Educating People to be Emotionally Intelligent
by Reuven Bar-On, Kobus Maree and Maurice Elias (Heineman) R299
This book consists of 20 chapters which showcase the contributions of three respected authors and a diversity of theorists, scholars, practioners and researchers working in the field of social-emotional learning and the main schools of emotional intelligence.
It does not make for riveting reading, but if it is theory in practice and application that you are looking for, then this is the book for you. Each chapter deals with different approaches and attempts to provide a book that is accessible to the widest audience possible — from parents, educators, practitioners and researchers et cetera. From a parent reader perspective the first six chapters would be of interest and so the book would appeal to the individual’s respective interest in a particular field or approach within the broad construct of emotional intelligence.
A question raised in chapter nine: ‘Creating an emotionally intelligent school district: a skills-based approach” did manage to capture my attention. The authors highlight potential contradictions within a specific learning outcome within the Life Orientation curriculum and pose the following question: how do we teach these children about the need to wash their hands after visiting the toilet and before a meal when they do not have a toilet or a meal, nor running water, nor a bar of soap? Definitely an area of redress 12 years into our democracy.
I got a sense that in certain chapters, introducing an emotional intelligence programme would resolve many of the schools difficulties, but would the implementors still not face the same contradiction highlighted in the Life Orientation curriculum?
I would definitely recommend reading chapter 20 by Peter Salovey, which provides an integrative summary and succinct review of each chapter, skillfully highlighting which area of research the authors are focusing on. The author asks important questions which summarised what I was left wondering after reading this book: ‘What is it about these programmes that make them effective? What are the active ingredients of programmes that work? What kind of school contexts allows programmes to thrive or, alternatively, to ruin the best designed programmes? Can we generalise competencies developed through school-based programmes in other settings?
There is no doubt that programmes that develop the emotional intelligence competencies of children and adults, are of great benefit to changing the social fabric of society. Weaving it into the tapestry of our current realities, I suppose is our challenge as a society.
Zena Richards is an educational psychologist