Rationale: For education to be meaningful, real and useful for our children, they need to be taught social and emotional learning skills: they need these skills to learn how to manage their emotions and how to face many of Life’s challenges.
We live in a century that has already seen rapid technological changes; many of which have impacted the social and emotional fabric of our lives. Family sizes have shrunk and family time has become limited with both parents leading busy lives. Social media has also impacted our lives in positive and negative ways. In such times, it becomes imperative, not just important, to help children navigate their social-emotional development by providing them with the tools and skills in order to help them learn positive mental health concepts.
Failing to address these important intelligences – and thinking that “it’s something that happens on its own”- will increase the likelihood of many children becoming anxious and confused. In many cases, children adopt self-defeating methods of handling problems.
A very worrying trend has been the growing number of children who are experiencing some sort of anxiety, depression or suicidal thoughts and tendencies and drug and alcohol intake.
The social and emotional learning program is largely based on the principles of Cognitive Behavior Therapy, whose efficacy in dealing with emotional problems (both in anxiety and depression) has been well proven and documented through years of research and practice. The lessons are developmentally appropriate and designed to match the cognitive levels of the child.
The program is offered to children aged 8 to 18 years as individual lessons, once a week for one hour.
Each topic is covered in six to eight lessons. The activities and discussions in the individual lessons are structured to suit the age and cognitive level of each child, and is offered as one hour weekly sessions. The emotional curriculum is also offered as workshops conducted topic wise for grades 6 to 12.