What’s the single most important thing affecting student outcomes? Emotions. And not necessarily students’ own emotions but ours—those of the adults around them. So says Marc Brackett, a professor at Yale University and director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence.
“I have to start by asking, ‘How are you feeling?’” Brackett said during the final plenary session at TEACH.
School is an emotional rollercoaster, Brackett noted, with studies that show high school students feeling tired, bored and stressed—emotions that hinder their creativity and academic performance. With a quarter of teens suffering from anxiety disorders, with bullying rates holding steady and the suicide rate up, he said, it’s no wonder their teachers feel frustrated, stressed and overwhelmed.
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