Social Emotional Learning

Supporting children’s social-emotional growth throughout the early stages of development builds a solid foundation for their future.

In order to support better SE development, ECC has been able to implement our current Second Step program in preschool this year. Our little ones are beginning to discover a wider community outside their safe home hub. As they learn how to transition from solitary play to collaborative play, they undergo a variety of emotions as they mature.

Second Step targets important skills for children to work on. It prepares our students to successfully manage their emotions and behaviors, establish caring relationships with others, follow limits and expectations and interact in groups.

Some Skills like bouncing back from being teased, sitting still in a group to listen to a story and helping a peer feeling sad when hurt are all examples of healthy social and emotional development. They involve the ability to manage feelings and impulses which are needed to grow and learn.

Our ECC learning support specialist gives SEL sessions on a weekly basis allowing our youngest students to learn and access to resources that will help them understand:

How to express their wants and needs effectively during conflict

The consequences of their behavior when in our community

How visual cues and gestures help guide their actions when engaging with peers and adults

How to listen actively and empathetically

The importance of social rules in order to create a safe and caring classroom community

As our early year students develop and acquire more challenging social skills, our goal is to expose children’s emerging emotional capacity to develop close, satisfying relationships with other children and adults as they actively explore their environment and learn.