Novice Teacher’s Social and Emotional Learning: Challenges and Coping Strategies

Teachers play a vital role in students’ social and emotional learning, but they are not merely facilitators or interveners; they are also social and emotional learners themselves. This qualitative case study, involving six novice primary teachers in a Chinese context, elucidates their social and emotional challenges and, how they learn to cope with these challenges in their early careers. The results showed that novice teachers encounter key challenges such as intense emotions caused by the gaps between educational ideals and reality, unconscious compliance with school leaders’ assignments, difficulties in student management and parent communication, and insufficient experience in emotional regulation. From the perspective of social and emotional learning, novice teachers’ effective coping strategies include exploring suitable stress-relief methods, seeking support from the community, handling conflicts with fairness, discriminating tasks and allocating time accordingly, and adjusting expectations of educational work. These coping strategies reflect a dynamic and interactive process. Through this process, novice teachers develop and integrate dimensions such as self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship skills to address social and emotional challenges. Implications for novice teachers, schools, and professional development programs are discussed.