The Student EQ Edge

Emotional Intelligence and Your Academic and Personal Success: Facilitation and Activity Guide

Korrel Kanoy, Steven J. Stein, Howard E. Book

• Publisher: Jossey-Bass
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN:
  9781118094617
• eBook ISBN:
  9781118483893
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Student Life

THE STUDENT EQEDGE Facilitation and Activity Guide

This Facilitation and Activity Guide is a companion to the book The Student EQ Edge: Emotional Intelligence and Your Academic and Personal Success . It offers faculty and facilitators a hands-on resource for helping students reach their potential by tapping into the power of emotional intelligence. The Facilitation Guide includes exercises and activities which are designed to help students develop confidence, independence, the ability to set and meet goals, impulse control, social responsibility, problem-solving skills, stress tolerance, and much more—all of which help improve academic success. The Guide also contains a wealth of illustrative case studies, questions for student reflection, movie selections and TV shows that illustrate emotional intelligence, and a self-development plan.

"The single best resource on emotional intelligence in student affairs, The Student EQ Edge: Student Workbook and Facilitation and Activity Guide are well organized, creative, and offer everything an emotional intelligence facilitator would need in a fast-paced student affairs environment. The examples are soundly constructed and resonate with students. These materials are my go-to resources."—Candice Johnston, associate director of student leadership and organizations, Wake Forest University"If I were building a new course to improve student success, it would be founded on emotional intelligence. All the instruction in the world on 'study skills' cannot touch the advantages that come to students who are able to manage their emotional intelligence. And the best news of all is that these skills can be taught. EQ skills make the difference." —Randy L. Swing, executive director, Association for Institutional Research

"This Facilitation and Activity Guide is particularly useful, offering options from which the facilitator can draw in preparing assignments or learning community meetings. The focus on learners' needs, and particularly an authentic exploration of self and purpose, is practical yet has the potential to draw students to a deeper understanding of self that will draw them to high performance and contribution to others."—Dennis Roberts, assistant vice president for faculty and student services for the Qatar Foundation

Chapter 1

Introduction to the Facilitation and Activity Guide

You made a wise choice when you decided to help students learn about and develop their emotional intelligence (EI). Research summarized in The Student EQ Edge: Emotional Intelligence and Your Academic and Personal Success shows how important EI is in predicting success in college and across a wide variety of professional careers. Unlike IQ, EI can be learned and improved at any age. Rarely, however, do secondary schools, colleges, or universities teach this topic to students. You chose to do so, and your students will benefit.

EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE DEFINED AND RESEARCH OVERVIEW

Emotional intelligence is “a set of emotional and social skills that influence the way we perceive and express ourselves, develop and maintain social relationships, cope with challenges, and use emotional information in an effective and meaningful way” (Stein & Book, 2011, p. 13). Research with college students demonstrates that EI can predict academic success. Consider the following examples:

Schulman (1995) found that the EI skill of optimism was a better predictor of first-year students’ college GPA than their SAT score.

Schutte and Malouff (2002) found that incorporating emotional skills content into a college transition course enhances student retention. First-year students who received emotional awareness and development strategies in their course not only demonstrated growth in EI between pre- and post-measures, but were also more likely to persist to the next academic term than a cohort of students who did not receive the emotional intelligence content.

Mann and Kanoy (2010) found that first-year college GPA could be predicted by the following EI scales: optimism, independence (negative predictor), self-regard, impulse control, and problem solving. The students with the highest GPAs (3.35 and higher) scored higher on EI than the middle third of students (2.50–3.34) for assertiveness, stress tolerance, and problem solving; mid-performing students scored higher on social responsibility and impulse control than low-performing students.

Sparkman (2009) studied 783 college students over a five-year period and found relationships between EI and college outcomes.

• Social responsibility, followed by impulse control and empathy, were the three strongest positive predictors of college graduation.
• Self-actualization, social responsibility, and happiness were positive predictors of cumulative GPA, but very high independence and interpersonal relationship skills were negative predictors of cumulative GPA. Students who will not ask for help when they need it (high independence) tend not to do as well as those who seek help from Learning Centers, Career Centers, or Counseling Centers. And if a student is too skilled at interpersonal relationships, it’s likely that person spends more time doing just that—interacting with others—which leaves less time for study.

Figure 1.1 shows the five realms and 16 scales of emotional intelligence as measured by the EQ-i 2.0. Consult The Student EQ Edge: Emotional Intelligence and Your Academic and Personal Success for additional information about each scale.

Figure 1.1 Emotional Intelligence Defined

Source: Reproduced with permission of Multi-Health Systems. All rights reserved. www.mhs.com

PLANNING YOUR CLASSES

One of the authors, Korrel, has been a college professor for over 30 years, and during that time she has learned there is no one style or formula of teaching that works best at all times and with all classes. Passion about what you teach and actively engaging students are key ingredients. Throughout this guide, you’ll find exercises, tips, and ideas to help you engage students in their learning. Rarely will the plan dictate that something must be done in small groups or must be done in class rather than assigned for homework. Sometimes it can work just as well to have a class of 20 to 25 discuss a topic rather than dividing into four or five small groups. This is especially true if you need to monitor the discussion for accuracy, focus, or progress. For those of you who prefer a more detailed plan for teaching each topic, each chapter will contain suggested activities for leading a 50- to 60-minute class or a three- to four-hour workshop. (These three- to four-hour workshops can be broken into two or three different segments for a class that meets two or three times per week.) Additionally, Appendix A contains a suggested course syllabus that can be used for a semester-long class or adapted to accommodate a two- to three-day student workshop.

STUDENT REFLECTION

Reflection is one of the most effective tools to encourage student cognitive and social-emotional growth; thus each activity in this book will contain reflection questions for students. Reflection—unlike reasoning, which requires a systematic process that is evidence based—allows students to engage in mental inquiry meant to help develop self-discovery rather than help them arrive at a correct answer. The more reflection they do, the better! Thus this Facilitation and Activity Guide provides two different opportunities for reflection.

• Reflection questions are included on the student worksheets. Ask students to submit written responses or to think about their responses prior to class discussion, or include the questions during the in-class debrief.
• In-class debrief questions should be discussed in class after the worksheet or activity has been completed. Debriefs are designed to solidify learning and insights related to an activity.

Because reflection promotes cognitive growth, it’s a key part of student learning. And it’s possible to grade worksheets and the reflection questions for quality. Appendix B provides an example grading rubric for a reflection exercise.

STUDENT EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE ASSESSMENT

Students can complete the EQi 2.0, a reliable and valid measure of emotional intelligence that provides scores for overall emotional intelligence, five realms (self-perception, self-expression, interpersonal, decision making, and stress management), and the 16 scales outlined in each chapter of this book. For more information about how to give the EQi 2.0 to your students, go to ei.mhs.com. Free assessments of emotional intelligence are also available but are not guaranteed to be reliable or valid and most likely will not align with the chapters outlined in the Facilitation and Activity Guide or the Student Workbook.

FACILITATING CLASS DISCUSSIONS

For the first couple of days, while you’re building rapport, choose activities and discussions that are fairly safe but highly engaging. Also, have the group develop guidelines, or you can suggest three to five like the following suggestions. Either way, make sure everyone in the class agrees to some version of these guidelines:

• Personal information that is shared does not get repeated outside of class.
• Use conventions of good interaction, including not interrupting others, not dominating the conversation, and not judging others’ comments.
• Everyone must participate some of the time and listen all of the time.

To make sure everyone gets to participate, encourage the students to be brief. Succinct comments help the conversation flow better. Introverted students are encouraged by the idea that they don’t have to talk for long, and extroverts who have some self-awareness appreciate the help in self-monitoring. And everybody appreciates not having one or two people who drone on and on!

Finally, give small groups questions to discuss and then have them “report out” to the larger group. There are two reasons for doing this. First, if there are inaccuracies in content (for example, maybe they don’t understand the definition of self-regard), those can be corrected. Second, if they have to report out, they usually take the assignment more seriously.

AGREE-DISAGREE ACTIVITIES

When discussing controversial issues or trying to get students to take a position on an issue, using an agree-disagree activity usually works well. Here’s how it works. On the far right side of the board, write the word “agree” and on the opposite side, write the word “disagree.” (Or just point to each side of the room if you don’t have a white board to write on.) Then pose your question and have students get up and move to the side of the room that best represents their opinion. Standing in the middle of the room is highly discouraged! Ask students from each side to explain why they chose to agree or disagree with the statement you read. For example, near the end of your course, after students have learned a lot about emotional intelligence, you might pose the following question: “Emotional intelligence learning should be required of all students at this school.”

ORGANIZATION OF THIS GUIDE

This guide and the activities within it are organized so you can find what you want and pick and choose the activities that work best for your class.

Chapters follow the same order and numbering as found in The Student EQ Edge: Emotional Intelligence and Your Academic and Personal Success and in The Student EQ Edge: Student Workbook.

Although some of you will prefer the “pick and choose” approach when selecting activities for your class, each chapter outlines a comprehensive plan for a 60-minute class and one for a half-day workshop. You will find these suggestions in the “Planning Your Class” section.

If you only have a few hours within an existing course to discuss emotional intelligence, it’s probably best to pick two or three scales that are highly relevant to that class (for example, emotional self-awareness, empathy, and interpersonal relationships in an Interpersonal Communication course) and focus on building those skills.

Each chapter contains these elements:

• Student Learning Outcomes
• Suggested Reading, Movies, and TV Shows—students love watching movie or TV clips; these clips are very effective for demonstrating EI concepts, and watching others demonstrate effective or ineffective EI makes the concepts come alive.
• A list of activities by name, with a brief description.
• A step-by-step guide for preparing to lead the activity, facilitating it, and debriefing it, and the expected time each will take.
• A copy of the worksheet found in The Student EQ Edge: Student Workbook.

MATERIALS

For almost every class period you will need access to the following:

• White board or flip chart
• Markers
• TV with DVD or VCR player
• Internet connection (if you want to access TV clips through www.hulu.com or YouTube clips)

Also, we highly recommend you have a copy of The Student EQ Edge: Emotional I...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• Title
• Copyright
• Preface
• About the Authors
• Chapter 1: Introduction to the Facilitation and Activity Guide
• Chapter 2: Case Studies of Emotionally Intelligent (and Not Emotionally Intelligent!) Behavior
• Chapter 3: Emotional Self-Awareness
• Chapter 4: Self-Regard
• Chapter 5: Self-Actualization
• Chapter 6: Emotional Expression
• Chapter 7: Independence
• Chapter 8: Assertiveness
• Chapter 9: Interpersonal Relationship
• Chapter 10: Empathy
• Chapter 11: Social Responsibility
• Chapter 12: Reality Testing
• Chapter 13: Problem Solving
• Chapter 14: Impulse Control
• Chapter 15: Flexibility
• Chapter 16: Stress Tolerance
• Chapter 17: Optimism
• Chapter 18: Happiness
• References
• Appendix A: Model Syllabus
• Appendix B: Sample Grading Rubric for EI Reflection Questions
• Appendix C: Movie Selections for Teaching Emotional Intelligence
• Appendix D: Self-Development Plan for Improving Emotional Intelligence
• Appendix E: Resources for Teaching Emotional Intelligence