Life Chances. We need to act sooner for our teenagers.
Recent surveys and news isn’t great for the youth of our nation, particularly for those who are teenagers now. Isn’t it time then to be proactive and do the best we can to ensure that future teenagers are better ‘equipped’ from a younger age to deal with their life rather than sit back and wait for them to reach a crisis point?
Surveys and news…
- 1 in 5 children has symptoms of depression according to a recent YouGov Survey (July 2013) and almost one third of 16 to 25 year olds has thought about or attempted suicide.
– For Secondary teachers that could be 6 of the Year 11’s in your class.
- Some 34% of 2,300 16 to 25-year-olds with poor GCSE grades polled for The Prince’s Trust charity believed they would “end up on benefits”. (Source BBC News August 2013)
- Children Society Data re well-being of 8 to 15 year olds (July 2013) cites that well-being is declining in early teenage years and that the low point is age 15.
There’s a relationship between well-being and longer term outcomes/life chances. If we invest in the well-being of our children from an early age and continue this investment throughout their school career then we would hope that better life chances are within their reach. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have our spirits raised by some positive statistics?
Surely everyone who works with children and young people wants to try and positively impact their life chances. We aim for everything, from experiences and opportunities to the relationships they develop to be the best for each and every one of them. We want them to aspire to achieve their potential throughout their lives. Whatever input we have in children’s teaching and learning at whatever stage needs to set them up for life as it happens now and for the future. This has to be recognised as a shared responsibility between all settings. It is essential for us all to understand and respond to the needs of the whole child. Education needs to stop being driven by academic standards alone.
SEAL
Many primary schools use the *SEAL (Social, Emotional Aspects of Learning) learning and teaching framework to develop all children’s social, emotional and behavioural skills. This resource has 5 broad aspects – self awareness, managing feelings, motivation, empathy and social skills. For any social, emotional and behavioural learning and teaching framework to be successful it needs to involve the whole setting/community. Our settings need to have good role models if we are to positively influence the social, emotional and behaviour choices our children make. This is sure to help them achieve better outcomes in the here and now, and in the longer term.
We regularly hear in the news or have first-hand experience of children who are growing up in difficult circumstances, possibly in complicated families with strained relationships. Family breakdowns are occurring at very young ages for some of our children and they need support to understand and express their emotions. Building up emotional resilience is tough for adults let alone young children. It is ever more important that we help them to develop their social, emotional and behavioural skills if they are to thrive.
**Nef’s (new economics foundation) 5 Ways to Well-being for adults are connect, be active, take notice, keep learning, creativity & play and give. Those in bold text have been found by the Children’s Society in their Good Childhood Report 2013 to be relevant for children. If we embrace these daily with children then they’ll develop good habits, growing up and maturing to be mentally and physically healthy. This is sure to impact their life chances.
Remember that relationship between well-being and life chances? Everyone’s life chances are affected by levels of self-esteem, self-confidence, perseverance, resilience, morale and relationships. Let’s use well-being initiatives for our children to grow these skills from a young age so that they’ll have a more positive outlook ahead of them.
*These social and emotional aspects of learning can be found in the Primary National Strategy’s core professional development materials Excellence and enjoyment: learning and teaching in the primary years (DfES 0518-2004-G). The SEAL curriculum resource provides additional support for schools that are using this learning and teaching framework. http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130401151715/https://www.education.gov.uk/publications/eOrderingDownload/SEAL%20Guidance%202005.pdf
** http://www.neweconomics.org/search?q=well+being&submit-btn=%E2%96%B6
