This article offers a critique of social-emotional learning programs through the lens of psychoanalytic theory and with a particular focus on the theoretical contributions of Kleinian psychoanalysis. In particular, the article draws on concepts of affective positions to show that social-emotional learning is mired in a paranoid-schizoid mentality…

This paper addresses two major and potentially conflicting movements: the importance of diversity as both a conceptual and political issue and the rise of the evidence-based practice movement in education. This tension is particularly important when evaluating and reporting universal interventions because of their intended applicability across…

This study examined how teachers support kindergarten children's social and emotional development in everyday contexts. It used an ethnographic qualitative mode of enquiry, employing participant observations and semi-structured and structured interviews to examine the ways teachers optimize opportunities for supporting kindergarten children's…

This article traces the evolution of holistic student development as the centerpiece of the college experience in the 1960s to its current all-too-often overlooked function in postsecondary education, and it explains why students, employers, and the democracy all benefit from educating the whole person. Holistic student development encompasses…

This article is based on data from a two-year ethnographic study on children in school-age child-care in Sweden. It describes a boy's way from positioning himself as a "boy who does not fight" to a "boy who fights". In Sweden, independence is viewed as paramount. Fostering children to independence can be seen from different…

This article charts social and economic transformation in the developing world over recent decades by drawing on a number of different secondary data sources. I propose that this rapid change means that we need to re-think the teaching of development in the curriculum to move beyond a polarised view of developed versus developing. The article…

Outcomes in the inter- and intra-personal realms are central to the goals of Jewish education, yet educators often struggle to address them in a meaningful way. In this article, we describe what we learned from facilitating an online community of practice for congregational school leaders and day school educators seeking to enhance their work in…

Rates of participation in early childhood education (ECE) programs are on the rise globally, including in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet little evidence exists on the quality of these programs and on the role of classroom quality in predicting learning for young children across diverse contexts. This study uses data from the Greater Accra Region of Ghana…

Charts that keep (public) track of whether a student's behavior is in some equivalent of a red (problem), yellow, or green ("well-behaved") zone are ubiquitous in elementary schools. This strategy based on shaming students is due to be retired because (1) it promotes only compliance, not social-emotional learning; (2) charts don't teach…

Students with disabilities (SWD) at an urban high school in Midwestern United States experienced academic, social, and emotional problems. When SWD experience difficulties in high school, they may drop out and face potentially life-long problems. The purpose of this case study was to understand how a Response to Intervention (RTI) tutoring program…

The study examined the reading and character growth of elementary school students (n = 2144) in urban public charter school classrooms (n = 88), focusing on the relationship between the students' growth and a character-focused lesson. Reading growth, as measured by in-classroom reading assessments, and character growth, as measured by self- and…

"Wholehearted Teaching of Gifted Young Women" explores the important role school communities play in supporting the social and emotional needs of high-achieving young women. Using a youth participatory action research model, this project follows 20 student researchers from high school through college. This longitudinal study leads to…

This essay traces the history of an activity designed to promote the intellectual and social development of elementary-age schoolchildren during the afterschool hours. Following in the footsteps of Urie Bronfenbrenner, I highlight his argument that just as all human development occurs in contexts of varying levels of inclusiveness and mutual…

In this paper, I study the narrative structure of comics as a means to describe the ways that indeterminate modes of representation can allow the reader to imagine that which in childhood can never be fully expressed. Analyzing a number of panels from Gilbert Hernandez's graphic novel, "Marble Season," I describe a conceptual link…

This present article takes an interest in the fairly new phenomena of social and emotional training programs in youth education. Prior research has shown that values and norms produced in these types of programs are supporting ethical systems that teachers may not always be aware of. This motivates the development of methods for analyzing these…