Little Readers, Big Feelings: Social-Emotional Learning Through Children’s Literature

Presenters

• Kathleen M. Crawford, Georgia Southern UniversityFollow
• Heather Huling, Georgia Southern UniversityFollow

First Presenter's Highest Degree Earned

EdD

Year First Presenter's Degree Was Awarded

2016

First Presenter's Field of Study

Elementary Literacy

Institution Where First Presenter Received Highest Degree

Georgia Southern University

First Presenter's Institution

Georgia Southern University

First Presenter's Brief Bio and Description of Credentials for This Presentation

Kathleen Crawford, Ed.D., has been in the field of education for over twenty years; she is currently an Associate Professor of Elementary Literacy at Georgia Southern University, where she teaches elementary literacy courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Prior to joining the faculty at Georgia Southern, she was a K-5 Literacy Coach and 4th/5th grade ELA teacher in Jacksonville, Florida. Her research interests include effective literacy instruction, integration of children’s literature inclusive of diverse populations of people, teacher education, artificial intelligence in education, mentoring beginning teachers and instructional coaches, humanizing online instruction, and understanding the emotions involved in teaching and learning.

Second Presenter's Institution

Georgia Southern University

Second Presenter’s Email Address

hhuling@georgiasouthern.edu

Second Presenter's Highest Degree Earned

EdD

Year Second Presenter's Degree Was Awarded

2023

Second Presenter's Field of Study

Elementary Literacy

Institution Where Second Presenter Received Highest Degree

Georgia Southern University

Second Presenter's Brief Bio and Description of Credentials for This Presentation

Heather M. Huling, Ed. D. is currently an Assistant Professor in the Elementary Education Program at Georgia Southern University where she teaches courses in arts integration and children’s literature, language arts methods, and supervises preservice teachers in their senior level field experiences. She was an elementary educator in the public school system before moving into higher education to work with preservice teachers as a teacher educator and mentor. Her research interests focus on literacy education, mentoring preservice teachers, online learning, artificial intelligence in education, teacher education, and best practices in teaching.

Location

Ballroom F

Document Type

Individual Presentation

Primary Strand

Youth Resiliency

Relevance to Primary Strand

This proposal directly aligns with the Youth Resiliency strand by highlighting evidence-based practices that build students’ self-awareness, emotional regulation, and interpersonal skills through children’s literature. When students engage with stories that explore a range of feelings and social situations, they learn to identify their own emotions, recognize emotions in others, and practice empathy in supportive, structured settings. These interactions strengthen self-control and communication skills because students are not only hearing about emotional experiences, but also discussing and reflecting on them in ways that transfer to real-life social interactions.

Alignment with School Improvement Plan Topics

Student Learning and Development

Brief Program Description

This session demonstrates how children’s literature can support social and emotional development in elementary classrooms. Participants will explore evidence-based strategies that use children’s literature to help students recognize emotions, respond to social situations, and engage in productive social interactions. The session focuses on purposeful discussions and reflective practices that give students space to name experiences and emotions, consider perspectives of others, and practice self-regulation. Integrating these practices into everyday literacy instruction strengthens self-awareness, interpersonal skills, and overall well-being, contributing to improved social interactions and academic engagement.

Summary

In today’s elementary classrooms, teachers are navigating a growing need to support students’ social and emotional well-being alongside academic learning. The reality is simple: children are coming to school carrying big feelings with very few tools to process them. Children’s literature offers a powerful and accessible pathway for helping students name their feelings, understand others, and practice empathy in a developmentally appropriate way that doesn’t feel like a lecture or a behavior chart. When we choose the right books and create space to talk about them, students get the language, models, and confidence to handle real-life emotions and interactions.

This session highlights how purposeful text selection and interactive read-aloud strategies can build students’ emotional vocabulary, increase awareness of self and others, and strengthen problem-solving skills. By engaging with stories where characters experience a range of emotions, from frustration and loneliness to joy and courage, students learn to recognize similar feelings in themselves and others. The work is gentle, but the impact is real: students start to pause, notice, name, and respond more intentionally.

Participants will explore a wide variety of children’s books that center on emotional expression and social interaction, paired with practical instructional strategies such as morning meetings, role-playing, turn and talks, shared storytelling, and reflective drawing or journaling. These approaches demonstrate how literature-based conversations can establish classroom routines where students feel seen, heard, and supported, rather than corrected or managed.

Ultimately, increasing students’ social and emotional skills strengthens mental health, peer relationships, and academic performance. When children are equipped with language and tools, like books, for responding thoughtfully, they are better able to engage, persist, collaborate, and thrive. Attendees will leave with book recommendations, discussion prompts, and meaningful activity structures that can be implemented immediately across elementary grade levels to develop empathetic, emotionally aware learners.

Evidence

The approach presented in this proposal is grounded in well-established research on social and emotional learning (SEL) and the role of narrative in cognitive and emotional development. Studies have demonstrated that direct instruction in identifying and discussing emotions leads to measurable improvements in students’ self-regulation, interpersonal skills, and classroom behavior. For example, the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) identifies self-awareness, social-awareness, and relationship skills as core competencies linked to improved academic performance and positive peer interactions.

Children’s literature is a validated instructional tool for supporting these competencies (Parker & Cronin, 2025). Research indicates that students who regularly engage with stories that address emotional experiences show increased emotional vocabulary, stronger perspective-taking abilities, and more effective conflict resolution. Structured discussion routines, such as guided read-alouds and classroom community conversations, have been shown to provide the modeling and practice necessary for students to transfer these skills into real social contexts.

This approach is also supported by promising practices in elementary literacy instruction. Integrating SEL within existing literacy time avoids the need for additional curriculum blocks and supports continuity between emotional development and academic learning. Studies on morning meetings, reflective response activities, and collaborative storytelling have demonstrated that these routines contribute to a stronger classroom climate and increased student engagement (Morton & Akram, 2022).

Field applications of these strategies have demonstrated increased student participation, improved peer collaboration, and more consistent use of emotion language and problem-solving strategies during classroom interactions. Collectively, the research and practice base confirms that purposeful use of children’s literature is an effective and developmentally appropriate means for strengthening social and emotional skills in elementary learners.

References

Morton, T., & Akram, S. (2022). Capturing Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) through Children's Literature. English in Texas, 52(1), 13-19.

Parker, F., & Cronin, J. (2025). Fostering Social-Emotional Learning in Children's Books: An Analysis of Content and Quality. Georgia Journal of Literacy.

Learning Objective 1

Participants will be able to identify children’s literature that effectively supports social and emotional learning in elementary classrooms.

Learning Objective 2

Participants will be able to apply read-aloud and discussion routines that help students recognize emotions and engage in constructive peer interactions.

Learning Objective 3

Participants will be able to integrate SEL-focused literature experiences into existing literacy instruction to strengthen students’ self-awareness, emotional regulation, and interpersonal skills.

Start Date

6-1-2026 2:15 PM

End Date

6-1-2026 3:15 PM

Recommended Citation

Crawford, Kathleen M. and Huling, Heather, "Little Readers, Big Feelings: Social-Emotional Learning Through Children’s Literature" (2026). Southeast Conference on School Climate. 20.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/secsc/2026/2026/20

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.