August 2018

Monthly Archives

  • On the Use of the Big Five Model as a SEL Assessment Framework

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    By: Dana Murano, Jason Way, Cristina Anguiano-Carrasco, Kate E. Walton, and Jeremy Burrus; Center for Social, Emotional, and Academic Learning, ACT, Inc. Most researchers agree that social and emotional skills are a) important, b) can be improved through systematic programming, and c) must somehow be organized and assessed. The belief that these skills must be organized and assessed emphasizes the need for a social and emotional skills framework, of which there are myriad. An ongoing debate concerns whether or not the Big Five personality framework is an appropriate framework through which to organize social and emotional skills. The Big Five factors include conscientiousness (work ethic; organization), agreeableness (kindness; empathy), emotional stability (composure; flexibility), openness (curiosity; analytical thinking), and extraversion (sociability; […]

  • Update on the Growth and Diversity of the Collaborator Network

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    Over a year ago, the Assessment Work Group created Measuring SEL and the Collaborator Network for Social and Emotional Competence Assessment as a powerful opportunity for members to exchange ideas, forge new relationships and collaborations, and provide input to ultimately help address some of the most critical questions about SE assessment facing educators and researchers today.   The collaborator network has been steadily growing and is now almost 11 times larger than a year ago with almost 1800 members (see graph)! We have members from all 50 states and 67 different countries representing all continents and both developed and developing nations!     Members play a range of roles with respect to SEL as well, with 70% indicating they are […]

  • A 360 degree Approach to Measuring SEL in Early Childhood Products

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    By Sally D. Lo, Research and Education Manager at Peppy Pals, sally@peppypals.com   With a growing industry of game-based learning solutions for early childhood education, a call for educational technology (EdTech) solutions with Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) focus has arised. However, SEL is a concept with a connotation of being “fluffy” and “difficult to measure”.  Despite extensive review (Goodman, Joshi, Nasim & Tyler, 2015) on the many benefits of teaching young children SEL, all studies are observational, and causality is not established (it has not been experimentally tested). Hence, EdTechs with a SEL focus face the challenge of finding a balance between meeting the child on their level, engaging and educating them, while at the same time producing a valid product […]

  • Design Challenge Winner: Democracy Prep Public Schools

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    By: Miguel Rivera Rios, Democracy Prep Public School   Social emotional learning (SEL) is essential for a student’s success both in school and out of school, which is why most schools provide students and families with a set of core social emotional values that are meant to provide students with guidance on cultural expectations. Although these values are integral to a school’s mission, they are often times very difficult to directly measure/quantify and most of the effective strategies are aimed only at elementary-school-aged children (Domitrovich et al 2017). In particular, schools usually struggle with understanding how students are a) developing in these values and b) transferring these values or skills outside of the classroom. At best, schools use survey-like tools […]

  • Design Challenge Winner: The SRASEC

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    By: Ryan Kettler   My colleagues (Drs. Kelly A. Feeney-Kettler and Leah Dembitzer) and I propose a measure of social-emotional competence based on selected-response items. The Selected Response Assessment of Social Emotional Competence (SRASEC) will be computer administered in a game-like format and will be appropriate for elementary school students in kindergarten through fifth grade. As a direct assessment, the measure will indicate students’ knowledge of social-emotional competence, yielding key information about specific areas needing further development to support positive student outcomes.   The SRASEC, Social-Emotional Competence, and Achievement   Measures of social-emotional competence and student achievement have historically been difficult to compare in part because they have been based on different methodologies (i.e., rating scales and observations for social-emotional […]

  • Design Challenge Winner: The SRASEC

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    By: Ryan Kettler   My colleagues (Drs. Kelly A. Feeney-Kettler and Leah Dembitzer) and I propose a measure of social-emotional competence based on selected-response items. The Selected Response Assessment of Social Emotional Competence (SRASEC) will be computer administered in a game-like format and will be appropriate for elementary school students in kindergarten through fifth grade. As a direct assessment, the measure will indicate students’ knowledge of social-emotional competence, yielding key information about specific areas needing further development to support positive student outcomes.   The SRASEC, Social-Emotional Competence, and Achievement   Measures of social-emotional competence and student achievement have historically been difficult to compare in part because they have been based on different methodologies (i.e., rating scales and observations for social-emotional […]

  • National Practitioner Advisory Group Launches!

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    By Dale A. Blyth, Sr. Consultant to CASEL and Deborah Moroney, Managing Director, American Institutes for Research   This last spring, we invited applications from practitioners to become part of a new National Practitioner Advisory Group on Using Data to Inspire SEL Practice (NPAG). There was an overwhelming response as almost 200 people applied from all over the US and even a few internationally.  It took a while to select the 26 people and four Assessment Work Group liaisons who now make up NPAG. It is quite an impressive group as you can see from the list that follows this blog.  We are grateful to our funders and in particular CASEL who invested the needed funds to make this effort […]