Social and Emotional Learning is essential for everyone. Pupils need to be able to build their social and emotional skills which are integrated in all lessons and subjects.
Some of the ways this is done are:
This is a curriculum that focuses on social and emotional development. It specifically enhances leadership qualities and includes all the traits required to develop effective leaders. The curriculum is based on Steven Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People
This is a time for communicating with the rest of the group, for reflecting, setting goals, and expressing concerns or challenges.
This serves the social and emotional skills and needs as well as communication and reflection skills. It provides a sense of belonging and acceptance where their class or group is a ‘safe place’ to express themselves.
This is also a time to set goals, revisit previous goals, reflect on lessons learned and offer support to each other in regard to achieving their goals.
Reflection is explained as: “a complex and deliberate process of thinking about and interpreting experience in order to learn from it. This is a conscious process which does not occur automatically but is in response to experience and with a definite purpose…reflection is a highly personal process, and the outcome is a changed conceptual perspective, or learning.”
Reflecting after lessons or activities ensures that children develop the skills to analyze, evaluate, modify and improve independently. The ability to reflect and use tools for reflective practices are crucial skills for any competent professional.
Pupils who are reflective thinkers as opposed to mere academically competent pupils, will be prepared for the challenges of professional work. Through reflection, children gain a deeper understanding of themselves, how they learn and the most effective ways for them to gain knowledge and skills. This will help them become lifelong learners who are able to determine the best way for themselves to learn.
Pupils need time where they can work on their individual interests, talents and hobbies. This would be difficult to do during class time as there could be a large number of interests within one class. Therefore, there are weekly clubs where pupils choose the club they’re most interested in. Clubs bring together pupils that have the same interests, so they include pupils from all grade levels. Examples of clubs are, journalism club, gardening club, arts and crafts club, book club, cooking club, drama club, science club, debate club, sports clubs, STEAM club, etc. These change every term and are determined based on pupil interests.