Building Inner Strength: The Samsung Welfare Foundation’s Early Childhood Program

This summary was prepared by ChatGPT based on a presentation by the Samsung Welfare Foundation.

The Samsung Welfare Foundation’s early childhood program, Building Inner Strength, helps young children understand their emotions, regulate their responses, and recover from difficulties. Through breathing, movement, play, and creative expression, children develop self-awareness, emotional resilience, and confidence.

The program includes 27 activities for children aged four and five. Fourteen activities help children become calm through breathing, body awareness, and physical movement. The remaining thirteen encourage planning, cooperation, creativity, gratitude, emotional expression, and child-led rule-making.

The program runs for 18 weeks for three-year-olds and 26 weeks for four- and five-year-olds. Breathing is practised every day as a foundational activity, while other exercises are naturally incorporated into classroom play and daily routines.

Research presented by the program indicates that participating children’s inner-strength scores increased by 0.193, compared with 0.039 among children who did not participate. This represents approximately five times greater growth. The reported effect size was 0.64 for the participating group and 0.13 for the non-participating group.

The program also benefits educators. As teachers model emotional awareness and participate in the activities, they become more relaxed and positive in the classroom. In this way, the program creates a supportive environment in which children and teachers can strengthen their emotional well-being together.