Skip navigation

SEAL

…teaching pupils how to understand their feelings and those of others, persevere when things become difficult, resolve conflict and manage worries…

We have a fantastic SEAL resource available on CD ROM for schools. It combines all the published SEAL resources including Family SEAL. The material has been organised by theme and by year group to make it easier for teachers to use. The CD also contains some superb PSHE / SEAL mapping and planning tools. Send us an email or ring us on 01209 310061 for a copy of the CD ROM or download the SEAL and PSHE mapping tools.

Education is increasingly recognising the fundamental importance of SEAL to learning and achievement in school. "Social, emotional and behavioural skills underlie almost every aspect of school, home and community life, including effective learning and getting on with other people. They are fundamental to school improvement." (SEAL Guidance, DfES 1378-2005.)

There has been an increasing interest in helping children develop good self-esteem and emotional literacy to help them make the most of their learning opportunities. Schools have become more and more interested in Circle Time as one way to help deliver this area of the curriculum and in Protective Behaviours as way of helping children develop the skills to help keep themselves safe.

A major research report, published by the DfES in 2003, looked at the importance of developing children's social and emotional competence and wellbeing. This led to the development of the outstandingly successful Behaviour and Attendance Pilot and the SEBS pilot project. From this stemmed the SEAL materials.

One of the key findings of the research was:

"Programmes which attempt to build social and emotional competences must include extensive, routinised, regular and predictable work to develop specific skills across the curriculum, and reinforce these skills by pupils' real life experiences across the whole school."

This is exactly what SEAL aims to do.

A further report on the pilot programme published in 2006 is already describing the impact SEAL is already having on behaviour and attendance, emotional literacy in pupils and parental involvement.

An introduction to SEAL

The SEAL resource aims to provide schools and settings with an explicit, structured whole-curriculum framework for developing all children's social, emotional and behavioural skills. (SEAL Guidance DfES 1378-2005)

What are the social and emotional aspects of learning?

It may be helpful to consider five broad social and emotional aspects of learning:

  • self-awareness
  • managing feelings
  • motivation
  • empathy
  • social skills.

These fall into two categories: the personal (for example self-awareness) and the inter-personal (for example social skills). The knowledge, skills and understanding developed by the SEAL resource. (Appendix 1 of the SEAL Guidance DfES 1378-2005).

You can download all the new SEAL (formerly SEBS) curriculum materials and background information at the Behaviour and Attendance website.

The relationship between SEAL, PSHEE and Healthy Schools 

The government has issued a short paper on the relationship between SEAL, PSHEE and Healthy Schools highlighting the common approaches of the three programmes and showing that they make a major contribution to schools' achievement of the Every Child Matters outcomes as well as statutory responsibilities. Download the paper.