Soft skills are hard skills

In the latest issue of ShapeAmerica, FA Health teacher Christine Botti chronicles how social-emotional learning fits into the academic classroom and beyond.

In her column for the publication ShapeAmerica, Friends Academy health teacher and physical educator Christine Botti writes of her journey to better understand social and emotional learning (SEL) and its connection to not only health and physical education, but success in the classroom.

Botti explains that self-awareness and self-management are two crucial skills. "SEL focuses on these skills and helps create a 'toolbox,' which can be used to help students identify feelings and recognize how their body is responding to those feelings. In my classes and other interactions with students, I now spend more time practicing mindful activities. We work to reflect and self-evaluate in order to address and strengthen the skill of self-awareness."

Read Christine Botti's entire article.