Mill Valley School District

Social-Emotional Learning the in the Mill Valley School District Strategic Plan

Objective 1: Balanced Learners
All students will learn in an environment that fosters social-emotional well-being, equity, global perspectives, and awareness through inquiry and project-based instruction.

     Strategy A: Integrate social-emotional learning (SEL) by embedding the attributes of the Mill Valley School District (MVSD) Learner Profile into the curriculum. 

          Indicators of Success

               1. Students demonstrate the attributes of the MVSD Learner Profile: Balanced, Collaborative, Communicator, Courageous, Critical Thinker, Empathetic, Inquirer, Knowledgeable,m Open-Minded, Perseverant, Principled, and Reflective.

               2. Appropriate levels of counseling support for students across the district will be determined and provided. 

Social-Emotional Learning in MVSD Elementary Schools

For the 2019-20 school year, the Mill Valley School District counseling team launched Toolbox as the district's new SEL curriculum. Please read more about Toolbox in the column on the right. Additionally, learn more about its use in MVSD elementary schools by watching the video below from Jen Ferrer, Counselor at Edna Maguire Elementary School. 

Social-Emotional Learning in the Mill Valley Middle School

The Mill Valley Middle School added a 3rd counselor during the 2018-19 school year to increase service to this larger population of students. To learn more about the counseling program at MVMS, please watch the video below.

INTRODUCING "TOOLBOX"

Dovetail Learning's social-emotional learning curriculum, Toolbox, was implemented district-wide at the elementary level at the start of the 2019-20 school year.

ABOUT TOOLBOX

Toolbox is a K-6 curriculum that supports children in understanding and managing their own emotional, social and academic success. Children learn 12 simple yet powerful Tools. With practice, these tools become valuable personal skills: self-awareness, self-management, and relationship skills; these in turn foster responsible decision-making. Because the techniques are simple and the language is shared, children adopt the tools and master them quickly.

Toolbox starts with each child, building self-knowledge and self-mastery; it soon improves empathy and communication and helps resolve conflicts in the classroom, on the playground, and throughout the whole school community.  Children experience their own power and naturally take more responsibility for managing themselves and solving problems.

WHY IS IT IMPORTANT?

Toolbox builds a critical foundation for whole-child development as well as academic success. Despite growing pressure to improve academic results, decades of research has proven that children cannot learn until they feel safe and are able to understand and manage their emotions and social interactions.  It has shown that:

1) social and emotional skills are essential for academic learning,
2) these skills can be taught and learned, and
3) this kind of training has powerful benefits for life success.

TO LEARN MORE, DOWNLOAD THE TOOLBOX BROCHURE BY DOVETAIL LEARNING