Abstract

Globally, K–12 schools are embracing practices of social and emotional learning (SEL) to address students' interactional and emotional needs and to create a safe and nurturing environment for their learning. As a curricular program and approach to pedagogy, SEL instruction socializes learners into specific social and cultural ways of naming, claiming, expressing, evaluating, and valuing emotions and emotional states in oneself and others. To inquire into the language skills, behaviors, and ideologies drawn upon during SEL instruction, a collaborative self‐study of teaching and teacher education practice was undertaken as part of a preservice teacher's TESOL practicum placement. Situated in a third‐grade classroom at an English as a second language (ESL) cluster site school located in the U.S. Midwest, the self‐study examines rich points (Agar, 1999) that surface within the practicum student's teaching demonstration of SEL skills delivered during a morning meeting. Through critical reflection, reframing and transformation of practice, and collaborative engagement in self‐study research with the practicum student's supervisor, this work demonstrates how inquiry into instructional rich points can evolve into teachable moments that educators can draw upon in support of classroom students' development of not only SEL skills and competencies, but also grade‐level curricular knowledge and English language development. The inquiry also reveals the social, cultural, and linguistic socialization that underlies SEL instruction and its impact on classroom learners, student teachers, and even teacher educators.