ABSTRACT
Society has become increasingly focused on the promotion of children’s mental health as an antidote to what is viewed as a rising tide of social and public health issues. In children and young people these are manifest as violence, bullying, underage pregnancy, suicide, or drug and alcohol use. Nationally and internationally schools are identified as one of the priority sites for the promotion of children’s emotional health and well-being, and teachers as the most appropriate carriers of knowledge, skills and awareness to address such problems. In each of the four nations of the UK the approach has been to isolate an element within the curricula that aims to address the social and emotional development of children and youth. This element of the curriculum or discrete ‘subject area’ generally goes under the heading of personal and social education or PSE 1 but has a different nomenclature across England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
