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Second Step® Insights

Why Resilience Is Essential for Kids—And How SEL Can Help Them Build It

October 23, 2024 | By: The Second Step® Team

Kids are naturally resilient. They bounce back from setbacks and skinned knees as if they’re made of rubber, forging ahead to the next hill to climb or lesson to learn. That said, educators should also understand that resilience is an ability that children can develop and that can be influenced by various environmental factors. In other words, resilience isn’t a fixed trait that you simply have or don’t have. Rather, it’s a dynamic ability to overcome challenges that’s supported by other protective factors and social-emotional skills.

The American Psychological Association defines resilience as “the process and outcome of successfully adapting to difficult or challenging life experiences, especially through mental, emotional, and behavioral flexibility and adjustment to external and internal demands.”

Why is resilience so important for kids of all ages? From a research perspective, studies have linked resilience to outcomes like academic success, higher connections, better stress management, and increased well-being. Students who demonstrated resilience were more likely to report higher levels of school involvement, task orientation, motivation, and academic and social self-confidence.

In the context of social-emotional learning (SEL), resilience is unique because it isn’t a social-emotional skill or outcome like emotion management, self-awareness, relationship-building, or problem-solving. While closely related, it’s more accurate to think of resilience as a capacity built on the foundation of those other skills. Though it may be harder to define, that doesn’t mean resilience isn’t essential. In fact, many educators and experts view resilience as one of the essential abilities that a young person should develop.

Here are a few ways in which SEL can help kids build the skills that lead to resilience—the skills that can help them navigate the ups and downs of life in and out of school, for many years to come.

Resilience requires emotion management

Resilience isn’t suppressing emotions in the face of adversity, despite what old Hollywood westerns might have you believe. Rather, resilience stems in part from one’s ability to understand and manage the difficult emotions that arise in the face of adversity—like fear, frustration, anger, even sadness.

Self-management, which encompasses emotion management, is considered a core social-emotional competency. It’s also an essential part of building resilience. Like adults, kids experience myriad emotions all the time, but especially when dealing with adversity.

SEL teaches kids how to identify and manage emotions through intentional strategies, giving kids the language to name and understand their emotions as well as practical tools to manage them—such as feelings charts, deep breathing exercises, reflective exercises, and goal-setting. This knowledge and these strategies could make the difference between a child either becoming overwhelmed and giving up after a setback or taking a deep breath, learning from the setback, and moving forward.

Relationship skills support resilience

As much as we may think of resilience as an individualized skill, resilience is also built on your ability to form and maintain healthy, supportive relationships. When the going gets tough or the road gets long, resilient people don’t just go it alone—they seek support from trusted others.

The ability to build and maintain healthy relationships is a foundational social-emotional competency and a key instructional focus of many classroom-based social-emotional learning programs and interventions. SEL gives students real opportunities to witness, understand, and practice healthy relationship skills in the classroom, which can include everything from handling conflict to getting along with people who are different from them.

As kids develop their ability to connect with and depend on others, they grow more equipped to navigate challenging experiences when they occur. When obstacles come, kids with healthy relationship skills know that they don’t have to face them alone—that they have friends, family, and teachers who can support them if they fail an algebra test, miss the cut for the soccer team, or lose a loved one. Relationship skills help them handle and work through these difficult experiences.

Responsible decision-making raises resilience

Another key to understanding resilience in children is the role of decision-making. Responsible decision-making is another core SEL competency, and it encompasses things like having curiosity and open-mindedness, making reasoned judgments after analyzing information, identifying solutions for personal and social problems, and anticipating consequences for one’s actions. All of these abilities contribute to a child’s ability to navigate and overcome challenges.

Again, resilience isn’t just rigid strength in the face of adversity. It’s more accurate to think of resilience like surfing—catching and riding some waves, missing others, and all the while adjusting to the movement of the ocean around us. Children who have developed resilience can better respond to difficulties with open-mindedness, analyze information, and make decisions about how to handle their challenging situation.

Resilience for all ages, for years to come

The benefits of resilience in children are nearly too many to name. Resilience helps them stay connected with others, remain motivated in school and other activities, and build confidence. It drives academic performance, and it improves their well-being and sets them up for success in the long run.

While there’s no single way to help students become more resilient, comprehensive social-emotional learning in the classroom is a great place to start. The foundational competencies of social-emotional learning—like relationship skills, emotion management, and responsible decision-making—can play a role in helping kids build resilience that will benefit them for many years to come.

Second Step® programs are designed to empower kids with those foundational competencies. Learn more about our social-emotional learning programs for PreK–12 students.