Closing Transition

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Pages: 4

Addressing children’s social emotional needs in the end-of-day routine.
The closing transition can be one of the most challenging transitions in the school day for students and teachers. The closing transition is the last transition of the day, in which students ready themselves to leave the classroom. Teachers describe the last transition to dismissal as often feeling rushed, pressured, and chaotic. Student and teacher emotions can run higher at the end of the day due to tiredness from the demands of the school day. However, the end of the day is also an opportunity to build in reflection, allow students to connect in meaningful ways with each other and reinforce learning by reviewing the day’s learning. Some educational approaches
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Social emotional learning improves student achievement by 11 percentile points, increases positive social behaviors such as sharing and empathy, improves student feelings about school, and reduces stress for students. (Durlak et al., 2011) (CDC source). In addition, individual students with strong social emotional skills are more accepted by peers, have more positive attitudes about school and more involvement in the classroom. Research shows as a result these students are receive more instruction and positive feedback by teachers. Young children with poor social emotional skills are more likely to have negative attitudes about school and have lower academic levels. (Raver & Knitzer, 2002). In order to build these critical skills, experts say it is important to organize activities that build positive relationships among students by giving them time to connect with each other. (Durlak …show more content…
“Neural mechanisms underlying emotion regulation may be the same underlying cognitive processes.” (Bell and Wolfe 2004, 366). In fact, researchers say that the traditional distinction between cognition and emotion no longer accurately reflects the way these processes occur in the brain (Barrett and others 2007). A study by the National Research Council and Institute of Medicine in 2000 found that most learning in the early years occurs with emotional supports. Emotion and cognition collaborate to form children’s perceptions and influence behavior. Together, emotion and cognition influence attention, decision making, and learning (Cacioppo and Berntson