Early Childhood - Connecticut State Department of Education

Social-Emotional Competence and Family Relations Chapter 10
BEST PRACTICES
Early childhood educators are encouraged to consider
the following best practices in fostering social-emotional
development.
• Use positive words of encouragement such
as, “You are doing a good job picking up
your socks.”
• Spend time developing relationships with
each child.
• Provide language models for children as they
try to express concerns and solve problems.
• Provide opportunities to discuss feelings, using
literature and puppets as springboards.
• Pair a child who is behaviorally challenged
with a strong peer model.
• Use praise quietly and individually. Avoid
manipulating children’s behaviors by offering
rewards or compliments in front of a
group.
• Respect a child’s wish not to participate in an
activity. Provide alternatives that may be acceptable
within the learning environment.
• Provide lots of opportunities for children to
play and participate in groups with other
children.
SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
IN A GROUP SETTING
Many children spend much of their waking hours
in group situations, most often in early childhood
classrooms. These groups are miniature communities
that require social skills. Children do not automatically
develop social skills. They need direction, support and
experiences led by teachers who can take advantage
of teachable moments and planned activities. Social
competence, the ability to initiate and maintain satisfying
reciprocal relationships with peers, is a critical part of
early childhood development. The teacher’s role is
both guide and leader. Teachers model compassion,
responsibility, trust and concern for others with the
language used in the classroom and the climate they
create and carefully maintain. “The teacher purposefully
leads children from the world of me to the world of us” (Stone,
1999).
Knowledge of child development provides
a framework for use by teachers in making decisions
regarding behavior, routines and activities in the
classroom setting. Teachers must be patient. Young
children, by nature, regress, make mistakes, and need
time to rehearse and practice emerging skills and abilities,
especially in the emotional and social domains.
Group and peer behaviors to be encouraged in
an early childhood classroom include the following:
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• sharing;
• taking turns;
• being patient;
• being respectful;
• negotiating;
• cooperating;
• articulating preferences;
• explaining actions;
• accepting compromises;
• empathizing with others;
• handling impulses; and
• being responsible for actions.
The child’s developmental stage and ability,
temperament, cultural values, particular situations,
peers, the environment and classroom expectations,
influence these behaviors.
BEST PRACTICES
The following best practices are recommended for
implementation by early childhood educators in group
settings.
• Ensure consistency and predictability in your
expectations and classroom guidelines.
• Engage children in building classroom
climate. Promote discussions of class rules
and expectations.
• Model support and understanding of feelings.
Encourage children to support each other.
• Encourage children to use verbal skills when
communicating with peers.
• Offer guidance on negotiating as children try
to compromise and collaborate.
• Provide opportunities for children to be
responsible, make choices, cooperate and
share.
• Use techniques to encourage turn-taking.
• Evaluate the daily schedule to determine how
often and for how long children are in largegroup
situations. Minimize this practice in
favor of opportunities for children to meet in
small groups or pairs. Children, ages 3 and
4, do not profit from group times of over 15
to 20 minutes.
• Provide children with a consistent daily
schedule and alert them when changes are
made in the routine. Children benefit from
the security of knowing what is expected and
what is next.
• Plan a daily routine that provides for varied
groupings, noisy and quiet times, active and
slower-paced experiences.