Happiness Curriculum

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Imagine children from childcare through 8th grade developing the skills to cultivate greater happiness in life. What a wonderful idea to introduce happiness, to accept that one can adapt and change the mindset to BE HAPPIER.

This is the reality at 1,030 schools in India, where a government-sponsored happiness curriculum has reached 800,000 students since 2018.

In daily half-hour happiness classes, students learn from teachers and engage in games, storytelling, guided mindfulness practices, and role-playing. Each child is encouraged to reflect on their feelings, thoughts, and behaviors, and how these impact their day-to-day lives, their families, society, and the natural environment.

What a wonderful idea! What’s there to lose, besides a lot of unhappy future adults.

Social-Emotional-Learning short SEL. Who would have thought this could be needed?

How do you teach happiness? If you think about it, that’s a tall order and sums up what we seem to be missing right now. If we look around, we see a lot of unhappy people in the virtual world and in the real world. So many seem to be stuck in the past, unable to move forward, paralyzed by past events, and held captive by negative thoughts and events.

Too many of us are hiding behind a happy mask online, but feel empty and lonely in real life. So many seem to be full of hate, and others are afraid to speak up.

What does Social-Emotional learning SEL mean to teachers who have taught the happiness classes and students who have participated? What does happiness look and feel like to them? 

Students learning mindful digital engagement,  contemplative ecological education, the integration of mindfulness and social justice, and the use of contemplative practices to reduce racial bias among teachers.

Mindfulness! How important it is. Social justice is for many just a dream.

According to a recent Gallup poll, unhappiness – in the form of growing anger, stress, sadness, and worry – has been on the rise globally for more than a decade. Global leaders are more focused on gross domestic product (GDP) than on how people are feeling.

The emphasis on happiness education in India demonstrates a growing concern related to mental health overall, with other countries, including Bhutan, Mexico, and Peru experimenting with similar initiatives. Various Indian educational policies (including the new National Education Policy) have highlighted a broader vision for education emphasizing social-emotional learning and well-being. The happiness curriculum was launched in the presence of the Dalai Lama, an outspoken advocate for educating the heart.

Educating the heart! Oh, how needed it is.

The happiness curriculum may be one of the largest – if not the largest – rollout of a curriculum of this nature in the Global South. Teaching happiness, and peacebuilding so their relations with others, families, and community members are more empathic and compassionate.

A happiness study, what a brilliant idea!