Einstein -Chapter 8, Getting to Know You-How Children Develop Social Intelligence

This chapter really highlights what is important in early childhood education.

On page 183 the authors state that "Social intelligence does not come for free. It is gained on the "job"- that is, through meaningful interaction with others in life. What children become when they grow up is in large part of a result of the way we interact with them at home, at child care, and at school." This really points to the importance of interacting with children. We were talking about the different sets of skills that our students come to school with, and we can definitely notice the difference in children that have had more social experiences or more exposure to situations that lend themselves to socialization- such as children that have been with dedicated caregivers, parents, and exceptional daycare type of facilities. As the authors discussed in this chapter, we really agree that the students who can regulate their emotions and are starting to understand the perspective of others are the same students who are overall well-adjusted and doing well academically. On page 186 the authors state that "Interaction is the key and lots of it." We feel that this really validates what we do in early childhood, or at least in Pre-K. When we have students that do not demonstrate age-appropriate social emotional skills, we work hard on helping them to move toward a healthy social-emotional development which will help to prepare them for things to come- in and outside of school.