Dear Friends and Colleagues,
Human Understanding requires Empathic Imagination – the ability to imagine the emotional experience of the other. This is a task as complex as Shakespeare and rocket science to master, but it can be taught. And it must be taught, in an educational trajectory that's given the same weight as every other academic subject, from elementary through PhD programs. The purpose of Emotional Imprint™ is to develop such a curriculum and consider ways of implementing it.
Many students graduate from American schools lacking skills necessary for group problem solving. Contributing to this problem are the challenges students face working as leaders and responding to others whom they perceive to be “different.” They may instinctively treat those perceived as different with distrust, fear and contempt. Such rigid modes of experiencing, feeling and thinking lead to conflict. Furthermore, poor social and emotional skills have been negatively correlated with academic success. Existing social and emotional literacy (SEL) programs addressing this problem are often squeezed into an already full academic day, and are rarely implemented across grades or cohesively taught.
Currently, over 20 SEL programs are implemented in state schools. Preliminary assessment suggests these supplemental programs have achieved some success in improving students’ ability to collaborate, reason with less bias, and assume leadership roles.
With Emotional Imprint™, we will develop a pedagogical approach to teaching SEL that is integrated with the existing core curriculum. Students will understand their own and others’ emotions, improve their ability to read and respond to emotional communications of others, and internalize that understanding through academic work. Our unique use of thought experiments as a teaching tool will allow students to deepen their understanding of self, other, and text.
Toward this goal, Changing Our Consciousness has engaged an outstanding team of educators to begin the process of "imagining" Emotional Imprint™. In early 2010 we retained the Princeton Center for Leadership Training and Director Melissa Brand, Psy.D., to create a presentation for us to deliver in order to engage pilot schools to test the initial iteration of an Emotional Imprint™ curriculum, as well as attract support to finance the program's development. We are currently applying for grant funding, in collaboration with Marshall Alcorn of George Washington University, Mark Bracher of Kent State University, and Melissa Brand.
On the following pages, you can learn more about the structure, method and possible content for the Emotional Imprint program, as it might be implemented at different primary and secondary school grade levels. You can also read examples of homework assignments that utilize one component of the EI™ method: "Thought experiments." These scenarios can be read as a series, or individually.
Human Understanding, empathic imagination, and emotional depth perception are qualities I hope to develop in our young people through this revolutionary initiative. The learning process is HARD WORK ... it IS rocket science!
Thank you for your interest in Emotional Imprint™, and please contact me to continue the conversation.
– Alice L Maher, MD, Creator of Emotional Imprint™
Meet the EI educational team >>
Read more about Emotional Imprint™>>
Read a series of Thought Experiments>>
Join a discussion forum at Waging Dialogue™ and participate in the envisioning of this new educational track>>