Introduction
What is new about SEAL and how does it build on what is already in place?
Schools have for some time included work on social and emotional issues in the curriculum (e.g. PSHE, citizenship, drama and the arts) and helped pupils reflect on the importance of good social and emotional skills. They might already have been doing much to promote social and emotional learning through the whole-school environment, their approach to spiritual, moral, social and cultural development, or the framework of the National Healthy Schools Programme. Or they may be promoting pupils' skill development through other initiatives such as circle time, peer mediation or restorative justice approaches. The approach taken in SEAL builds upon this important work, recognising that skills are grounded in people’s understandings, values and attitudes, and are not just demonstrable behavioural outcomes, divorced of context and meaning. It encourages deeper understanding through enquiry, uses concrete examples and promotes learning through the stages of skill development that includes identification, modelling, coaching, feedback, practice, reflection, consolidation, internalisation and generalisation. The intention is to provide pupils and staff with a more flexible repertoire of skills so they can take more control of their lives by actually being able to do things differently, if they choose to, as well as understanding why they should.
The learning model used in SEAL provides a comprehensive approach with opportunities to learn the same set of skills explicitly through direct and focused teaching and learning, and implicitly when they live and interact with the social, emotional and physical environment.
1.4.2 Activity