Pyramid Club: Effectiveness in Promoting Social Emotional Competence and Wellbeing in Primary Aged Children

In line with Every Child Matters: Change for Children, 2003 and The Children's Act, 2004, 'Promoting Children's Mental Health & Well-Being' has now become a National Priority.

Precedence is being given to the commissioning of services which address the five outcomes for children and young people, particularly in tackling barriers impeding the social inclusion of those who are most vulnerable.

One such group is children who are experiencing social, emotional and behaviour difficulties (SEBD). Children with SEBD are among the groups of children that teachers and other professionals working in schools and LEAs find most difficult to include (Evans & Lunt, 2002).

Children need relationships and friendships to develop social skills and to provide the context for social, emotional and cognitive development (Gifford-Smith & Brownell, 2003). Increasing isolation from one's peer group can lead to increasing despair and bad feelings about oneself which are then reflected in behaviour (Newton et al., 1996). Indeed, children who are socially isolated from their peers are a vulnerable group in schools (Wentzel & Asher, 1995).

The need to develop and evaluate interventions aimed at promoting social-emotional health and inclusion has been strongly argued (Stallard et al., 2007).

One of the longest established primary school based social emotional interventions within the UK is the Pyramid Club. Limited systematic information on the effectiveness of this intervention has led to the current exploration.

The study compared the changes which took place in an experimental group who received the intervention (n=33) and a control group (n=39) using measures to assess social, emotional and behavioural competence, self-esteem, loneliness and social dissatisfaction, inclusion and class ethos. These measures were obtained at two time periods, pre and post intervention.

Results obtained on outcome measures show changes that were statistically significant for improving social emotional difficulties and reducing loneliness and social dissatisfaction.

These significant statistical results provide promising findings in support of the Pyramid Club intervention for socially isolated primary aged children.

However, no significant changes in inclusion, both in terms of peer acceptance and self perception of social acceptance was found.

In addition no significant changes were found for self esteem or class ethos.

Future replication studies with larger samples may help to ascertain the extent to which Pyramid Club can contribute to evidence-based practice with socially isolated primary aged children.