1st

school in the UK to introduce happiness and wellbeing to the curriculum

Our Wellbeing Programme

The Wellbeing programme is based on the principle in Virtue Ethics that there are habits, skills or virtues of living well as humans and that over time, with the right encouragement, we can hone those skills so that our lives become focused on the pursuit of the good: both for ourselves and others. The Wellbeing lessons cover a variety of aspects of what it means to be human and using knowledge from disciplines such as Philosophy, Psychology, The Sciences as well as wider human wisdom, aim to help pupils have time and space to reflect on what it means to be human.

The Wellbeing programme also covers the mandatory Relationships and Sex Education as set out by the Department for Education.

The course is based on six key elements:

  1. Physical health
  2. Human relationships (including ethics)
  3. Perspective (developing a psychological immune system)
  4. Engagement
  5. The world (living sustainably in a consumer culture)
  6. Meaning and purpose

All pupils in their first four years at Wellington have Wellbeing on their timetable for one lesson per fortnight, rising to two lessons per fortnight in the Fourth Form, where we cover a lot of ground on Relationships and Sex Education. Each lesson focuses on something practical or theoretical which pupils can incorporate into their lives to increase their wellbeing; from finding ways of improving sleep hygiene to thinking about how we establish boundaries in our personal relationships or how we go about capitalising on our ethical and moral resources to pursue a good life.

For more information on the ideas underpinning the teaching of Wellbeing at Wellington, see Learning to Ride Elephants (second edition) by Ian Morris, our Head of Wellbeing.

"Wellington College leads the way in Wellbeing. Head of Wellbeing, Ian Morris, has developed an award-winning teaching programme that covers a lot of ground from relationships, physical health and sex education to perspective, meaning and purpose."

Absolutely Berkshire

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