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Tag Archives: social literacy

Hurting others hurts us: Study

18-Jun-13

Although the victim is usually the focus in discussions about the impacts of social cruelty, everybody involved in it feels some pain or distress, research shows. Two recent studies offer fresh insights into the impacts on bystanders, both those who witness cruel behavior and those who feel compelled to participate. First the latter, from the [...]

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Wisdom about bullying from a former target

06-Jun-13

There’s probably no better testimony to the power of social-emotional learning than this UK student’s poem about what happens to the “bully” when victimizing someone else (don’t miss this 1:25 min. video of Garrett reading his poem). Garrett was a student at New Line Learning Academy in Maidstone, Kent, UK, when he read this poem [...]

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Social literacy up, social problems down in Chicago Schools

05-Jun-13

More than 50 Chicago schools were recommended for closure this year, but one of the four schools that won’t close isn’t closing because of its strong, successful social-emotional learning program, Education Week reports. Marcus Garvey Elementary School “is recognized for helping children develop empathy and problem-solving skills.” SEL is “problem-solving with dignity,” as teacher-songwriter Tontaneshia [...]

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Invaluable social literacy lessons from an anti-bullying conference

04-Mar-13

This is genuine progress. My thanks to Lisa Jones at the University of New Hampshire for pointing me to the recent Beyond Bullying Summit‘s “top three takeaways.” Notably, they’re all about social literacy: “SEL [social-emotional learning] is not adding to your plate. It is the plate,” said Ed Dunkelblau, founder and director of the Institute [...]

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More signs that what works offline works online too

22-Feb-13

I keep seeing research evidence that “what goes around, comes around” online too. We think of it as common sense in the face-to-face world, but it’s becoming pretty evident online too. There’s safety in respect for self and others wherever it’s shown, including in digital spaces. Here are three examples in the research, starting with [...]

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A social media company’s social-emotional learning

25-Jan-13

One of the fascinating impacts of our now very social media environment is technology companies having to learn a whole lot about the best and worst of humanity – and, for their own and their users’ sake, about how to foster the best of it. Facebook, for example, has an engineering team working with empathy [...]

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Mining Minecraft, Part 2: Brilliance when students drive the learning

13-Dec-12

Guest post by Marianne Malmstrom At the Elisabeth Morrow School, we have been on a journey to help our students develop the essential skills of creativity, collaboration, communication, critical thinking and citizenship. We turned to virtual worlds and MOGs because these are the same skills many young gamers practice through immersive play. Initially, we used [...]

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Personal ‘brand management’ for social literacy

18-Oct-12

This article was originally published April 12, 2012, then my service’s server crashed, losing months of data. So reposting 10/18/12. The cynical way to say it might be that we’re all our own best spin doctors these days. There are a lot of ways to say it, though – e.g., protecting one’s public image, reputation [...]

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A suspension of disbelief needed

20-Sep-12

Sidebar to my post below, “Literacy for a digital age” In talks he gives, media professor Henry Jenkins, often refers to the advice Peter Parker, aka Spiderman, gets from his Uncle Ben: “With great power comes great responsibility.” But Dr. Jenkins, a professor at the University of Southern California, isn’t only creating a parallel between [...]

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