This workshop is a practical, reflective professional learning experience designed to support K–12 teachers in building safe, inclusive, and productive classrooms that foster social-emotional learning (SEL). Participants will examine real classroom scenarios, like responding to student distress and disappointment, navigating power differentials, and keeping classroom routines that contribute to burnout and undermine both teacher and student well-being. Participants will explore how school mission and culture, along with their own teaching VIBE (values, identities, beliefs, and expectations) shape boundary-setting and partnership practices in daily classroom interactions. Through guided reflection, discussion, and practice, participants will differentiate between supportive teacher-student relationships and patterns that unintentionally lead to over-functioning, blurred roles, or emotional exhaustion.

By the end of the course, participants will develop a personalized action plan aligned with their grade level and school context. The plan will include language, routines, and decision-making frameworks to support intentional implementation of SEL practices during the academic year. Attendees will leave with practical strategies and a renewed sense of professional agency to sustain both effective instruction and healthy teacher-student partnerships. This course is designed for classroom teachers but welcomes school staff, faculty, and administrators without direct teaching responsibilities. Because collective efficacy depends on shared knowledge and coordinated action across a school, non-teaching participants can support implementation by understanding the practices being developed and helping create conditions for success.

Upon completion, participants will be able to:

  • Describe common classroom contributors to student-teacher relationship friction and teacher burnout, including role confusion, missed opportunities for partnership, and inconsistencies in routine and expectations
  • Reflect on real classroom scenarios and professional experiences to explore how factors like teaching VIBE (values, identities, beliefs, and expectations), school culture, and classroom structures influence social-emotional learning, boundary-setting, and partnership practices
  • Differentiate between supportive student–teacher relationships and patterns that undermine student autonomy and teacher well-being
  • Develop a personalized boundary and role-clarity action plan to support implementation aligned with grade-level expectations and school context