The Brain Science Is In: Students’ Emotional Needs Matter
April 24, 2018
By: Jim Shelton
Source: Education Week
Among policy elites and pundits in education, the urgency to improve academic achievement has stoked a raging debate. On one side are those who prioritize rigorous cognitive and academic development; on the other, those who care most about students’ noncognitive skills and the physical, social, and emotional needs of the whole child. To many teachers, the debate seems ridiculous—because they have long known the answer is “both.” Now, science is on their side.
Teachers, like parents, have always understood that children’s learning and growth do not occur in a vacuum, but instead at the messy intersection of academic, social, and emotional development. And they know that students’ learning is helped (or hindered) by the quality of students’ relationships and the contexts in which they live and learn. Working to weave those threads, skilled teachers often have yearned for schools—and policy approaches—that understand this complex reality.