St Peter's RC Primary

Dill Road, Aberdeen, AB24 2XL, 01224 483217, stpeters.enquiries@ab-ed.org

P7 2024-2025

Roots of Empathy

Carolyn Kelman

Overview 2024/2025

We have recently completed our third year delivering the Roots of Empathy programme at St. Peter’s R.C. Primary School.

Roots of Empathy is an evidence based programme which has been proven to reduce aggression, increase sharing, caring, and inclusion, and promotes resilience, well-being, and positive mental health. 

This year the Junior Programme was delivered to our Primary 7 class. Our Roots of Empathy family was Baby Zumar and his mum, Anika. Baby Zumar’s sister is a pupil here at St. Peter’s and Anika was happy to commit to the nine class room visits during the course of the school year.

There are nine themes that we learn about throughout the year: 

  1. Meeting The Baby
  2. Crying
  3. Caring And Planning For Baby
  4. Relationships
  5. Sleep
  6. Safety
  7. Communicating
  8. Who Am I?
  9. Goodbye And Good Wishes

Through guided observation our pupils label the baby’s feelings and intentions, learning both the affective aspect (emotion) and the cognitive aspect of empathy (perspective-taking). 

Emotional literacy develops as children begin to identify and label the baby’s feelings, reflect on and understand their own feelings, which in turn helps them to understand the feelings of others!

Over the past three years our classes have enjoyed learning from their ‘Tiny Teacher’ and have developed empathy, compassion and understanding through this experience. They celebrate when the baby achieves a milestone e.g. sitting up, growing a tooth, crawling and understand that every baby is different, we all develop at our own pace.

Theme 1: Meeting Baby

Theme 5: Sleep

Next Year:

We are hoping to continue to deliver the programme next year as we recognise the benefits that Roots of Empathy can bring to the classroom. 

In order to do so, we are looking for a new Roots of Empathy family. Our baby must be aged between two and four months old when the programme begins (September / October), and available to visit us on nine separate occasions. If you would like more information please contact Mrs Kelman or ask at the school office. Thank you in advance!