Social and Emotional Education in Primary School ― Integrating Theory and Research into Practice

This book synthesizes concepts, findings, and best practices for a complete guide to planning, implementing, and evaluating social and emotional education (SEE) programs. Emphasizing "caught" as well as taught lessons, it offers a whole-school framework for SEE, with content, rationales, assessment tools, and age-appropriate strategies. Interventions are also included for use across subjects, to engage learners and assist students with behavioral and emotional difficulties. And the lessons travel beyond the classroom, involving the whole school, families and communities.

Key areas of coverage include:

• How SEE can be taught and assessed as a core competence.
• Classroom and whole school frameworks to enhance SEE.
• Examples of targeted interventions for at-risk students.
• Techniques for enlisting parents and communities in supporting SEE.
• A complete online set of SEE class and homework activities.

Social and Emotional Education in Primary School is an essential resource for scientist-practitioners, educators, and other professionals as well as researchers and graduate students in special and general education, child and school psychology, educational psychology, social work, positive psychology, and family-related fields.

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“This book cogently summarizes the latest advances in research, theory, and practice for educators who promote the social, emotional, and academic learning of primary-school students. It provides practical tools and strategies that teachers, administrators, and student support staff can apply in daily instruction and programming to enhance students' optimal development and academic performance.”

Roger P. Weissberg, President and CEO, Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL)

“This extraordinarily compact and valuable book integrates the best available theory, research, and practice internationally and services as an essential resource for practitioners, researchers, and policy makers. It is rare indeed that one book, in relatively few pages, can accomplish all of these goals. But Carmel Cefai has done so.”

Maurice Elias, Director Rutgers Social-Emotional Learning Lab, Rutgers University, NJ, .

“This book breathes life and vitality into the journey for researchers, teachers, and anyone undertaking the challenge of helping young people flourish in academically and socially competent and resilient ways in this modern world.”

Phillip Slee, Professor in Human Development, Flinders University, South Australia.

Carmel Cefai, Ph.D., CPsychol., is the Director of the European Centre for Resilience and Health, and Head of the Department of Psychology, at the University of Malta, Malta. He is founding Honoury co-Chair of the European Network for Social and Emotional Competence (ENSEC) and joint editor of the International Journal of Emotional Education. For a number of years he also worked as a school teacher and educational psychologist. He leads a number of international projects on social and emotional education, mental health and resilience in schools, and has numerous publications in the area, including the popular Promoting Resilience in the Classroom: A Guide to Developing Pupils Emotional and Cognitive Skills (2008).

Valeria Cavioni, Ph.D., is an educational psychologist in Italy, and she’s currently collaborating in research and teaching with the Department of Brain and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Pavia in Italy. She is also involved in research projects on wellbeing with the European Centre for Resilience and Health at the University of Malta. Her field of research is social and emotional learning and emotional wellbeing in nursery and primary schools, and she is presently working on evidence-based programs in this area. She has published various scientific papers, book chapters and participated in numerous conferences on social and emotional development in childhood.