Empathy is the ability to put yourself in someone else’s position and better understand their feelings, opinions, and actions.
Among its many benefits, building empathy allows our students to:
Build a sense of security and strong relationships with peers and adults.
Better understand and appreciate a diversity of people and cultures.
Thoughtfully address conflicts or misunderstandings.
Become confident, productive group members and leaders.
Create and maintain a positive, happy school community.
SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL LEARNING
Our teachers draw from innovative resources to create a balanced, proactive, and responsive curriculum. Second Step from Committee for Children is one such program, providing an important structure for teaching concepts and skills such as mental focus, emotion management, and conflict resolution.
SOCIAL COMMUNICATION
Social Thinking is an approach that helps students analyze their emotions, interpret the actions of others, and better understand how their own behavior affects those around them. Tools such as “Zones of Regulation” provide students and teachers with a common language to discuss how they are feeling and reach affirmative resolutions.
CLASSROOM AGREEMENTS
Every student begins the year helping to develop class and schoolwide expectations so that we can all work, play, and interact positively with each other. Responsive Classroom is a framework that teachers use to guide related discussions, creating norms that everyone understands and strives to embody.
COMMUNITY MEETINGS
Active communication is key to creating a kind, empathetic community. Each classroom sets aside time each week to address issues that students or teachers deem important.
WEEKLY ASSEMBLIES
Students share examples of their accomplishments and experiences, engage with and encourage peers who are presenting, and talk about our core values of bravery, curiosity, empathy and joy. Parents are welcome to attend.
STAFF SUPPORT
Regular staff meetings are dedicated to discussing our empathy work, the social-emotional status of individual students, and useful perspectives and strategies.
PARTNERSHIPS
Perkins works with several organizations to help us analyze and update our social-emotional curriculum. Recent partnerships include collaborations with University of Washington’s 3DL Partnership, Under The Umbrella, and social learning consultant Julie Bergess-Dennis.