Supporting the capacity for self regulation and the development of emotional intelligence in children, young people and their families

We are offering an online educational intervention called **Smart Brain Wise Heart** (2017) to teach self-regulation, stress management and emotional well-being. It has two streams to target children of different ages, their families, and our communities to prevent the onset of stress, anxiety and trauma triggered by the Corona pandemic.

The key ideas relate to the self-regulation of emotional / physiological arousal using activities that are fun, engaging and easy to follow. A psychologist supports the child and family to engage with the learning material and put it into practice together: review questions, key vocabulary, activity worksheets.

Practitioners use active participation to learn skills, movement activities and games to consolidate the learning and put it into practice. Each session ends with a learning based scenarios video that reinforces the key ideas from the unit. Action assignments are given as "homework" in between sessions to consolidate what participants have learnt and demonstrate to the practitioner that they have successfully achieved the goals of the previous session

The success of such programmes has already been extensively researched and developed. Bothe et al. (2014) studied the effectiveness of a school- based stress management and self- regulation programme similar to ours. The study showed a significant decrease in anxiety immediately after the completion of the programme and one year follow up in comparison with the control primary school children assessed.

We wish to offer this programme to people in isolation, those who may not have access to mental health services or those who are not considered a risk priority at the time. We aim to teach emotional intelligence through emotional regulation to reduce the development of trauma when individuals return to work and school. Criswell, Sherman and Krippner (2018) implemented a similar bio-psycho-social approach to reduce Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms in adults by teaching skills for future resilience in the face of stressors. Of the 26 adults that completed the programme only one returned to a PTSD diagnosis at a three month follow up.

It is now paramount to engage and support our communities with a programme that is accessible. along neurofeedback, cognitive behaviour therapy and family therapy this programme teaches a core competency for life, further ensuring our "wrap around the child" approach.