An excellent school goes beyond providing a safe environment where excellent learning happens and applies the same commitment to evidence-based practices in pastoral care as to academic learning. In practice, this means considering the health and wellbeing of the whole child, their physical, emotional, spiritual, and ethical development, and aligning pastoral curriculum, behavior systems, and culture, to achieve this.
Hold on, isn't socio-emotional learning (SEL) just "21st Century Skills" masquerading as something else? (The teacher's fad alarm is waking up the neighbors at this point.) We know the answer to this one! Yet another manifestation of the generic! Wellbeing interventions are an unrealistic silver-bullet; burn the witch! Peak pointlessness and educational woo-woo from patronizing consultant types. Giving everyone a sweet and telling them to eat it very slowly is no solution to the mental health crisis in society!
Worse, "wellbeing" as a goal passes responsibility for student wellbeing to teachers. Teachers aren't therapists! They have enough to do already. So now they have to deal with literacy, history, maths AND make the kids feel good at the same time? Teachers might have done a couple of courses on psychology back in the day, but mental health requires sustained interventions with the family, medication, and possibly therapy. Sniffing raisins for a few minutes in an English class isn't going to cut it.
It's kind of hard to come back from those arguments. We are, rightly, I think, as a profession, becoming increasingly belligerent when defending ourselves against "the tyranny of the new." The word "innovation" has become synonymous with "transforming" learning. The question remains, transform to what? Here the answer has been up until now, well, anything BUT the so-called "factory model, anything BUT the "teacher-led" model.
People have built entire careers around telling people that standing in front of a class, explaining something you know well, asking lots of questions, and getting kids to practice is "bad." We were told to talk for only ten minutes, get children to do more of the work, be "the guide on the side" and let kids find out the answer on their own. Worksheets and textbooks were an enemy that any right-thinking professional railed against, proselytizing in favor of rich and authentic projects, and real-life contexts where children can build their 21st Century-skills.
This false and damaging dichotomy between listening passively and active learning is dissolving; there is a silent revolution in teaching. Teachers are engaging with research that paints a more nuanced picture than the "smash the factory-system" progressivism of the past. Nobody serious in education now fails to recognize that knowledge and memory are crucial to learning (if not everything) and that the current, fading vogue for problem-solving skills derives as much from the philosophical writings of Rosseau as it does from science. To deny "knowledge-denial" ever happened is a form of academic gaslighting that nobody should let pass. If your local education academic doesn't admit that "a change has come," they are probably not paying enough attention and should be ignored until they do a bit more reading.
So why doesn't socio-emotional learning fall into this category?
For a start, we know that the emotional element of learning matters, right? Ever had a kid sit there and cry in your class for no reason? Or always seem angry or anxious? Depressed kids are less ready for learning; anxious kids are less ready for learning; happier kids are better able to learn. Right fine, you might be thinking, but what can I do about that? All those things are outside of my control; what I need to do is teach my subject.
There are plenty of things we can do. Before we get to that, wellbeing is useful for learning, but it's also an end-in-itself. When I interview parents, they are concerned about bullying, substance abuse, and disruption as much as they are about the school's academic results. Rightly so, they want the children to be at peace, experience equanimity, generally be more "okay" than not okay physically, spiritually, socially, and emotionally. I am proud to be able to give them a good explanation of exactly what we do as a school to cultivate and nurture healthy and happy minds. Our socio-emotional learning program is reassuring to them for more reasons than "they'll learn more stuff." They'll learn more stuff is, as it were, a happy by-product.
Economic growth has brought great prosperity, but the next move for schools is teaching people how to survive in this information-rich but meaning-poor world. In other words, how to manage our collective state of mind.
We need to get across to kids that it's cool to be kind. They need to know that it's good to be good. Some kids see the choice as a stark one; their academic success will only ever be enough for an intense working week with a boss they don't like. As much as we bang on about the dignity and value of hard work, images of money, fame, and glamour bombard them. We need to help them see that hard work, learning and work itself are not merely a means to an end but a pathway to a satisfying life.
Many kids have stressed families struggling to make ends meet; they want to achieve security and wellbeing for themselves and their families. We say, okay, work hard, get your good GCSEs, and you'll be able to get a relatively decent job. It's true to an extent. But it's not enough; we need to offer them something more than the vague promise of a life of struggle and toil. They need to optimistically believe that even the most mundane of activities can be full of joy and meaning. We need to provide the aspiration for something more than the world of work.
That something more doesn't have to be material. It can be the promise of equanimity, peace, good-will to all men, and a general sense of not needing to achieve or do anything to be satisfied. If this sounds like a recipe for apathy, don't be confused. We've traditionally associated wellbeing with success and achievement, but this association is making us sick. Better to teach that wellbeing, equanimity, and peace now are the keys to success in the future. Society has done a great job of convincing kids that they need to "achieve to be happy"; why not teach them to achieve a sense of peace first? Rather than letting them find out that buying new stuff isn't enough for a satisfying life on their own, let's guide them towards dealing with the anxious and destructive desires that drive them towards consumerism, violence, and materialism when they are still young.
In the UK, there is a statutory requirement for schools to concern themselves with the personal, social, health, and economic education of children, and there is significant leeway for schools to do this in ways that they feel are productive and appropriate. So let's cut to the chase, what can schools do to nurture and sustain healthier, happier young people that aren't going to feel like "yet another thing," doesn't require "transformative pedagogy" and actually works?
Schools can't cure the sick, but they can help keep kids healthy.
When a child has got to the stage of requiring intervention for mental health, there isn't a lot a school can do but seek help from parents and external professionals. School-based counselors aren't generally able to provide the in-depth CBT or psychotherapy they need. Better to aim to prevent by teaching them strategies to take care of their wellbeing before we get to this stage. Health services are there to deal with the sick, but schools can do a lot to help keep people healthy. Schools should pay attention to teaching children the knowledge and skills they need to make healthier decisions and to make it easier to make those decisions.
Look carefully at what you currently have in place before doing anything new. Too often, new things happen without enough attention to what's already in place. Do you need a new thing, or can you merely pay more attention to the cultivation and improvement of what is already in place? The question, "what do we currently do to promote health and wellbeing across the school" needs to be answered thoroughly before any new initiative is created.
Agree on clear indicators for success
After the question, what do we currently do to promote health and wellbeing, you should ask yourself, if we were able to improve health and wellbeing across the system, how would we measure that? Decide on a few indicators for success and record where you are right now to compare where you get to. Be public and transparent about these indicators to hold yourself accountable. Historical bullying referrals, children referred for stress, survey data on school safety, and surveys on subjective wellbeing are all rich sources of information. See which of those you think most accurately reflect your goals and then begin the conversation about which indicators give you the most balanced picture of what you want to change.
Sort behavior
When the behavior is poor, teachers and kids are stressed. The silent majority seeth when the grindstone of low-level disruption erodes their learning time, so involve teachers in the creation and communication of detailed but easy-to-understand procedures, then implement with high-levels of consistency — support and back teachers when they use the system. Train everyone well in how to create routines that enable basic classroom processes to be carried out with minimal fuss.
Physical exercise
Is your PE program designed to make kids move or make them compete? Are you overly focused on team sports at the expense of things like Yoga, dance, or martial arts? Every kid should be out of breath for at least 30 minutes every day, and many avoid PE because of the fear of being inadequate in a team. It's often the least healthy kids that would benefit most from more intense exercise every day. I knew of a school where every in the school would run together for 30 minutes before school every day. That's a cool idea! You might be able to contact a local provider of Yoga, Tai Chi, or Kung fu classes that young and old alike can all learn together. Given how important physical exercise is for mental health, I'm surprised how many kids are prescribed psychotropics without even being asked about how much physical exercise they are getting.
Engage and involve parents in the process
None of this works if kids are living unhealthy lifestyles at home. Helping parents put healthy boundaries around screen use, sharing necessary nutritional information, and sleep is essential. Review your parent education program, does it touch on these areas systematically through the children's education?
Conversations with parents are helpful qualitative information for deciding on the indicators; they are the ones in the best position to evaluate the wellbeing of their child. Hold focus groups. Talk to them about their children's social media use, about apathy, about concerns around behavior and risk. Try to see underneath the surface and get to know what your parent's most profound concerns for their children are. If nothing else, it's better to ask now than be held responsible for something you can do little about later.
Gut health = mental health
Common health enemies are soft-drinks, added sugar drinks, and refined grains. I'd ban them altogether. If money allows, having a cafeteria serving whole-grain foods would be great. Use common-sense, remove as much of the processed food as you can, make the school lunch the most nutritious one in a child's day. Stuff every available food-giving space with probiotic foodstuffs. An easy way to save the money to make this happen would be to serve meat only twice a week. Beans and legumes like lentils and chick-peas provide an entirely adequate amount of protein at a fraction of the cost. Here's a link to more information.
Take care of the teachers
If teachers are stressed and unhappy, you're not going to have much luck getting them to talk wellbeing with the kids. Have a sensible policy on marking and observations for teachers, keep things lean and mean on data and use whole-class feedback. If you don't trust your teachers, mistake paperwork for learning, or generally think that holding someone accountable means nitpicking every email or display for not fitting corporate requirements, you're going to have an unhappy school. Respect the time teachers need to work on their planning. Celebrate the amazing things that happen every day. Drop graded lesson observations, support on behavior, get out into the classroom, and see what's going on then engage in dialogue around how learning can be improved - that's the easiest form of performance management.
Another helpful tactic is listening to people. Listening to teachers is hard. You cannot always do what people want, leaders have multiple demands and stakeholders, but if you consistently don't act on concerns or don't seek feedback, trust, and wellbeing, erode.
Use an evidence-based curriculum that includes mindfulness, kindness, and gratitude - such as "mind-up or Dot-B" - for your PSHE/advisory classes.
If you have got behavior right, kids are getting enough exercise; you can start explicitly teaching strategies for managing a state of mind. The first strategy I'd recommend is a dedicated meditation practice. Mindfulness meditation isn't hard at all; you don't need someone with a qualification to show you how to do it. In the same way that everyone can run, everyone can meditate. Sit straight... (slouching on a desk means you fall asleep)... close your eyes... focus on breath... observe thoughts non-judgementally... let them pass... *repeat*. Aim to go from 1-2 minutes to 10 minutes by the end of the year. Make it an expectation. The actual practice of meditation is easy; what's hard is getting kids to buy into it and having the discipline to do it regularly. Over time, you'll begin to notice thoughts rather than have thoughts. You'll notice emotions rather than being swept up in them. Noticing emotions is crucial for self-regulation.
You only need two or three minutes a day to develop a meditation practice to the opportunity cost is minimal. It's the perfect thing to do in advisory or tutor time. Like running, it's not going to have an immediate impact, but the long-term benefits are well-established. Just google it! Alongside this, a good PSHE program should include opportunities to be kind to people for no reason. In my current school, every Monday, kids do random acts of kindness. They write a gratitude journal, and they learn all about the fight and flight response. Dot B or Mind Up are the right places to start, but you can create your curriculum like this without too much effort.
So there you go, some ideas, I am sure many could find much to disagree, with but I think if there is one thing we need more of in the world right now, it's peace and equanimity. A school is an excellent place to begin making this explicit.
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