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1. Introduction
These are important questions that we can all answer for ourselves.
I will share
with you some words expressed by some educators regarding these
questions ...
You may believe that it goes without saying that understanding,
teaching and
being caring is important. At the same time - there can be some
value to putting
these sentiments into words. I know for me, it often serves as a
helpful reminder.
I welcome you ... before reading these discussions below ... to
take some minutes
and examine your impressions. We here at our website would love
to hear your
views ... not only regarding responses ... but also learning about
some other questions we might look at.
From my point of view, there are many reasons that can be given
to answer the
important questions above ... but to me the first and most important
answer to
the importance of caring is ... “It just is.” Sometimes the answers are
based on some combination of feeling and thinking that are obvious.
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2. Why is caring important to education?
Nel Noddings
The main aim of education hould be to produce competent, caring,
loving and
lovable people.
The Challenge to Care in Schools
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Daniel Goleman
“Emotional literacy programs improve children’s academic
achievement scores and school performance.... when too many
children lack the capacity to handle their upsets, to listen or
focus, to rein in impulse, to feel responsible for their work or
care
about learning, anything that will buttress these skills will help
their education. In this sense, emotional literacy enhances schools
ability to teach.”
Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ
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Alice Ray
"Research has shown that critical thinking skills learned in
the context of
social emotional training, transfer easily to an academic contect,
but the
opposite is not true: critical thinking skills learned in an academic
context do not transfer naturally to a social-emotional context.
This may
explain why some kids who have strong analytical skills in terms
of math or
science continue to make unsafe or injurious decisions in the social
realm,while kids with strong social-emotional abilities do better
in school
than their less emotionally literate classmates with higher IQ's."
The citation for the research above may be on the committee for
children site.
Alice Ray <info@rippleeffects.com>
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A study by The Northeast Foundation for Children
Do Social Skills Enable Academic Skills?
In 1996, the Northeast Foundation for Children, with the generous
support of the Shinnyo-En Foundation of San Francisco, CA, began
a three
year study to look directly at the question: Does an elementary
classroom promoting social skill development enable higher academic
functioning among its students over time?
The magnitude of the question is clear. If a classroom promoting
social
skill development led students to higher academic achievement over
time,
then a clear and defensible avenue for educational reform was open.
No
longer would programs promoting social and emotional learning work
on
fuzzy feelings and appeals of right and righteousness; rather these
programs could point to the hard evidence that social skills enable
higher academic functioning and therefore higher academic achievement,
giving all teachers another way to help all our children become
principled, caring, knowledgeable, and productive members of our
society.
Study Abstract
In this study first, second, third, fourth, and fifth grade students
in
two schools, one a school using The Responsive Classroom® *
approach and
the other a non-Responsive Classroom school, were assessed over
a two
year period in three areas of functioning: social skills, problem
behaviors, and academic achievement. Time 1 assessment occurred
in the
fall of 1996, Time 2 in the spring of 1997, Time 3 in the fall of
1997,
and Time 4, the last assessment, in the spring of 1998.
Teacher ratings of social skills and problem behaviors showed significantly
greater growth in both improving social skills and reducing problem
behaviors
for The Responsive Classroom students than for non-Responsive Classroom
students. Academic growth, as measured by the ITBS, also showed
significantly greater growth for The Responsive Classroom students.
A
regression analysis indicates that students with higher social skills
tended also to perform better on the ITBS and that this relationship
becomes stronger over time for third and fourth graders.
The complete study, The Responsive Classroom® Approach: Its
Effectiveness and Acceptability in Promoting Social and Academic
Competence, is available from Northeast Foundation for Children,
71
Montague City Road, Greenfield, MA 01301
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3. Why is it important to "be" and "instruct
caring
Roger Weissberg
“It is most beneficial to provide a developmentally appropriate
combination of formal, curriculum-based instruction with ongoing,
informal and infused opportunities to develop social and emotional
skills from preschool to high school.”
CASEL, the Collaborative for the Advancement of Social and
Emotional Learning under direction of Dr. Roger Weissberg, Univ.
of Illinois.
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Thomas Lasley
“Achieving selflessness is not something young people will
do because they are told. Rather, it emerges because young people
see extra-centeredness in the personal decisions that adults make,
in the way adults comport themselves when confronted with conflict...
all the significant adults in children’s lives teach by example.”
Teaching Peace
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Frank Smith
“Consider a student – a child in the primary grades or
a mature adult in graduate school. After weeks of hard study the
student has taken a test that could play a large part in his or
her career. The instructor solemnly reports the score.” C-minus
again,” the instructor observes. “You haven’t learned
very much, have you? But the student has, on the contrary, learned
a great deal. The student has registered the condemnatory look on
the instructor’s face, experienced the sickening feeling in
the stomach, and concluded once more what a fruitless and punishing
experience the entire learning situation can be. The student has
lost a bit more confidence – and is unlikely to forget any
of it.”
The Book of Learning and Forgetting
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I've come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive
element in the classroom. It's my personal approach that creates
the climate. It's my daily mood that makes the weather. As a
teacher, I possess a tremendous power to make a student's life
miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument
of inspiration. I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all my
situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis will
be escalated or de-escalated and a student humanized or
de-humanized.
Haim Ginott
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(added November 2001)
The messages our students receive from our modeling are even more
potent when we are teaching basic life skills such as effective
communication, relationship-building and handling personal and social
problems. Integrating social and emotional learning into the classrooms
can be done quite mechanically or it can be offered with a kind
of "presence" that carries the class to a place where hearts are
moved and genuine connections occur. We celebrate these precious
moments and admire teachers who live there most of the time.
Rachael Kessler
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4. Why is it important to define caring?
I believe that it is important to define caring because this helps
us know for ourselves if what we are doing is caring. It can serve
as a useful reminder at times when we may feel out of balance ...
giving too much attention to thought or perhaps to our emotions
and needing to remember what “in calmer times” I have
considered to be a caring way to bring my thoughts and actions to.
There is much more that can be discussed here ... the above is a
start.
Your observations are most welcome.
Marty Kirschen
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Why Caring is Important
From the article - A Model for Defining the Construct
of Caring in Teacher Education
http://www.sarasota.usf.edu/specialeducation/Caring2.htm
by
R. Lee Smith
Department of Special Education
University of South Florida at Sarasota Sarasota, and
Lynda Emigh
Sarasota County Schools. Florida
Several contemporary researchers and authors have suggested that educating teachers in aspects of care should be an important component of teacher preparation programs (Noblit et al., 1995; Noddings, 1984, 1992, 1995; Wolfgramm, 1995). However, there is a need for a pragmatic and parsimonious explanation of caring in teacher education. Such a definition will allow for the development of curricula to teach about caring and caring behaviors for pre-service students. The purpose of this article is to describe a model that defines a construct of caring for use in teacher education programs and to promote discourse about the caring and caring behaviors in teaching and learning.
There are three interrelated reasons why the the concept of caring and a definition is important. First, this topic deserves attention because the public education system does not adequately prepare all students for adult life. In fact, nationally only 88% young adults students currently finish twelve years of school (McMillen, Kaufman, and Klein, 1997 ). This large number of students who lack success in the public education system provide impetus for teacher educators to question the pedagogics of relational aspects in education, about how these issues relate to the broader notions of social interaction in schools, how relational issues may effect both the traditional achievement outcome measures and the outcomes related to social functioning and quality of life. In general, individual and group relational aspects of education have been neglected in the professional literature and in the research about reform policies.
Noblit, Rogers, and McCadden (1995) believe current forms of educational organization are a result from a belief system that values the technical dimensions of teaching and learning over the relational aspects of teaching. Caring, in contrast, gives priority to relationships, and how these relationships are socially constructed. Likewise, Noddings (1995) contends that educators should strive for more than just adequate academic achievement, namely, the development of caring competent people. She asserts that by caring for and teaching students to care they can be led to develop the skills and knowledge necessary to make positive contributions, regardless of the vocation they choose. Furthermore, Noddings (1995) challenges contemporary educational thought by encouraging educators to consider it legitimate to spend time "developing relations of trust, talking with students about problems that are central to their lives, and guiding them toward greater sensitivity and competence across all the domains of care" ( Noddings, 1995 p. 679). She sees this change of attitude as fundamental to reform, allowing educators to pursue, as a central mission, the development of caring and competent people.
Secondly, an understandable construct of caring and related behaviors and attitudes among teachers may help to better educate of the increasing numbers of students and families who enter school from low socioeconomic homes and environments. Deford (1996) suspects that, as a result of increased violence and crime, poverty, child abuse, substance abuse, teenage pregnancy, and high dropout rates, many families depend on schools to act as an extension of our social support system, including emotional support and guidance for their children.
A final reason to study caring is to help legitimize it as an important value or ethic in teacher education as teacher educators prepare professionals for school systems actively participating in the reform movements. Perhaps, because of the traditional and widespread belief that parents are the primary care givers and providers of emotional nurturance, caring in teacher preparation programs has often been overlooked. The study of caring and caring behaviors may help educators begin to value caring explicitly, making it an equal priority with the achievement oriented aspects of teaching and learning. Perhaps, because a primary focus of educational research has been aptitude treatment interactions of instructional practice or because there is societal pressure to produce higher test scores, the inquiry activities in educational settings to develop social and relational aspects in students have been depreciated. Noddings states "...by giving some attention to topics involving affective growth, character, socials relations, sharing, and the pursuit of individual projects, researchers can give added legitimacy to educational goals in all these areas" (1988, p. 226). The quest for efficiency of method, curricula, and higher test scores may have sent a message to educators that caring has little value in education.
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