Maureen Downey: Does anyone care about the social and emotional needs of teachers?

Does anyone care about the social and emotional needs of teachers?

Is anyone considering the social and emotional needs of teachers?

Teachers face increasing stresses in system that treats them as technicians

This is a good piece on something that seldom gets any real consideration – the rise in teacher stress.

Yes, we all talk about how teaching has become harder and how so much more is being asked of schools, from policing children’s social media to keeping them safe from an active shooter.Yet, we continue to pile responsibilities on teachers, including the social and emotional well-being of their students. We are now asking teachers to go beyond teaching multiplication tables to delivering the critical life skills that kids must have to thrive in the world. 

In a guest column, University of Georgia education professor Peter Smagorinsky and Stacia L. Long, a UGA doctoral student in language and literacy education, assert we should be offering social and emotional support to teachers to help them cope with an increasingly demanding job. We also should learn what the job entails to understand why teachers are so stressed.By Stacia L. Long & Peter Smagorinsky

The social and emotional needs of students have gotten a lot of attention in the press and among researchers in recent years. The Social and Emotional Learning or SEL movement addresses the ability of students to manage their emotional lives so that their social behavior allows them to function well, and perhaps thrive, as learners CONTINUE READING: Does anyone care about the social and emotional needs of teachers?