Promoting Socio-Emotional Skills in School Children for Healthy Living

The present study was carried out in two cultural zones of Haryana state. One thousand children in the age group of 6–10 years, 500 children from each cultural zone were assessed for their social and emotional developmental status. On the basis of developmental scores, 20 per cent children with delayed socio-emotional development were selected. This sample of 200 children included 100 children from each cultural zone. Fifty children from each zone were taken as control group children and the other 50 children as experimental group children. Pre-testing results revealed no significant differences between control and experimental group children for social (t=2.20) and emotional (t=0.59) development. Class teachers of these children were trained in imparting the activities to promote social and emotional skills of these children with delayed milestones. Intervention package was imparted to experimental group children for a period of three months. After a gap of one month, control and experimental group children were post-tested for their socio-emotional developmental status. Results revealed that after exposure to intervention programme, socio-emotional status of experimental group improved significantly higher. Although developmental gain was also observed in control group childrensignificant improvement was observed for social (t=5.04*) and emotional (t=6.73*) development of children from both the cultural zones, the mean gain in developmental status of experimental group was significantly higher as t-values were highly significant for social (t=13.33*) and emotional (14.91*) domains of development.Thus, it can be interpreted from these findings that intervention programme helped in promoting socio-emotional skills of school children for healthy living. Good socio-emotional skills are predictors of positive mental health and social relations. This leads to healthy living. Findings of the present study have implications for children, parents, teachers and child care professionals.