Teacher-led to Student-led SEL:
Sunnybrook School District's Success Story with moozoom, a teacher’s perspective
By Amanda Alderfer
4th grade teacher
Social and emotional learning (SEL) has, in the last years, become a hot topic in education. With rising safety concerns and the pandemic’s devastating effects on children’s mental health, educators are realizing it's crucial that schools find an effective SEL program that can be implemented easily and quickly. Our district was in search of such a program when we discovered moozoom at the ISTE conference in 2021. After using the program for 60 days, we have already seen positive outcomes worth sharing.
One of the main challenges we were facing when it came to SEL was the lack of student engagement. Traditional teacher-led lessons can be difficult for students to relate to, and this can lead to disengagement and even mockery. moozoom addresses this issue by providing bite-size “choose your own adventure” real-life movies where students can observe other kids' behaviors and various options on how to react to everyday challenges.
Another challenge we faced was the limited expertise of our teachers to deliver SEL and the potential increase in their daily workload in fully implementing a program. moozoom addresses this issue by being easy to use and requiring no training or preparation time. Teachers can just go in, print out questions, look at the videos and get started with the lessons. All were thus able to integrate moozoom into our weekly routines within the first couple of weeks. Our teachers reported that they felt confident enough to start allowing more time than they had before to deliver SEL in class.
moozoom also includes a student skill assessment dashboard that allows us to track quick improvements in our school climate. We noted a significant increase in student engagement, with 96% of teachers reporting an increase in engagement during lessons. Teachers have also reported being able to reduce their SEL lesson planning by more than 75% and have seen a decrease in student conflict by 25%.
To sum up, the integration of moozoom in Sunnybrook School District 171 has greatly improved the fidelity and quality of SEL instruction in the district. The platform has reduced the stress associated with preparation, training, and expertise, and as a result, teachers have been more than willing to incorporate SEL into their lessons.
Within 60 days, positive results have been observed and this program is worth considering for other schools and districts seeking to enhance their SEL programs.
Check out moozoom's free SEL movies by clicking here.
