Welcome to the SEAL Community!
Social and emotional learning helps children and young people to:
‘… learn how to communicate their feelings, set themselves goals and work towards them, interact successfully with others, resolve conflicts peaceably, control their anger and negotiate their way through the many complex relationships in their lives today and tomorrow’.
This kind of learning underpins positive behaviour and attitudes to learning, personal development and mental health and wellbeing. It is at the heart of PSHE, relationships and health education.
Research shows it also helps raise attainment. Social and emotional learning is attracting increasing attention in schools. On this website you will find age-related teaching resources and whole school frameworks to support your work.
Many of them come from the national ‘Social and emotional Learning’ (SEAL) initiative. By registering with us (which is free, quick and easy), you can immediately find and download all of the national SEAL curriculum materials and teacher guidance. There’s a progression in learning objectives that can be used in any school, and training materials if you want to introduce or refresh a whole-school SEAL approach. Click on National Resources then click the Getting Started with SEAL tab.
If you would like regularly updated teaching resources, you can also join our SEAL Community. Set up and supported by leading experts in the field, the SEAL Community is a not-for-profit organisation which aims to promote and develop SEAL through sharing news, practice, resources and expertise. Joining costs £30 for individuals, £75 for schools/settings and £100 for local authorities or other multi-school organisations. Click the Join button on this page to join.
News update
Next year’s Empathy Week will take place from to 10th to 14th March 2025. The theme is... 'What's Your Spark?' 💫.
More schools are 'off-rolling' weak pupils a few months before their GCSE exams in an attempt to protect overall results, according to a report ‘Suspending Reality’ ...
‘School is too much pressure’. More than half of young people taking part in a survey identified school as a contributing factor to poor mental health, including factors such as the stress, worry and fear they experienced in school, as well as ... 
Young Minds have released their latest wellbing Advent Calendars, for pupils and staff. Really useful . Find them here
Don't miss these primary assembly and teaching resources for World Kindness Day, developed by the National Literacy Trust in partnership with Pengion Random House and Charlie Mackesy, author of The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse. Find them at ...
Sharing practice
Watch this amazing film case study about how Matthew Moss High School have reshaped relationships and helped students (and adults) regulate their emotions and behaviour – by teaching staff and students about transactional analysis.
At Parkway Elementary School it looks like this..
Ladybridge High School have created a distinctive approach to personal development, in which learners can elect to visit the ‘Human Library’ during weekly 30-minute personal development time...
How about a cross-curricular module on stress, taking it beyond just PSHE? This is what they’ve done at an American high school... 
Anna Parker, an elementary school teacher at Lister Elementary School in Tacoma, Washington, asks students to rate problems on a scale from 1 to 5, and reflect on what sort of response each problem merits. Students discuss ...
Resource roundup
Here we have a 2024 collection of primary resources for work on change and transition, and here a new collection of primary and secondary resources for the start of the new school year in September. They are all about new beginnings and will really help build a sense of belonging and community from the start.
Looking ahead to the autumn and work on the Getting on and falling out/Learning to be together themes, have you seen the latest No Outsiders lesson plans? The brilliant Andrew Moffatt and his team have made more lesson plans for his scheme of work on identity, diversity, differences and prejudice. You can find the lessons on these links
We hope your school took part in Empathy Day on June 6th but if not you can still access all the resources.<
We liked this new GoNoodle video about combatting negative self-talk. Good to sing along to. It comes with useful lesson ideas .
You might want to have a look at the award-wining Ripple Effects for Teens, which delivers a highly tailored virtual SEL learning environment for secondary students.
Practical tools
This is a three minute film with good ideas for end-of-year activities to help students look back over challenges they faced, celebrate what they have achieved and set new intentions for next year.
Here are some great ideas from a blog by Stephanie Filio. She writes:
One of the easiest ways for teachers to incorporate mental health check-ins with their students is to rethink the way they use their entry and exit tickets. Exit tickets are classroom tools where students answer a couple of questions or provide a short answer before concluding class. Entry and exit tickets can be used together for data collection on student understanding, and they are typically quick assessments.
Try using ChatGPT to create lesson plans aligned to specific incidents or student needs.
Teaching children how to work together in groups is a big part of SEAL, as is promoting a sense of belonging in the class group. Using the Jigsaw technique will do both, helping learners get to know others outside their friendship group. Have a look at...
Everyone is talking about the post-COVID increase in attendance problems, and we’ve been thinking about the contribution that social and emotional learning can make to tackling the issue – particularly by creating a sense of belonging in school. You can read ...
New research
Social isolation and reduced access to services may have brought the experiences of traditionally advantaged groups closer to ch
Teenage boys were hit hardest by the Covid lockdowns, with their mental health not recovering despite the return to 'normality', according to the most comprehensive academic study of its kind. Previously, it was thought girls were worst affected by the pandemic. 
A survey of 2,594 primary students (aged 7 to 11) and 2145 secondary students , carried out by the organisation Embracing Differ
This new research shows that parents who express empathy toward their teenagers may give teens a head start in developing the skill themselves. In addition, adolescents who show empathy and support toward their friends are more likely to become supportive parents, which may foster empathy in their own offspring.
The Survey on Social and Emotional Skills (SSES) is an international survey designed to improve our understanding of students’ social and emotional skills, including how these skills relate to key life outcomes.
Sixteen sites, including six countries, took part in SSES 2023 - Bulgaria, Chile, Peru, Spain, Mexico, Ukraine, Bogotá (Colombia), Delhi (India), Dubai (United Arab Emirates), Emilia-Romagna (Italy), Gunma (Japan), Helsinki (Finland), Jinan (China), Kudus (Indonesia), Sobral (Brazil) and Turin (Italy).
Guess what? The UK declined to take part
Top resource
My Life on Fire by Cath How is a great book to use in upper KS2 to discuss and develop empathy.
We love this new book for children from EmpathyLab. Written by Rashmi Sirdeshpande, with stunning illustrations from Juliana Eigner, it gives young people concrete, fun, accessible ways to practice and build their empathy skills.
We’ve created three new resources, to support work on self-awareness/self-regulation
- A progression in vocabulary for describing emotions – words to teach from EYFS through to Year 7
- Twenty simple exercises to help children stay calm – a collection of breathing and relaxation exercises, with instructions and video links
- Top emotion check-ins – thirteen different ways for children to show how they are feeling at points during the day