Welcome to ChatSEL 🌱
ChatSEL is under active development, please stay tune for more updates!
ChatSEL is an open-source, AI-powered chatbot designed to transform how teachers in low-resource settings deliver Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) support to students.
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What is ChatSEL?​
ChatSEL is a generative AI coach that provides teachers with evidence-based and context-sensitive guidance on understanding and implementing SEL programs in a low-resource classroom.
We work with NGOs to develop multiple context-specific versions of ChatSEL that incorporate both academic knowledge on SEL coaching and the organization's own SEL curriculum.
Why ChatSEL?​
In many low-resource settings, teachers often face challenges such as:
- Limited time and financial resources for training.
- Overburdened responsibilities that hinder program implementation.
- Lack of access to continuous support and feedback around SEL practices.
ChatSEL addresses these barriers by being an always-on teacher companion that provides evidence-based and context-sensitive guidance on any SEL programs. The current version of the ChatSEL is built via WhatsApp, a widely accessible platform to many low-resource settings.
How Does It Work?​
- Interactive Activity Learning: ChatSEL suggests SEL activities tailored to classroom contexts and provides guided, step-by-step implementation support. Teachers who are unfamiliar with the SEL curriculum can role-play activities with ChatSEL and practice their skills in delivering the activities in the actual classroom.
- Feedback-Driven Learning: ChatSEL collects daily teacher data and feedback and adjusts its recommendations for future activities. This adaptive learning ensures variety and context-relevance of the SEL implementation.
- Real-Time Translation and Voice Interaction: ChatSEL translates activity instructions into local languages and supports voice input tailored to diverse cultural settings.
- Culturally Relevant Adaptation: ChatSEL offers real-time tips for adapting activities to fit cultural contexts, based on NGO-provided guidelines and SEL coaching framework in the academic literature.
- General Developmental Guidance: ChatSEL also provides general advice on child development and SEL. Teachers can ask questions about specific classroom challenges, and ChatSEL will offer both targeted interventions and broader recommendations.
Who is Behind ChatSEL?​
We at the Agency Fund developed the core knowledge base, evaluation database, and the engineering architecture of ChatSEL. We also partner with various non-profit and acadmeic organizations to build context-specific versions of ChatSEL for their own programs.
ChatSEL x Enseña por Colombia​
We are partnering with Enseña por Colombia to pilot ChatSEL in Colombian classrooms as part of the organization's broader effort to support teachers in delivering social-emotional learning (SEL) in diverse, often low-resource settings.
ChatSEL x RISE​
We are partnering with Girl Rising to bring ChatSEL to rural classrooms in Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh, India through their RISE program, which strengthens adolescent girls’ agency through story-based SEL and gender equity curricula. ChatSEL strengthens this effort by providing continuous teacher support over the 28-week RISE curriculum.
ChatSEL x SEL Kernels​
We are partnering with the Harvard EASEL Lab on ChatSEL for SEL Kernels, bite-sized, low-cost, and evidence-based SEL activities, to low-resource classrooms in countires such as Uganda, Brazil, and Ukraine. The EASEL Lab is a research group at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, led by Dr. Stephanie Jones, that focuses on advancing the science and practice of social and emotional learning (SEL) in schools and communities.
Please see About Us for more information on our core team and external research and design partners.
We are actively seeking partners to pilot ChatSEL in their own programs.
If you are interested in collaborating with us, please reach out to Zezhen Wu at the Agency Fund!
Learn More
Visit our Behind the Build sections to dive deeper into ChatSEL’s functionality and development process.