Internship Project: Self-Regulation and How to

Increase Social/Emotional Skill Building through

the Instruction Domain in the CLASS Assessment

Marni Siegel-Tuch
Division of Early Childhood Education, NYC DOE
April 26, 2017
Spring 2017 Semester
Professor Aronowitz
 Table of Contents

1. Needs assessment
2. Objectives
3. Project planning, description and implementation
4. Project evaluation
5. Project reflection

1. Needs Assessment:

2/2/17
According to Wikipedia, Emotional dysregulation (ED) is a term used in the mental health
community to refer to an emotional response that is poorly modulated, and does not fall within
the conventionally accepted range of emotive response. ED may be referred to as labile mood
(marked fluctuation of mood)[1] or mood swings.

Possible manifestations of emotional dysregulation include angry outbursts or behavior

outbursts such as destroying or throwing objects, aggression towards self or others, and threats to
kill oneself. These variations usually occur in seconds to minutes or hours. Emotional
dysregulation can lead to behavioral problems and can interfere with a person's social
interactions and relationships at home, in school, or at place of employment. (Wikipedia)

Specifically relating to early childhood, Wikipedia also states Research has shown that failures
in emotional regulation may be related to the display of acting out, externalizing disorders, or
behavior problems. When presented with challenging tasks, children who were found to have
defects in emotional regulation (high-risk) spent less time attending to tasks and more time
throwing tantrums or fretting than children without emotional regulation problems (low-risk).
These high-risk children had difficulty with self-regulation and had difficulty complying with
requests from caregivers and were more defiant.[14] Emotional dysregulation has also been
associated with childhood social withdrawal.[15] Common signs of emotional dysregulation in
early childhood include isolation, throwing things, screaming, lack of eye contact, refusing to
speak, rocking, running away, crying, dissociating, high levels of anxiety, or inability to be
flexible.

I believe teachers need to utilize self-regulation skills in the classroom to help children succeed.
Self-regulation is an important factor in classroom behavior and educational success. Teaching
children skills and using skills in the classroom will increase the likelihood that the children will
do better at school.
 2. Objective:

Working across many schools in 3 districts in the NYC school system, I find that teachers are
most concerned with children who cannot self-regulate. According to Education.com, Self-
regulation is the ability to monitor and control our own behavior, emotions, or thoughts, altering
them in accordance with the demands of the situation. It includes the abilities to inhibit first
responses, to resist interference from irrelevant stimulation, and to persist on relevant tasks even
when we don't enjoy them. The New York State Pre-Kindergarten Foundation for the Common
Core details learning expectations for Preschoolers. There are 5 Domains; Approaches to
Learning, Physical Development and Health, Social and Emotional Development,
Communication, Language and Literacy, and Cognition and Knowledge of the World. Under the
Social and Emotional Domain, the PKFCC outlines Self-Regulation expectations for the
children. These are that a child regulates his/her responses to needs, feelings and events; a.
Expresses feelings, needs, opinions, and desires in a way that is appropriate to the situation. b.
Appropriately names types of emotions (e.g., frustrated, happy, excited, sad) and associates them
with different facial expressions, words and behaviors. c. Demonstrates an ability to
independently modify his/her behavior in different situations. This is usually the first concern of
Pre-K teachers and they typically ask the Social Worker to help with these children. Many
struggle with understanding how to help and teach the children how to learn to self-regulate.
Teachers believe these children should be evaluated because of their dysregulation.

Many Pre-K students come to school without the skills to help them learn how to self-regulate.
There are many tools teachers have available to them but seem to have difficulty understanding
how to utilize these tools on a regular basis. Through the lense of the CLASS assessment, I will
help teachers to transfer these skills into instruction.
 3. Project Planning, Description and Implementation:

I will be working at 26Q213 to help teachers understand that utilizing tools they already have
access to can help them to teach children self-regulation skills. Utilizing self-regulation tools can
also be translated into the Instructional Domain on the CLASS assessment. City-wide, the
Instructional Domain scores are significantly lower than the other two Domains.

There are four teachers who teach Pre-K. Three of the teachers have been teaching for over 20
years and the other teacher has been teaching for at least 15 years. I will be working with an
Instruction Coordinator, Jennifer Wynne, to help teachers to bridge social emotional
development with the NYS Pre-Kindergarten Foundation for the Common Core. The
Instructional Coordinator role is similar to the Social Work role but they work on the
instructional components of Pre-K. We will be using the CLASS assessment to help teachers
understand how to improve their performance with children. The CLASS assessment assesses
three components of a Pre-K Program; Emotional Support, Classroom Organization, and
Instructional Support. All classes are observed and scored based on a 1-7 Likert scale.
According to the CLASS Assessment, Emotional Support looks at positive relationships among
teachers and children, the ways that teachers support social/emotional functioning, and the
degree to which teachers promote childrens autonomy. Classroom Organization considers how
well time and behavior is managed to maximize learning opportunities. Instructional Support
encompasses the ways in which teachers implement lessons and activities to promote both
cognitive and linguistic development. It also focuses on how teachers use feedback to help
children learn.

26Q213 Pre-K snapshot:

72 children

Preferred Language(s) for Oral Preferred Language(s) for Written

Communication: Communication:

ENGLISH (55) ENGLISH (55)

CHINESE,ANY (11) CHINESE,ANY (11)
KOREAN (2) KOREAN (2)
SPANISH (1)
SPANISH (1)
UKRAINIAN (1)
UKRAINIAN (1)
PUNJABI (A.K.A. PANJABI) (1)
PUNJABI (A.K.A. PANJABI) (1)

According to the most recent CLASS report, 26Q213 scored

CLASS: Classroom Assessment Scoring

District Citywide
System 26Q213
Average* Average**
Assessment Year: FY16

Emotional Support
6.833333
( How well do teachers help children feel 6.6 6.0
333
safe and connected to the program? )

Positive Climate 6.5 6.5 6.2

Negative Climate 1 1 1.2

6.8333333
Teacher Sensitivity 6.5 6.0
33

Regard for Student Perspectives 7 6.3 5.3

Classroom Organization
6.777777
( How well do teachers manage time, 6.5 5.8
778
behavior and student involvement? )

Behavior Management 6.8333333 6.6 5.8

 33

6.8333333
Productivity 6.6 6.2
33

6.6666666
Instructional Learning Formats 6.4 5.4
67

Instructional Support
2.388888
( How well do teachers build childrens 3.1 3.6
889
language and thinking skills? )

1.1666666
Concept Development 2.8 3.4
67

2.3333333
Quality of Feedback 2.9 3.7
33

3.6666666
Language Modeling 3.5 5.4
67

Much of my work with the teachers over the course of the school year has been helping the
teachers tailor skill building by utilizing the tools available to them to help the children regulate.
The newest teacher has seen improvements in one of her students ability to regulate his
behavior, GP. At the beginning of the school year he was unable to manage his feelings and
would tantrum and cry. He now can control those emotions. He uses the cozy corner; an area in
the classroom used to help children calm themselves. This area usually is a soft comfortable area
with soft toys, a feelings chart and books and may also have a chart on how to manage negative
feelings. The child also labels his feelings and uses some of the techniques that the teacher has
taught him.

For the purpose of beginning this project, I will look at Quality of Feedback and Language
Modeling to help teachers improve their score in this area under the Instructional Support
Domain and assist them in understanding how this can support them with self-regulation skill
building in class. Jennifer and I will meet with teachers and paras to discuss the Instructional
Support Domain during a Monday Professional Learning session time. We will view and discuss
videos on Concept Development, Quality of Feedback and Language Modeling to help them
self-reflect on their practice. The CLASS assessment utilizes videos to facilitate understanding of
best practice. After the Professional Learning, I will observe all four classes and monitor their
use of the tools. The classes will also receive the CLASS assessment and I will be able to
determine improvements based on the results.

Jennifer and I will conduct a lesson utilizing the CLASS videos. We will also review the unit of
study for the month and how this will relate to the assessment. In utilizing the CLASS video
library and the companion for facilitators, we will view a video and have the teachers discuss
what they see, and ways to improve their practice. We will align the videos with the unit of study
and with a focus on self-regulation. Tools teachers have already in their toolbox are self-talk,
parallel talk, praise, positive reinforcement, visual cues and verbal prompts. Helping the teachers
think about ways to use these tools will help to increase their management of self-regulation for
the children as well as increase their score in the Instructional Support Domain in the CLASS
assessment.

2/13/17

The CLASS assessment was scheduled for February 27th and plans that had been put in place to
provide Professional Learning for the teachers needed to be adjusted. Due to the immediate need
to support the teachers for their CLASS assessment, the Principal and Assistant Principal decided
that we would work with each teacher individually, focusing in on their needs. Our work with the
teachers will be tailored emphasizing the instructional components with a focus on skills they use
for the social/emotional domains. We will not use the CLASS videos.

2/17/17

Jennifer and I observed each class. We began with JY. LK, MF, and JI have been teaching Pre-K
for over 10 years and are veteran teachers. JY is new to the grade and had taught Kindergarten
for approximately 10 years. JY had many questions but was most concerned with a child who she
has been working on self-regulation skills. We discussed the importance of Language Modeling,
Regard for Student Perspectives, and Quality of Feedback. In each of these domains, the
instructional component overlapped with the social emotional needs. This trend continued
throughout all the other classrooms.

Jennifer and I provided the teachers with Professional Learning on the units of study over the last
few months so the teachers seemed to have a better understanding of Concept Development. Our
goal was to help them to connect their high scores in the Social/Emotional Domains to the
Instructional Domains. The teachers understood how to provide Social/Emotional Support to the
children and will need to translate that support to their Instructional Support. Using self-
regulation skills, they can think of moving childrens educational needs in the same way.

After meeting with the teachers individually, we met as a group to go over the trends we
observed. The CLASS assessment is scheduled on the first day back from vacation so we
focused on actions they could amend to their teaching styles. The CLASS report will be sent to
the school 4-6 weeks after the assessment.

2/3/17

While at PS 213, the teacher and the paraprofessional were having difficulty with the boy, GP,
mentioned earlier in the project. GP was having difficulty sharing and was knocking down
another classmates building. Modeling for teachers is one way to show how teachers can use best
practice with the children. I sat on the rug and told the boy to tell GP to stop knocking down his
building. GP answered the boy, No. I then stated to GP that the boy does not want his building
knocked down and that he will need to be careful driving his truck around the boys building. GP
did not respond to my statement but proceeded to play with his car carefully around the building
and then eventually moved out of the block area. I expressed to both teacher and
paraprofessional that it is helpful to sit with GP and guide him through the interactions associated
with sharing and playing cooperatively.

3/16/17

While conferring with another Instructional Coordinator at another Pre-K on their CLASS
Assessment, the scores continue to mirror what was seen at PS 213. Most schools score well on
the Emotional Support and Classroom Management Domains but perform poorly on the
Instruction Domain. Using my observations and discussions from PS 213, I applied these to PS
32s discussion of their scores. This seems to be a trend in most scores and it is interesting to
help teachers reflect on how they can bring the social/emotional skills that they do well on into
the instructional areas.
 4. Project evaluation:

4/6/17

On Thursday evening, before the April holiday vacation, Principal McCauley from PS 213 sent
me the CLASS assessment score. There have been some improvements when compared to the
CLASS assessment from last year. One difference to note in comparison to last years score is
that there is one new teacher to the grade.

CLASS: Classroom Assessment Scoring

26Q21 Citywide
System District Average*
3 Average**
Assessment Year: FY17

Emotional Support
( How well do teachers help children
6.8 6.6 6.0
feel safe and connected to the
program? )

Positive Climate 7.0 6.5 6.2

Negative Climate 1 1 1.2

Teacher Sensitivity 6.8 6.5 6.0

Regard for Student Perspectives 6.6 6.3 5.3

Classroom Organization
( How well do teachers manage time, 6.8 6.5 5.8
behavior and student involvement? )
 Behavior Management 6.9 6.6 5.8

Productivity 6.9 6.6 6.2

Instructional Learning Formats 6.5 6.4 5.4

Instructional Support
( How well do teachers build
2.5 3.1 3.6
childrens language and thinking
skills? )

Concept Development 2.4 2.8 3.4

Quality of Feedback 2.1 2.9 3.7

Language Modeling 3.0 3.5 5.4

CLASS: Classroom Assessment Scoring

District Citywide
System 26Q213
Average* Average**
Assessment Year: FY16

Emotional Support
( How well do teachers help children 6.8333333
6.6 6.0
feel safe and connected to the 33
program? )

Positive Climate 6.5 6.5 6.2

Negative Climate 1 1 1.2

 6.83333333
Teacher Sensitivity 6.5 6.0
3

Regard for Student Perspectives 7 6.3 5.3

Classroom Organization
6.7777777
( How well do teachers manage time, 6.5 5.8
78
behavior and student involvement? )

6.83333333
Behavior Management 6.6 5.8
3

6.83333333
Productivity 6.6 6.2
3

6.66666666
Instructional Learning Formats 6.4 5.4
7

Instructional Support
( How well do teachers build 2.3888888
3.1 3.6
childrens language and thinking 89
skills? )

1.16666666
Concept Development 2.8 3.4
7

2.33333333
Quality of Feedback 2.9 3.7
3

3.66666666
Language Modeling 3.5 5.4
7
It is interesting to note that overall in Instructional Support, the school score went up by
approximately .3 points, from a 2.38 to a 2.5. In looking at the individual domains, the teachers
went up quite a bit in Concept Development. They scored a 1.16 in 2016 to a 2.4 in 2017. But in
Quality of Feedback and Language Modeling they went down in scores; 2.3 to 2.1 in Quality of
Feedback and 3.6 to 3.0 in Language Modeling. Interestingly, their scores in Emotional Support
and Classroom Organization are both very high, 6.8.

It is apparent that working with the Instructional Coordinator has helped the teachers with regard
to Concept Development. We worked on helping the teachers understand, develop and put into
practice the units of study. Teachers had a framework of concepts to utilize in the classroom to
help children understand concepts that were being taught.

What is also interesting is that although the teachers can score high in Emotional Support and
Classroom Organization, both which require social/emotional skill building, the teachers were
unable to transfer this to instruction. Although one would think this would be easy to do, utilize
social and emotional skills into instruction, this did not happen. Teachers were unable to take
skills from their toolbox on self-talk, parallel talk, praise, positive reinforcement, visual cues and
verbal prompts into instruction.

According to recommendations from the CLASS assessment, teachers should begin using self-
talk and parallel talk. Self-talk happens when staff narrates their actions as they are doing them
(e.g., I am placing the cap back on the marker). Parallel-talk is when staff narrate children'
actions as they are happening (e.g., I see that you are using the red to paint swirls of color). This
strategy can be particularly helpful for children whose home language is other than English.
Another recommendation from the CLASS assessment was that Staff should encourage children
to explain how they arrive at answers, rather than just saying the child was right or wrong. When
children give correct answers, ask follow-up questions such as, "How did you know that?" or
"How did you figure that out?" When staff asks follow-up questions that promotes deeper
thought and expands learning, children learn to think critically. Self-talk, parallel-talk, verbal
prompting, these are all tools teachers should have been able to use translating the self-regulation
skills for children.

5. Project reflection:

In reflecting on my project, I believe more work needs to continue. Teachers at PS 213 improved
their overall score but by only a small amount. When looking at each individual score in the
Instructional Domain, teachers seemed to have scored lower than they did last year but improved
overall. Teachers seem to understand how to ensure social and emotional supports in their
classroom. What makes this interesting is that they do not seem to understand how to transfer
this into the Instructional Domain, specifically the Quality of Feedback and Language Modeling.
Somehow the teachers understand how to talk with children and be socially and emotionally
responsive but now have to shift that thinking into how to get children to think critically.
Teachers have to nurture the children and challenge them as well.

Teachers are able to use skills such as self-talk, parallel talk, praise, positive reinforcement,
visual cues and verbal prompts in Emotional Support and Classroom Organization. When
teachers observe a child who needs comfort, it is easy for the teacher to comfort and ask open
ended questions to find out what is upsetting the child. Once the teacher understands what is
upsetting the child, the teacher usually attempts to extend some problem solving skills to help the
child overcome what is upsetting them. Understanding how to take these skills and use them in a
manner to foster instruction still needs to be studied.

Unfortunately, the Instructional Coordinator and I were rushed into preparing the teachers for the
CLASS assessment. If we had more time to teach them how to transfer their own skills into the
Instructional Domain, maybe the scoring would have been different. What I do believe is that
this work that I have begun needs to continue. If teachers can learn how to move skills they
already know and use from the social and emotional support into instruction, they would score
higher in the CLASS assessment.

What I have learned from this experience is that there is a need to continue to learn more
information. Questions that I had asked myself in the beginning of this project led to other
questions. Why is there a difficulty in transferring skills from social and emotional development
into instruction? I believe that from my project there is still more information that needs to be
researched.