Teacher interactions with students in the classroom have an influential impact on students' social, emotional, academic, and behavioral development. The problem was that teachers are not prepared for the social interactions experienced in the classroom. The specific problem was that more research is needed to understand the significance between…

This study investigated the role of microcredentials in the perceived development of educator social and emotional competence and self-efficacy to deliver social and emotional instruction. While there is substantial literature regarding the benefits of social and emotional learning (SEL) for students, there is a gap in how to develop the…

Campus agricultural projects (CAPs) are campus farms or gardens where students learn to grow food. With at least 286 CAPs at institutions of higher education across the United States, this study seeks to understand the impact that participation in intensive internships at CAPs has on students and how student experiences align with the missions of…

Developmental research suggests that peer rejection has negative spillover effects which strain parent-child relationships and parent attitudes toward the child's school. This study tested whether a school-based social skill training program could reverse these effects and improve parent-child closeness and parent attitudes toward the school.…

Students with autism need social skills to succeed academically, which can be fostered with the use of digital social stories (DSSs). While many special educators are expected to use DSSs to teach social skills because of increased elementary autism diagnoses, a significant number of DSS users are unprepared. The problem addressed in this…

College options for students with intellectual disabilities continue to grow. However, there is a gap among students and families about available college opportunities. This study provides evidence of a weeklong summer academy that bridges the gap between high school and college. Results showed the summer academy increased participants' awareness…

Despite the implementation of reform policies and accountability measures on the federal, state, and local levels, the problem of struggling schools and students has lingered in the United States public education system. New York State has recently revised how struggling schools are identified and how they are held accountable for improving…

In this randomized controlled trial (RCT), the digital socio-emotional competence training Zirkus Empathico was tested in 74 Central European children (5.1 (0.9) years; 34 females) within a longitudinal design (three time points: T1 = pre-training; T2 = immediately following 6-week training, T3 = 3-month follow-up). The pre-registered primary…

This study differentially examined the relation between two clinical constructs: "social anxiety" and "social competence" in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Employing two questionnaires (SASKO; IU), individuals with ASD (n = 23) showed increased scores of SOCIAL ANXIETY (SASKO) and of INTOLERANCE OF UNCERTAINTY (IU), compared…

This article discusses the importance of teachers validating a student's feelings and helping them find a voice to express those feelings. When teachers play that role, they are offering that student the chance to cultivate deeper social-emotional skills and close the gap between the intent of their words and actions and the resulting impact on…

Confronted with two faculty vacancies to fill and a desire to minimize burnout among the remaining library staff throughout the search process, the Eccles Health Sciences Library at the University of Utah employed an interview method seldom utilized in academic libraries. The library's search committee arranged on-site group interviews that hosted…

Differences in prosody behavior between individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and their typically developing peers have been considered a central feature of ASD since the earliest clinical descriptions of the disorder (e.g., Kanner, 1943/1973). Prosody includes pitch and volume among other dimensions of vocal-verbal behavior that…

UCLA PEERS® for Adolescents is a widely applied program among a number of social skills training programs developed over the years. We synthesized current research evidence on the PEERS program to evaluate the treatment effect on four commonly used outcome measures. 12 studies met inclusion criteria for the review and nine met the criteria for…

"Lonely Kids in a Connected World: What Teachers Can Do" offers a comprehensive look at childhood loneliness and provides classroom teachers and specialized school professionals a toolkit of research-based intervention strategies. Because children who experience loneliness often feel alone, isolated, disconnected, and alienated, early…

Jeffrey Benson draws from his 40-plus years of experience as a teacher and an administrator to provide explicit, step-by-step guidance on how to incorporate social and emotional learning (SEL) into K-12 lesson planning--without imposing a separate SEL curriculum. The book identifies SEL skills in three broad categories: skills for self,…