According to the Department of Health, over 15% of Hong Kong children have been identified as having developmental delays, including social and emotional difficulties. Children facing such challenges may struggle to understand their own and others’ emotions, express their feelings appropriately, regulate emotions toward positive goals, cope with changes, handle conflicts, follow rules, and get along with peers. There is therefore a need to provide support and services to meet the needs of children, their teachers, and their parents.

Since 2015, with the support of the Simon K.Y. Lee Children’s Fund,  Prof. Kevin Chung and Dr. Ian Lam, Centre for Child and Family Science, EdUHK, led the 3Es project- Early Prevention, Early Identification, and Early Intervention: A School‑Based Support Model of Social‑Emotional Development for Kindergarten Children® (3Es®). The project team has developed, evaluated, and disseminated the 3Es Programme: a school-based, social-emotional learning programme. Two evidence-based curricula for 4-6-year-olds (K2-K3 children) and 2-4-year-olds were tested using randomized, wait-list control trials, along with providing teacher and parental training workshops. Built around four core themes aligned with the Chinese virtues (四德) of Benevolence (仁), Righteousness (義), Propriety (禮), and Wisdom (智), the 3Es curricula help children understand others’feelings and intentions, engage in prosocial behavior, manage their emotions and actions, express themselves appropriately, and follow rules and classroom tasks. Evidence showed that through structured and gamified learning tasks, play-based activities, and storybooks, the 3Es curricula effectively improved children’s cognitive control, emotional expression, emotional management, empathy, and prosocial behavior, which, in turn, support improvements in early reading and numeracy skills. The 3Es project benefited more than 5,500 children, their parents, and teachers.

Since 2019, the 3Es curricula (for K2-K3 children) and the Chinese inventory of children’s socioemotional Competence (CICSEC) have been used by the Education Bureau as enrichment resources to promote the social-emotional competence of young children in Hong Kong (https://bit.ly/3E9q7f3). The Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK) also incorporated 3Es resources into its pre-service and in-service teacher courses and professional training programmes to promote children’s social-emotional competence.

Selected Publications:

張溢明、黃凱羚、林俊彬與鍾杰華（2026）。《3Es情+社親子秘笈——從休息到韌性——親子同行的4Rs練習》。香港： 香港教育大學兒童與家庭科學中心。

Ip, I. N., Li, X., Chow, P. H. T, Lam, C. B., & Chung, K. K. H. (2026). Adaptation and validation of the Chinese inventory of children’s socioemotional competence (CICSEC-N) among 2-year-old Chinese nursery children. Early Education and Development, 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2026.2618813.

Lam, C. B., Li, X., & Chung, K. K. H. (2024). Improving Chinese children’s socioemotional competence, behavioral adjustment, and pre-academic skills: Impacts of the 3Es program. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 68, 13–23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2024.03.002

Li, X., Lam, C. B., Chung, K. K. H., Cheung, R. Y. M., Leung, C., & Fung. W. K. (2020). Development and validation of the Chinese inventory of children’s socioemotional Competence (CICSEC), Early Education and Development, 31(6), 854–872. https://doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2020.1715735