SEL for students with moderate to severe disabilities

Social emotional learning is a vital component of instruction for public school students, and for good reason.

Before we dive in, let’s define social emotional learning, or what is frequently referred to as SEL.

What is social emotional learning?

Social emotional learning is an element of education and development that helps students better recognize, comprehend and self-manage their emotions. Additionally, SEL teaches students skills so they can begin to empathize with their peers, families, friends and others.

Think of social emotional learning as a key that can open a door to enhanced learning outcomes, social behaviors and the creation of strong personal relationships that are built.

What can social emotional learning look like?

For many students with moderate to severe disabilities, social emotional learning begins with instruction on social skills and appropriate social interactions. From there, students begin to develop skills such as:

• Social perception: Understanding, identifying and interpreting social situations through social cues

• Perspective taking: Having the ability to relate to others based on a past experience or through application of general knowledge

• Tolerance for social unpredictability: Having the capacity to adjust to certain social situations that do not unfold as expected 

How can you implement social emotional learning in your classroom?

Research has shown that video modeling is an effective method of instruction for social emotional learning in young children and adolescents, which is where TeachTown comes in!

TeachTown Social Skills is a comprehensive, character-based video-modeling curriculum that offers teachers scripted lesson plans for direct instruction on social skills to individuals with moderate to severe disabilities.

Social Skills has students follow the adventures of four fun, relatable, animated characters as they learn to cooperate, respect personal space, express emotions appropriately, and more. This solution is broken into two age bands, Primary and Secondary School, allowing for students to build a foundation of SEL skills in the younger age range, then expand to address more complex SEL skills as they progress through Secondary School.

The social skills featured in Primary Social Skills helps to optimize classroom learning and school safety for students with extensive support needs. Integrated throughout Primary Social Skills are themes that help students build confidence, make good decisions, become successful students, and build positive peer relationships.

The Secondary Social Skills curriculum is designed to target a range of essential social skills for adolescent students. The lessons are designed to meet the needs of students who have difficulties in the areas of communication, social interaction, pragmatics, self-management, problem-solving, and/or emotional awareness.

TeachTown’s engaging, animated characters provide students with motivation to view, learn, and practice important social skills that will guide them down a path toward academic success and fulfillment in the relationships that are built.