | TED

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Sample Video of Socially Distancing Greeting at the Door

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Sample Video of Socially Distancing Greeting at the Door

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This teacher kicks off class in the best way with each of her students

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Welcoming Rituals

Welcoming Rituals establish and help maintain positive relationships.

In the classroom, they may be part of a morning circle, a class meeting, or even as simple as smiling and greeting each student by name as they enter the classroom. But when teachers purposefully choose a Welcoming Ritual and connect it in some way to the learning of the day, it strengthens the curricular connections and the climate of the class.

So if you're not already using this practice, have a go at using Welcoming Rituals in class, in professional development, and in your PLCs this year!

In the future, we plan to provide other examples of Welcoming Rituals for your reference. Please check back!

Organization and Credit

In the sections below, you will find several ideas for Welcoming Rituals grouped by grade level bands and for professional development sessions. Depending on how well your participants know one another, be thoughtful about what SEL skills you hope to grow among the group.

And remember to gear it to the content of your lesson or professional development activity for an even greater impact.

References: Cleveland Metropolitan School District's Class Meeting Ring Book; SmartBrief

Welcoming Ritual Ideas

Professional Development

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Social Emotional Learning - Welcoming Rituals

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Welcoming Rituals Welcoming Rituals establish and help maintain positive relationships. In the classroom, they may be part of a morning circle, a class meeting, or even as simple as smiling and greeting each student by name as they enter the classroom.

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Social & Emotional Learning (SEL)

Build social and emotional skills into any class.

Summit students rip up their stress.

Summit Preparatory Charter High School in Redwood City, California, uses a variety of activities in the weekly, 90-minute Habits, Community, and Culture (HCC) class, where students learn Habits of Success and develop social and emotional learning (SEL) skills. The school has developed an HCC curriculum for grades nine through 12 and hired two full-time teachers for HCC, but Summit's academic teachers also use some of these activities to build SEL skills and deepen their relationships with their students. Cady Ching, a biology and AP environmental science teacher at Summit, incorporates opening activities into all of her classes: "In my freshman classes, we do them every class period."

Visualization to release stress: Have your students imagine what stress looks and feels like inside their body, and then ask them to release it. "The mindfulness practice makes you think the stress is coming off your body," says Geoffrey, a 12th-grade student.

Noise isolation: There are a variety of sounds that your students hear when they're in your classroom, from students walking in the hallway to outdoor construction noise. Have your students focus on one noise and describe it to themselves and recall the last time they interacted with it.

Here are some of the opening, group sharing, and closing activities that teachers use at Summit:

Opening Activities

Summit students practice mindfulness.

2. Name the emotion you're bringing to class: Have each student call out the emotion they're feeling. This helps each student know how they and other students are feeling, what different emotions look like, and how to better interact with their peers based on how they're feeling.

3. Write down, rip up, and throw away your stress: Have your students write down their expectations and insecurities, rip them up, and throw them away. This emotional check-in takes about three minutes. By acknowledging how your students are feeling at the start of each class, you'll acknowledge their barriers to learning and create a safe space for your students to overcome them.

5. Quote of the day: Introduce a quote relevant to what your students are learning or to a shared experience-for example, an act of violence in the community. You can facilitate a whole-class discussion, group students into pairs, or have each student share a one-word response to the quote. This gives students the space to reflect on their beliefs and experiences and whether they agree or disagree with the quote and other students' opinions, and it gives them insight into their peers' perspectives and feelings.

6. Where we came from: Collect baby pictures from your students. Project one baby picture at the start of class, have your students guess who it is, and then have the featured student share something about their childhood.

7. Starting positive: Have each student tape a sheet of paper to their back and then walk around and write positive qualities about their peers on their backs.

8. Motivational moment: Have two students start the class with a three- to five-minute presentation-and come up with two or three discussion questions-based on their interests. The presentation must be related to the course content in a real-world context. "Many students include a video for visuals and increased engagement, but it's optional," says Ching. Have the rest of the class partner up to discuss their questions for one minute and then give them the opportunity to share out to the whole class. This exercise gives your students insight into their peers' interests.

Grades 9-12 | Redwood City, CA

Enrollment

388 | Charter, Suburban

Per Pupil Expenditures

Free / Reduced Lunch

47%

Data is from the 2014-2015 academic year.

Group Sharing

9. Circle sharing: To encourage active listening, create small groups. Have your students position their chairs in a circle so everyone can make eye contact. To strengthen empathy, you can facilitate deeper discussion around what a student shares by asking, "Why did that student share what they did?" or "What perspective is that student coming from?"

When discussing emotionally charged topics, it's important to have guidelines to foster a safe space. Summit uses the Courageous Conversation protocol created by Glenn E. Singleton when discussing race. The protocol is guided by four agreements-stay engaged, experience discomfort, speak your truth, and expect and accept nonclosure. Here is an example of elementary school discussion guidelines from School 21.

Summit students sit in a circle for a whole-class discussion.

10. Write a poem from someone else's perspective. Have your students choose someone they don't know. This helps them to understand that they don't "need to be best friends with someone to empathize with them," explains Ballard.

11. Have a conversation with someone you don't know. Have your students pair up with a student they don't know and provide the pairs with five questions to ask each other. Each student introduces their partner to the class, speaking as if they were their partner, while the rest of the class looks at the student being introduced. "We don't see people sometimes," says Ballard, "and this exercise helps students to see each other more deeply."

12. Play interest and identity-related bingo. Instead of squares filled with numbers or vocabulary words, create cards with information relating to your students. Summit's Bingo cards have things like "'I like to read' or 'I was born in a different country,'" says Armando, a ninth-grade student.

I would like to appreciate Brenda for facilitating the conversation in our small group.

I would like to thank everyone for taking this class seriously.

I apologize to everyone for having my headphones in for half of the time.

Closing Activity

13. Appreciation, apology, aha: Have your students get in a circle and share an appreciation, apology, or realization with the group. Students in Ballard's class have shared things like:

Encourage authentic and timely apologies. Apologizing for something that happened a long time ago has less impact than apologizing for something that happened that day or week. Let your students know that they don't have to name who they're apologizing to when they apologize for what they did.

Help students share helpful, not harmful words. "I often say, 'Appreciations, apologies, and ahas should be something that you genuinely think will be useful for people to hear,'" says Ballard.

Have your students snap, clap, or shake both hands when they hear something that resonates with them. "We snap to let people know that we hear them without exerting our own voice in their narrative," explains Ballard. Students shake their hands when peers share things that are emotionally charged. Ballard often gets this started by saying, "Let's shake it up for that."

"When you pay attention to each other, not only does it build a sense of community, but we're more able to understand other people," says Janet, a 12th-grade student. "If you're able to understand people at a younger age, you could work better with them as adults. That changes how the future generations will be. People can be more accepting, more helpful towards each other."

What makes this a SCHOOL THAT WORKS

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Build social and emotional skills into any class.