In The News

The New York Times writes on Roots of Empathy, a Toronto-based charity that is brightening elementary classrooms across the globe (see our August Yonge Street story on the organization). Launched in 1996 by educator Mary Gordon, Roots brings mothers and their babies into school classrooms with the goal of increasing empathy among students. Researchers studying Gordon's innovative program have concluded that the babies do indeed have positive effect on student behaviour, kind and accepting behaviours increase while negative aggressive behaviours decrease. Roots has now been active in over 2,600 classes across Canada, and has recently expanded to classrooms in the Isle of Man, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and the United States.

"Here's how it works: Roots arranges monthly class visits by a mother and her baby (who must be between two and four months old at the beginning of the school year). Each month, for nine months, a trained instructor guides a classroom using a standard curriculum that involves three 40-minute visits � a pre-visit, a baby visit, and a post-visit. The program runs from kindergarten to seventh grade. During the baby visits, the children sit around the baby and mother (sometimes it's a father) on a green blanket (which represents new life and nature) and they try to understand the baby's feelings. The instructor helps by labeling them. "It's a launch pad for them to understand their own feelings and the feelings of others," explains Gordon. "It carries over to the rest of class."

"The baby seems to act like a heart-softening magnet. No one fully understands why. Kimberly Schonert-Reichl, an applied developmental psychologist who is a professor at the University of British Columbia, has evaluated Roots of Empathy in four studies. "Do kids become more empathic and understanding? Do they become less aggressive and kinder to each other? The answer is yes and yes," she explained. "The question is why."

read full story here
original source New York Times