Student Wellbeing & Development
The Student Wellbeing program at The King David School teaches students important life skills over and above the prescribed curriculum. Wellbeing classes, incorporating The RULER Approach, give students the opportunity to have a more well rounded education, developing their emotional intelligence and helping them to succeed in the ‘real world’. The RULER approach has been developed by Dr Marc Brackett of Yale University and teaches emotional literacy skills that have a positive influence on personal development and academic achievement. Using the RULER approach means students are given the tools to Recognise, Understand, Label, Express and Regulate their emotions.
The importance of Wellbeing has been recognised by the School and all students have a “Wellbeing” class scheduled into their timetable each week.
In 2013 the program has started well with very forthright discussions in the various homerooms across the school as the students were encouraged to consider the following questions:
1. How do we want to feel in school each day?
2. What will we do to have these feelings consistently in order to create a positive learning environment?
3. How will we handle uncomfortable feelings and unwanted behaviours? How will we prevent and manage conflict?
Throughout the School, each class has created their own “wellbeing charter” which provides the answers generated and agreed upon by the class.
Psychological Services
The school psychologists are available to assist students with a wide range of problems including social, academic and familial. The psychologists all contribute to an atmosphere where students feel they can resolve problems, learn life skills and achieve academically. The School also offers special programs for the development of friendship skills as well as an extensive parent education program. The School has pro-active programs to deal with social issues, bullying and a wide range of other issues.
Learning Support
All students are assessed annually on reading comprehension, spelling and mathematics. These results are used to monitor progress as well as help to ascertain which students require extra assistance or enrichment. If a student requires extra assistance he or she will receive one-on-one or small group sessions, depending on the student’s needs and to assist in remediating the problem.