Supporting Teachers’ and Children’s Social-Emotional Competencies Using the ‘Lenses for Children and Families Tool’

Key Points

• Everyone has lenses through which they view and make meaning of others’ behaviors. Our lenses often unintentionally affect what we pay attention to, what we feel and think, and how we interact.
• Teachers’ lenses influence their responses to challenging behavior, and these responses can either support or hinder children’s experiences in the classroom.
• Over time and with practice, teachers strengthen their own social-emotional competencies, which helps them to more effectively support children’s social-emotional development.

This blog post was coauthored by Ann Partee, Ann Lhospital, Sarah Hammond, Amanda Williford, and Jason Downer of the Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning, part of University of Virginia’s School of Education and Human Development.

Gabriela sits down with her class for their daily circle time. The children are happily engaged in the planned group activity. Then, Megan, a 3-year-old in the class, grabs a toy from Harper, the child sitting next to her. Harper pushes Megan and yells, “Stop!” Megan stomps away from the circle. Nobody is participating in the activity anymore. Gabriela lets out a frustrated sigh and thinks to herself, “Megan does this every day! She ruins our activities.” Gabriela considers excluding Megan from circle time to keep the rest of the class on track.

Situations like this occur every day in classrooms. To manage the classroom environment and equip children with skills such as following directions, sharing, and making friends, teachers must draw on their own social-emotional and self-regulatory skills. Through the Virginia Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation (ECMHC) pilot, we have worked to strengthen early childhood teachers’ social-emotional competencies by bringing attention to how teachers perceive young children’s challenging behaviors, or their “lenses” for behavior, using a tool developed by the second author called Lenses for Children and Families.

Why Focus on Teachers’ Lenses for Challenging Behavior?

Everyone has lenses through which they view and make meaning of others’ behaviors. Our lenses often unintentionally affect what we pay attention to, what we feel and think, and how we interact.

Teachers’ lenses influence their responses to challenging behavior, and these responses can either support or hinder children’s experiences in the classroom. For example, if a teacher believes that a child is intentionally disrupting the class to annoy the teacher, the teacher may use more punitive or exclusionary disciplinary strategies. Conversely, when teachers see the behavior in a different light, such as noticing a specific context that is challenging for a child or identifying a skill that needs additional practice, they are more likely to implement supportive practices.

As part of the Virginia ECMHC pilot, teachers learned to identify and notice common unhelpful lenses for challenging behavior and “try on” alternative lenses, with support from their consultant. Through this process, teachers drew on several social-emotional competencies: self-awareness to notice one’s lenses, inhibitory control to pause before acting, emotion regulation to manage feelings of frustration, perspective taking to consider a range of interpretations of the behavior, and planning skills to implement inclusive and supportive strategies and reflect on their outcomes.

Over time and with practice, teachers strengthen their own social-emotional competencies, which helps them to more effectively support children’s social-emotional development.

The Lenses for Children and Families Tool

Consultants used the Lenses for Children and Families Tool with teachers to bring attention to four less helpful lenses and offer four corresponding more helpful lenses:

• The Negative Behavior lens, which describes when teachers mostly pay attention to children’s negative behaviors, and the alternative Balanced lens, which encourages teachers to notice both positive and negative behaviors
• The Negative Intent lens, which describes when teachers perceive that children’s challenging behaviors are purposeful and intended to harm the teacher or others, and the alternative Perspective-Taking and Individualizing Support lens, which considers the child’s feelings and needs and how the teacher can support the child to develop social-emotional skills
•  The Fixed lens, which describes when teachers perceive that children’s challenging behaviors are unlikely to change, and the alternative Behavior in Context lens, which recognizes the role that environmental context plays in children’s behavior and teachers’ ability to alter that context
• The Othering lens, which describes when a teacher distances themself from a child or makes assumptions due to differences (e.g., gender, race/ethnicity, or ability) and the alternative Diversity and Inclusion lens, which approaches difference through curiosity about others and inclusiveness.

The Lenses in Action

Returning to the opening example, Gabriela might recognize that she pays attention to Megan’s unwanted behaviors much more than her positive behaviors, and that over-focusing on the challenging behaviors has led to Gabriela feeling irritated and reacting punitively. Gabriela sets a goal to intentionally try on a Balanced lens with Megan. She remembers that Megan is a great helper and is one of the first to offer support to a friend when they are sad.

The next time Megan grabs a toy or has trouble sharing with a friend, Gabriela reminds herself to pause for a moment. “She doesn’t mean to, she just gets excited to play and sometimes forgets to ask to share toys instead of taking them.” Gabriela calmly helps Megan ask if she can play with the toy and leaves herself a note to remind the entire class about sharing at the start of circle time each day. Using this new approach, Megan stays included in group activities.

For more examples and vignettes of using the Lenses for Children and Families Tool in practice, see our team’s article in Social and Emotional Learning: Research, Practice, and Policy.

Acknowledgments: This blog was produced by the authors as part of the Virginia Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation program, a partnership between the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) and the University of Virginia’s Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning and funded by VDOE. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not represent the views of VDOE. The authors wish to thank the teachers who participated in Virginia’s Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation program and the mental health consultants who provided supportive services to teachers, children, and families.

The views in this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of CASEL.

Ann Partee, Ann Lhospital, Sarah Hammond, Amanda Williford, and Jason Downer are part of a team of applied researchers and practitioners at the Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning (CASTL) within the University of Virginia’s School of Education and Human Development. In their work, they partner with the Virginia Department of Education to implement and evaluate quality improvement initiatives for early childhood education programs across Virginia.

Related Posts

• 5 Powerful New Studies on Teacher Well-Being From the SEL Journal
• April 2025: 5 Must-Read Articles From the SEL Journal
• SEL Journal Recap: 3 Things We Learned About Culturally Sustaining SEL in the Classroom

Write for Us

Are you interested in writing for CASEL’s blog, Constellations? Learn more about what we’re looking for and how to pitch your idea!