How to take advantage of soft skills and emotional intelligence

Nowadays, the importance of soft skills in both the workplace and daily life is growing. Both within and outside of the classroom, it is crucial to possess abilities like emotional intelligence and empathy, teamwork, dispute resolution, and stress management. The participants in our study gained greater knowledge about how to hone their communication abilities through a combination of theoretical and practical activities.
The new edition of the course “Soft Skills and Emotional Intelligence for teachers and education staff​” took place in Tenerife from 26/02/2023 to 04/03/2023. The participants came from all across Europe, with Pietro Cappello and Francesco Rizzo from Istituto Comprensivo Statale Marineo Bolognetta "Mario Francese" in Italy; Kadri Saluri, Taisi Metsaviir, Helena Tõnsau and Marina Pokintšereda from Merivälja Kool in Estonia; Ana Maria Gomes da Silva, Margarida do Rosário Casimiro Ferrão, Pórcia Kato Miranda Vilela and Idália Maria da Piedade Constantino from Agrupamento de Escolas Emídio Navarro in Portugal and Mahdieh Shojaa from Tuebingen University in Germany.
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Emotional Intelligence was the course's initial topic for discussion. In order to be aware of ourselves and our environment, we must be able to recognize not just our own sensations but also emotions of other people. Empathy was another ability that was covered in this lesson. With the help of a series of activities, the participants learned how to use a variety of tools and techniques to improve their writing skills.
A good teacher is also a good leader of the classroom because they have to give motivation and guide their students to reach a specific goal. Leadership comes in different forms, but not all of them are effective in every situation. For this reason, participants were asked to think about the main characteristics of the leaders they admire and reflected on the different leadership styles.
Effective communication is one of the most crucial teamwork skills.. The participants focused their attention on the different communication styles: aggressive, passive, passive-aggressive and assertive. Communication is essential when it comes to teamwork. Being able to show assertiveness can be tricky, however, by discussing this topic they saw that being assertive does not mean to be impolite, but it means to communicate what you want effectively.
They had to create a public speaking exercise as part of their communication ability improvement. They gained knowledge of presentation techniques, body language management, and nonverbal communication. The participants were encouraged to prepare a brief, one-minute speech to deliver in front of the class in order to build confidence and put their newly acquired skills to work.
The last topic of this course was Conflict and stress management. Working with people can be difficult sometimes and we do not always know how to deal with conflicts. By sharing their own experiences they realised how these are common situations and that conflict doesn’t necessarily have to bring a negative outcome, but it is also a possibility for growth and development.
Participants were able to confront one another in this class and gain knowledge from their common experiences. Each participant's unique background helped the group as a whole grow in a positive direction. The scheduled cultural activities also made networking feasible, demonstrating that learning does not just take place in a classroom!
Discover more about this course here.

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