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Building Relationships in Allegheny County

 

What if we moved from solely focusing on developing students as content experts, to also developing students to be community members?"

 

In November 2023, the Office of Child Development continued a yearlong journey to bring more Social Emotional Learning (SEL) to Allegheny County. We held Communities of Practice with higher education, school leaders, elementary teachers, early educators, families, and family center staff. Across all of those session, we focused on one SEL skill, and used one very special picture book to get us thinking. Below is what we learned and each of us came up with ways that we might Build Relationships in our personal and professional lives. We talked about the need to slow down and intentionally invest in relationships. This means actively listening and checking in on each other. And making space to share our stories and get more acquainted to who we each are as individuals. We wondered what it would look like for relationships to handle conflict and struggle but still stay strong. Being openly commited to spending our time on energy on being connected with one another, might completely change the way our schools, workplaces, and neighborhoods feel. What might you do to build relationships in your life?

“That age range is critical for early reading development, but relationships are also really important, too. Kids’ relationships with schools matter greatly for literacy development, and later learning, and how they respond to questions like, ‘Do I feel good when I come here?’,  ‘Do I feel like I belong?’, ‘Do I feel like my teachers love me and support me and believe I can be successful?’ — a lot is happening developmentally in that age range that matters for learning,” said Dr. Caitlin Spear.

Here are some ideas for relationship building that came up in our conversation. If you are thinking that Building Relationships is important to you too, try it out and see what happens!

1) Recognize that each person is an individual with their own stories, needs, strengths, and contributions they can make to your group. Ask people what is important to them, be curious, and listen carefully when they are willing to share their stories. Here are some great questions to help you get started.

2) If biases and judgments come up as you get to know people, notice that and disrupt it before it can harm your relationship. Mindfulness practices are one way to improve your ability to notice and disrupt your biases. Another way is listening to people's perspectives that are different that your own. Here is a great podcast episode for that, and it is well-connected to our picture book above. 

3) Challenges and conflicts are going to happen in relationships. It is much easier to plan for how to deal with them before they happen, rather than in the heat of the moment. Talking opening with your students and colleagues may be one way to prepare for challenges that will inevitably arise. Restorative conversations are one way to follow a protocol and practice having a structured discussion about the issue and how to move forward.

 

Resources -

 

For more details, check out this story from our funder at the Allegheny Intermediate Unit.

And to see how the journey began, check out our October 2023 Community of Practce topic: Creating a Sense of Community

 

Gratitude -

Thank you for funding and leadership provided by Project SEEKS, Allegheny Intermediate Unit, PA.