Creating Emotionally Literate Classrooms: An Introduction to the RULER Approach to Social Emotional Learning

Many of the most prevalent and challenging behavior problems that occur in classrooms are rooted in students’ inability to adequately regulate their emotions. These include oppositional and disruptive behaviors as well as the alarmingly prevalent issue of bullying. In addition to behavior problems, poor social and emotional skills impede learning and stymie academic success. By adopting a comprehensive program of social and emotional learning that fosters emotional literacy, schools can improve student outcomes and decrease troubling incidences of problem behaviors such as bullying.

Creating Emotionally Literate Classrooms introduces The RULER Approach, an evidence-based social and emotional learning program that teaches 5 key emotional literacy skills:

1. Recognizing emotions in oneself and others
2. Understanding the causes and consequences of emotions
3. Labeling the full range of emotions using a rich vocabulary
4. Expressing emotions appropriately in different contexts
5. Regulating emotions effectively to foster healthy relationships and achieve goals

In schools throughout the country where The RULER Approach has been implemented, outcomes have been stunning: After one year of implementing The RULER Approach, students in RULER classrooms (compared to those who were not) had measurably higher end of year grades, better study skills, social skills, and fewer attention and learning problems.

Written by the Yale University team that developed The RULER Approach, Creating Emotionally Literate Classrooms explains how to use the model to teach emotional skills and create the kinds of safe, supportive, and empowering environments essential for social emotional learning to occur.

About The Author:

Marc A. Brackett, PhD is director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. He is also a senior research scientist in psychology and faculty fellow in the Edward Zigler Center in Child Development and Social Policy at Yale University. He co-created The RULER Approach to Social and Emotional Learning and has developed two university courses on emotional intelligence, one for undergraduates at Yale University and the other for aspiring school leaders at Teachers College, Columbia University.

In 2009 Brackett received the Joseph E. Zins Award for his research on social and emotional learning. His research funded by this grant focuses on (1) the role of emotional intelligence in learning, decision making, relationship quality, and mental health, (2) the measurement of emotional intelligence, and (3) the influences of emotional intelligence training on student and educator effectiveness, bullying prevention, and school climate. Marc also is working with Facebook on a large-scale research project designed to both prevent and decrease online bullying. He is the author of 100 scholarly publications.

As founder and president of the RULER Group, Brackett regularly delivers keynote addresses, consults with school systems on integrating RULER, and works with corporations on best practices for incorporating emotional intelligence.He serves on numerous research advisory boards, including CASEL, Lady Gaga’s Born This Way Foundation, and the Greater Good Science Center.

For National Professional Resources, Inc./Dude Publishing, Bracket is the co-author of the books Creating Emotionally Literate Classrooms: An Introduction to the Ruler Approach to Social Emotional Learning; Emotional Literacy in the Middle School: A 6-Step Program to Promote Social and Emotional Intelligence; and Emotional Intelligence: Key Readings on the Mayer and Salovey Model.

Janet Pickard Kremenitzer, EdD has worked in the fields of education and developmental psychology for over 35 years and has had the unique experience of being the educational founder of the Maimonides Academy of Western Connecticut. Currently, she is an associate professor in the Department of Early Childhood and Childhood Education at Lehman College, City University of New York.  She serves as a faculty affiliate (honorary designation) at the Edward Zigler Center in Child Development and Social Policy at Yale University and has been an associate research scientist in the Department of Psychology and the Yale Child Study Center as well as a research affiliate to Peter Salovey in the Department of Psychology.

Kremenitzer’s current research is in emotional intelligence/emotional literacy in both pre-service and in-service teachers as well as emotional literacy of children.  In addition to the RULER approach, she has integrated the Diary of Anne Frankinto an Aesthetic Emotional Intelligence Curriculum for inner city elementary children and their teachers in collaboration with the Anne Frank Center, USA, where Kremenitzer is a scholar in residence.  

Kremenitzer has published numerous articles in teacher education journals and presents regularly at both national and international conferences.  With Dr. Mark Brackett, she is a co-author of Creating Emotionally Literate Classrooms: An Introduction to the RULER Approach to Social Emotional Learning, published by National Professional Resources, Inc./Dude Publishing. She has two grown children, Becky and David, from whom she has over the years learned the most about childhood development, education, and emotional intelligence.