Sunday, April 1, 2012
Blog 9
Phillip Massa
April 1, 2012
Uy
Blog 9
A
particular statement that stood out for me in Steven Maran’s and Jonathan Cohen’s
article Social Emotional Learning: A Psychoanalytical
Perspective was, “[that] a psychoanalytically informed perspective about
SEL represents a framework that educators may utilize to further understand and
to generate questions about how we can teach and learn with children as well.”
For me this is extremely vital in creating, not only a positive learning environment,
but also a positive working atmosphere.
So far
through my observations, I have seen both positive and negative learning environments.
I feel comfortable to say I understand what it takes to create a quality and
positive learning environment (although the task isn’t easy). However, it seems
to be the work environment that causes problems for many teachers. With all the
responsibilities that teachers have in the classroom, they also have a
liability and accountability with coworkers and administration. This
accountability is student performance, meeting benchmarks, paperwork, teacher
performance, co-teaching, planning, etc. It’s easy for teachers to become
frustrated and disheartened just being in the classroom. However, when a work environment
becomes tense and negative it’s almost impossible for educators to perform at a
quality level.
As much
as we investigate the classroom and social emotional learning, I think it’s as
important to investigate social emotional learning at a work level. Constant
pressure and lack of support from administration would directly affect teacher
performance. Of course this negative work environment would directly correlate with
social emotional learning in the classroom. The teacher likely won’t be able or
willing to build a relationship with the students because of multiple reasons
such as, they’ve become jaded from such unfair politics, they’re burnt out,
they’re looking for a new job, etc. In all if the work environment is a positive
one, then these students will likely suffer for it.
In all
its vital as young teachers that we choose a school that has a supportive administration
and will back our decisions in the classroom. It’s important to build a
relationship and positive environment for our students, and if administration doesn’t
agree with our practices then tension will arise. We need to care for our
students and we also need a job. Sometimes that job isn’t the best situation
for a young teacher. We need to use our knowledge and training in SEL to create
both a positive learning and working environment, because one without the other
can’t work productively.
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