Weaving Together Social and Emotional Learning, Racial Equity, and Academic Learning With K–3 Educators

• In Event: Multiple Perspectives on Building a County-Wide Ecosystem of Social and Emotional Learning and Racial Equity

Abstract

Objectives/Purpose. We will provide an overview of the 3Rs in the Classroom (Reading, Racial Equity, Relationships), which is a community of practice with K-3rd grade educators from across seven schools that’s currently in its fourth year. This will include an overview of the ways we integrate all 3Rs into practice, with a particular focus on racial literacy, and how these are linked to teachers’ SEL and their relationships, within our communities of practice, and in their classrooms and larger school and community contexts (see Spear et al., 2023 and Wanless et al., 2022 for more details).

Theoretical Framework. In the 3Rs, we draw on multiple theoretical frameworks, including research into the science of reading (e.g., Petscher et al., 2020), critical pedagogy (e.g., Gay, 2000; Ladson-Billings, 1995, 2014; Muhammad, 2020; Paris, 2012), and teacher learning (e.g., Piasta et al., 2017; Kennedy, 2016) within communities of practice to support equitable reading
instruction. A key component of our work is developing teachers’ racial literacy, or the ability to understand the ways in which race and racism impact reading instruction and reading outcomes in their classrooms. For this paper, we will explicitly explore connections between racial literacy (e.g., Sealey-Ruiz, 2021) and social emotional learning theories (e.g., CASEL’s Transformative SEL Framework), and the ways communities of practice are particularly suited to support the integration of these two skillsets to shift teacher literacy practices.

Methods and Results. All data for this project will be collected as part of our larger 3Rs work and will be drawn from fieldnotes and observations of community of practice discussions. We will present our findings in the form of descriptive narratives that merge themes across sessions for broader sense-making purposes (Braun & Clarke, 2021). These themes will be based on multiple rounds of qualitative coding (e.g., initial thematic analyses using grounded theory, followed by a secondary round of constant comparative analyses to examine these themes theoretically). We will highlight the ways in which teachers’ racial literacy and social emotional skills are aligned and connected, and how teachers’ draw on both their racial literacy and social emotional skills in order to lead to more effective and equitable reading practices.

Scholarly Significance and Implications. Teachers need both racial literacy and social emotional skills to be able to enact culturally “informed” pedagogies in ways that address the root causes of racial disparities in education (e.g., Sealey-Ruiz, 2021, Jagers et al., 2019, Kelly et al., 2021, Ladson-Billings, 1995, Gay, 2000, Paris, 2012). By examining the connections between these frameworks, and the ways in which relationship-based communities of practice can simultaneously shift and develop both skillsets for practicing teachers, this session offers a potential model for shifting teacher practice in ways that disrupt racial inequities and lead to effective and equitable reading opportunities in elementary classrooms, and beyond.

Authors

• Caitlin Spear, University of Pittsburgh

• Jennifer O. Briggs, University of Pittsburgh