School-Wide Learner Outcome: Social Intelligence

Social intelligence is an important life skill that helps to build healthy relationships. Social intelligence is one’s ability to interact well with others. Often called people skills or tact, it is a learned ability involving situational awareness, understanding how to act within different social environments, and communicating easily with people from all walks of life. Someone who has high social intelligence (SI) is gifted at understanding others, making friends, and handling new situations. Social intelligence looks different across various cultures and demographics, as every group values different social skills.

Social intelligence isn’t static, but rather it continually develops throughout one’s life. It’s never too late to sharpen it, and children are especially easy to teach. Educating children on healthy communication helps them to be a friend who is empathetic, generous, kind, and a good listener. There are four main characteristics of social intelligence:

Empathy: Empathy determines how well one relates to other people’s thoughts and emotions. Empathetic people consider and understand diverse perspectives, even if they don’t share the same ideas. They can pick up on a person’s mood and adjust their reactions accordingly.

Respect: Many cultures value esteem between children and adults as well as between spouses. Respecting others can mean adapting your communication style to fit their needs or coming to a compromise. Mutual understanding calls for a degree of respect.

Behavior: This component concerns how people carry themselves in social situations. Are their actions appropriate for the setting? Do they make others feel relaxed or uncomfortable? A person must be able to change their behavior when necessary while still maintaining their core attributes.

Self-efficacy: This characteristic refers to how a person judges themselves on their capacity to perform particular tasks. If someone has a stable sense of self-efficacy concerning social intelligence, they’re confident in their social abilities. They experience little stress or worry over interacting with others.

CLICK HERE for some fun ways to encourage and develop social intelligence in your child.