The Zones of Regulation curriculum consists of lessons and activities adapted from curriculum designed by Leah Kuypers, a licensed occupational therapist. It is intended to support students in managing all the feelings they experience, without passing judgment on what they are feeling or how they are behaving. Its core focus is to positively support the acquisition of self-regulation skills in school-aged children as they learn to work together in a school and classroom community setting.

Kindergarteners will begin the year learning from an adapted version of The Feels/Slumberkins curriculum, which was  designed by Kelly Oriard and Callie Christensen. Students will learn about the 5 major emotional states and also learn strategies to handle big feelings using The Feels characters. Next they will begin to learn the basics of  The Zones of Regulation to be prepared for their first grade Zones learning.

First-graders will be reviewing and expanding upon their learning of the core components of the Zones curriculum. Second-graders will first review through detailed read-alouds and then further expand upon the concepts using their more advanced cognitive level of understanding. These students will also be generating materials to teach their younger first-grade peers about The Zones through projects using technology as well as art and other creative means. Research shows that students learn a great deal by explaining their ideas to others and also by participating in activities in which they can learn from their peers.

“Social thinking” or thinking socially refers to a process we all go through in our mind as we try to make sense of our own and others’ thoughts, feelings, and intentions. Our ability to think socially is part of social emotional learning that begins at birth and evolves across our lifetime. The Grade 3 Social Thinking  curriculum (adapted from the work of Michelle Garcia Winner, licensed Speech & Language Pathologist) has been designed to help students learn how to engage in social information processing; how to attend, interpret, problem solve, and respond in any situation. The students will develop the thinking and doing skills that will aid them in becoming increasingly successful in the social world throughout their lives by using frameworks, tools, skills and a shared language to improve social competencies.

The Social Thinking curriculum uses a similar framework of tools, strategies, and language as the Zones of Regulation, therefore making this focus on Social Thinking the best next step in the social-emotional education of Summit students.

The Keys to Success program infuses social-emotional learning and practice into the language arts curriculum, thus allowing teachers to make these learning experiences even more enduring by introducing literature that supports both the literacy curriculum and social-emotional learning. Such texts have the potential to facilitate rich discussions about how students can approach common social situations, such as making friends, conflict resolution, and embracing diversity.  

Literature becomes the impetus for proactive problem-solving methods such as debate, role-playing, and inquiry/grand conversations. The goal is for students to feel even more equipped to apply problem-solving strategies to their own social interactions. This can be accomplished through deliberate exposure to high-quality text and discussions.

With language and concepts that are expansions upon the ideas practiced in the younger SEL curriculums, Keys to Success provides teachers with ways to begin conversations in the classroom that highlight the skills necessary to navigate friendships and help grow kind, empathic, and respectful members of our classroom communities.