The Importance of Social Development in Kindergarten

This week's article summary is The Importance of Social Development in Kindergarten.

In our admission open house presentations, Brad and I talk a lot about how Trinity shapes our students’ academic and character foundation. As we delve deeper into just what character means at Trinity, Brad and I emphasize basic core values like empathy and integrity but spend the bulk of talking more generally about the importance of inter/intrapersonal skill/habit development. 

As you’ll see in this article, while there is a correlation between a student’s GPA and future success (job, salary, etc.), GPA is not only a result of a kid’s intelligence. In fact, a child’s EQ/Executive Function skills (attention, self-regulation of emotion, rationale decision-making) and relationships with others (cooperation, conflict resolution) play a much larger role than intelligence in overall success.

Furthermore, while IQ is more fixed, inter/intrapersonal skill development is malleable and teachable and very much influenced by home and school environment.

We know this at Trinity, hence the reason why we employ cooperative learning, emphasize a growth mindset (the power of ‘yet’), and ask our students to self-reflect and evaluate their progress in learning. 

Sadly to me, I still see non-educators focus too much on a child’s intelligence, rather than his/her attitude, flexibility, and willingness to work and adapt with others.

Any chance I get, I talk to our parents and other non-educators about the importance of a child’s EQ and its impact on his/her future.

Joe

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From an early age, we're led to believe our grades and test scores are the key to everything — namely, going to college, getting a job, and finding that glittery path to lifelong happiness and prosperity. 

But a recent study showed that when children learn to interact effectively with their peers and control their emotions, it can have an enormous impact on how their adult lives take shape.

In the study, kindergarten teachers evaluated the kids the Social Competence Scale by rating statements like "The child is good at understanding other's feelings" on a "Not At All/A Little/Moderately Well/Well/Very Well" scale. The research team used these responses to give each kid a "social competency score.” When each kid turned 25, the researchers gathered information about the now-grown-ups and analyzed whether these early social skills held any predictive value.

Here are the results:

Those good test scores we covet? They still matter, but maybe not for the reasons we thought: Traditional thinking says that if a kid gets good grades and test scores, he or she must be really smart, right? After all, there is a proven correlation between having a better GPA in high school and making more money later in life. But what that test score doesn't tell you is how many times a kid worked with a study partner to crack a tough problem, or went to the teacher for extra help, or resisted the urge to watch TV instead of preparing for a test. The researchers behind this project wrote, "Success in school involves both social-emotional and cognitive skills, because social interactions, attention, and self-control affect readiness for learning." That's a fancy way of saying that while some kids may just be flat-out brilliant, most of them need more than just smarts to succeed.

Skills like sharing and cooperating pay off later in life: We know we need to look beyond GPA to figure out which kids are on the right path. That's why the researchers zeroed in so heavily on that social competency score. What they found probably isn't too surprising: Kids who related well to their peers, handled their emotions better, and were good at resolving problems went on to have more successful lives. What's surprising is just how strong the correlation was. An increase of a single point in social competency score showed a child would be 54% more likely to earn a high school diploma, twice as likely to graduate with a college degree, and 46% more likely to have a stable, full-time job at age 25. The kids who were always stealing toys, breaking things, and having meltdowns? More likely to have run-ins with the law and substance abuse problems. 

Social behaviors can be learned and unlearned — meaning it's never too late to change: The researchers called some of these pro-social behaviors like sharing and cooperating "malleable," or changeable. Let's face it: Some kids are just never going to be rocket scientists. Turns out there are physical differences in our brains that make learning easier for some people than others. But settling disputes with peers? That's something kids (and adults) can always continue to improve on. And guess what? For a lot of kids, these behaviors come from their parents. The more you're able to demonstrate positive social traits like warmth and empathy, the better off your kids will be.

The bottom line? We need to do more than just teach kids information. We need to invest in teaching them how to relate to others and how to handle the things they're feeling inside. Ignoring social skills in our curricula could have huge ramifications for our kids down the road.