He modeled ethical behavior on tough subjects like divorce, disabilities, and race. It takes strength to talk about their feelings and to reach out for help and comfort when we need it.” It takes strength to face our sadness and to grieve and to let our grief and our anger flow in tears when they need to. It takes strength to acknowledge our anger, and sometimes more strength yet to curb the aggressive urges anger may bring and channel them into nonviolent outlets. Rogers once said, off-camera: “Confronting our feelings and giving them appropriate expression always takes strength, not weakness. Rogers wanted kids to learn about the real world - that it was not always a beautiful place, that they would have tough times and unpleasant feelings sometimes, and that that would be okay. Rogers taught social and emotional learning, or SEL, through interaction with viewers, through guests and puppets who lived in his neighborhood of make-believe. SEL has a wide-ranging positive effect on our lives, as it has been found to strengthen other abilities, including decision-making, planning and motivation, conflict management, and academic performance.īeyond giving kids a strong foundation in SEL, Mr. Grades, teacher ratings of students’ social and emotional competence, warmth and connectedness all improved bullying and aggressive behavior went down, compared to students in schools without RULER. EI means being smart about your feelings and harnessing the power of your emotions in the service of your goals. At the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, we define EI as the attitudes and skills related to “Recognizing, Understanding, Labeling, Expressing and Regulating” feelings, or RULER.ĭecades of research shows that becoming a student of RULER, an evidence-based approach for implementing social and emotional learning in schools, has a range of positive effects.

Going to Day Care by Fred Rogers