Once you have a knowledge-base for SEAL, it’s time to jump into what it means to become a SEAL teacher.  It’s way more than just integrating art projects into your teaching. And it’s just as much about your mindset as it is the methods you will bring to your students.

Change in your classroom starts with YOU!  You are the key to your students’ success. There’s just no other way around it!

In this unit we’ll look closely at:

• What it means to “take back control” in your classroom.
• How to promote a SEAL learning environment through your presence.
• What a SEAL classroom looks like in order to promote care and creativity.  
• Positive Practices of a SEAL teacher.  
• SEAL Teacher Self-Care practices.
• Teacher-Centered Professional Development.  

This is the fun stuff!  There are 4 distinct “Streams” of bringing SEAL into your classroom and we will go over all of them.  Then, you can decide what works best for you! Only use 1 stream or combine streams to work for your class and your schedule.

Remember, SEAL is not a program that you follow.  Rather, it’s a transformation of your teaching. This unit will help you to see the ways you can naturally bring SEAL activities to your students and how they will become part of your classroom culture.

The 4 SEAL Streams:

Stream One - Embed SEAL into Your Day 

First we’ll look at how to embed SEAL strategies into your everyday routines.  You will learn SEAL strategies from each of the 4 major art forms that can seamlessly work their way into your lessons.

Stream Two - Consistent Practice through Friendly Fridays  

This is a teacher favorite!  Whether or not you decide to use this method on a Friday or a Tuesday or any other time that works for you, the purpose is the same: to implement a consistent time for your students to build on their creativity and community through SEAL activities they will do with or for their classmates.

Stream Three - SEAL Lessons  

When you are ready, you can implement a SEAL lesson that will explicitly teach students a particular social-emotional skill while integrating an art form.  These lessons allow students to dig deep into the art form and develop the competency.

Stream Four - SEAL Club  

This is a bonus method of bringing SEAL into your classroom or school!  

In order to truly understand the power of SEAL, you must experience it yourself.  I will guide you through different experiences that will help you build your social-emotional learning.  (That’s the teacher-centered part.)  And of course, all the activities can be used in with your students too!

In this and the next 2 units, we will dig deeply into the arts-integrated activities that directly align with each of the 5 social-emotional competencies.

First we’ll take a close look at the competencies that focus on self.  You will get to experience some SEAL activities that will allow you to become more self-aware and give some insight to how you can self-manage with the arts.

Here’s a look at what you’ll do in Unit 4:

• First you’ll get an overview of the two self-competencies and how they relate to all four art forms
• Then, you’ll participate in a SEAL activity for each art form that will focus on either self-awareness, self-management or both.

This is your chance to jump into some SEAL activities that focus on the competencies of social-awareness and relationship skills.

Once again, we’re going Teacher-Centered here.  You will have the opportunity to work on some experiences that will allow you to discover the relationship between SEAL and the social competencies.  

Here’s a look at what you’ll do in Unit 5:

• We’ll start off with an overview of how each competency links naturally with each of the art forms.  There are just SO many connections that we can use in our teaching!
• Then, in the following lessons in this unit we will focus in on how SEAL integrates with the four National Core Arts Standards of Creating, Performing, Responding and Connecting.  (SEAL is a branch of arts integration, after all!)
• Finally, you will be able to choose from some activity options that will develop these skills.  As usual, these activities are ones you can certainly implement in your own classroom. (We’re ALL about practicality here.)

Finally, it’s time to see how SEAL can address responsible decision making through creativity and the arts.  These skills are so necessary for all students in school and in life and they can certainly be developed through the arts! 

Here are the highlights of this unit:

• We’ll first take a close look at how responsible decision making skills are connected to the creative process, which is a learning process and a natural vehicle to practice these skills!
• Then, I’ll show you some great examples of how this can play out in your classroom as you assign SEAL and other content projects.
• We’ll end this unit with a fun digital art activity! (But I can’t give it away to you yet!)

Of course you can access the SEAL lesson plans available to you through this course, but you can also create them yourself!  In this unit, we’ll look at what makes a SEAL lesson plan different from any other. And then you’ll have the chance to create your own. 

We’ll look at:

• The two types of SEAL lesson plans.
• How to create a SEAL lesson.

It’s time to celebrate!  You have everything you need to be a successful SEAL teacher!   

In this final unit, you will:

• Make your SEAL teacher status official.
• Do a couple of other things I just can't tell you . . . yet!!