Shaping classroom social experiences through collaborative small-group discussions

Technology-enhanced mindfulness-based collaborative social reasoning to improve adolescents' social-emotional competencies

This study reports the preliminary efficacy of an innovative school-based, technology-enhanced social-emotional learning program called "mindfulness-based collaborative social reasoning" (MBCSR) for middle school students. MBCSR was developed by an interdisciplinary team of educational psychologists, mindfulness researchers, computer scientists, and health experts. We integrated the strengths of contemplative approaches, collaborative small group discussions, learning technology, and multidimensional assessments of students' social-emotional outcomes. Using a quasi-experimental design, the study was implemented in four sixth-grade English language arts classrooms (2 experimental and 2 business-as-usual control; N = 74) in a public middle school in the Midwest of the United States. It was co-implemented by researchers and teachers, with sessions occurring for 45 minutes, once per week, for 8 weeks. The MBCSR group showed greater self-efficacy for using Upa-yoga and mindful breathing to regulate their emotions and behaviors (η p 2  = .13), and lower externalizing (η p 2  = .07) and bullying behaviors (η p 2  = .09) at the posttest compared to the control group, after controlling for baseline differences. Students in the experimental group overall showed positive and relaxed emotional and physiological states during the sessions. There were no significant differences between the two groups in mindfulness, emotional regulation, and social skills. This program sets an example for integrating social-emotional learning and academic learning into students' daily content instruction.

How Do Children Socially Learn from Narrative Fiction: Getting the Lesson, Simulating Social Worlds, or Dialogic Inquiry?

Educators read narrative fiction with children not only to promote their literacy skills, but also to support their sociomoral development. However, different approaches strongly diverge in their explanations and recommended instructional activities. Informed by theoretical understandings of reader-text transactions, this integrative review presents three different conceptions about how children learn socially from narrative fiction. The first approach explains sociomoral learning through narrative fiction by children’s extraction and internalization of the text’s moral message. The second approach refers to children’s training of mindreading and empathy as they become immersed in a fictional social world and imaginatively engage with the fictional characters’ perspectives. The third approach focuses on children’s social reasoning development through engagement in argumentative dialogues with peers about the complex sociomoral issues raised in narrative fiction. The article aims to theoretically position a wide range of literary programs to clarify their psychological foundations as well as critically discuss their strengths and limitations.