[School health promotion from Ottawa to today: opportunities and challenges]. / Schulische Gesundheitsförderung von Ottawa bis heute: Chancen und Herausforderungen.

A look back at the now 30-year history of school health promotion in Germany reveals lines of development that are helpful in understanding the past and that open the view for future opportunities and challenges. In this article, school health promotion will be considered from three perspectives: as a field of practice, a field of research, and a field of policy.In the practice field, health promotion in schools is confronted with a situation characterized by long-standing restrictions that have been imposed on students, teachers, and heads of schools. These measures are many and varied, but three forms of implementation that have developed from common roots can be identified: (a) behavioural approach, (b) health promoting school, and (c) good healthy school. "Health literacy" and the "health literate school" represent recent developments. In the research field, it is apparent that opportunities for evaluation are often underutilized, but in settings-based approaches they also face significant hurdles. However, in questions of dissemination and implementation strategies, which are further important research fields, clear progress has been made. In the policy field, important milestones have been set with the Preventive Care Act of 2015, the prevention guideline of the GKV (National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Funds), the recommendations of the KMK 2012 (Standing Conference of the Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs), and with the concept of the DGUV (German Social Accident Insurance) in 2013. School legislation of the federal states and the quality concepts of good schools show how health management can be linked with the educational quality management in schools.In conclusion, it is evident that a framework for school health promotion that would guide and link theory-based research and practice is still lacking.

[Game-based approaches to prevention and health promotion: serious games and gamification]. / Spielerische Ansätze in Prävention und Gesundheitsförderung: Serious Games und Gamification.

Digital game-based approaches can be used in the field of prevention and health promotion, for example to promote health-related information or to foster health behavior change. The two most relevant game approaches are "serious games" (games with a serious background) and "gamification" (the application of game-typical elements in nongame contexts). The term serious games is used to describe games that are used to convey serious content, such as health issues. Gamification uses game-design elements such as points, leaderboards, awards, profile design, and team events to increase motivation and performance, for example in learning environments. This narrative article examines the mode of action and study situation as well as the advantages and disadvantages of playful applications in prevention and health promotion and exemplifies some of these applications.Serious games and gamification show great potential in prevention and health promotion. Especially in the case of target groups that are difficult to reach and disinterested, a direct connection to their living environment can be established. The foundations for the effective use of playful approaches in the work and training of health professionals are their already high level of familiarity with the medium of games and that games directly address the basic psychological needs to increase motivation.

Enhancing the Emotional and Social Skills of the Youth to Promote their Wellbeing and Positive Development: A Systematic Review of Universal School-based Randomized Controlled Trials.

BACKGROUND: The acquisition of social and emotional skills is associated with positive youth development, character education, healthy lifestyle behaviours, reduction in depression and anxiety, conduct disorders, violence, bullying, conflict, and anger. School-based interventions aimed to enhance these skills go beyond a problem-focused approach to embrace a more positive view of health; they could also improve the youth's wellbeing. AIM: To describe the main features and to establish the effectiveness of universal school-based RCTs for children and the youth, aimed to promote their psychosocial wellbeing, positive development, healthy lifestyle behaviours and/or academic performance by improving their emotional and social skills. METHODS: Systematic review by searching for relevant papers in PubMed/Medline with the following key words: "mental health" OR "wellbeing" OR "health promotion" OR "emotional learning" OR "social learning" OR "emotional and social learning" OR "positive youth development" OR "life skills" OR "life skills training" AND "school". Interval was set from January 2000 to April 2014. RESULTS: 1,984 papers were identified through the search. Out of them 22 RCTs were included. While most interventions were characterized by a whole-school approach and SAFE practices, few studies only used standardized measures to assess outcomes, or had collected follow-up data after ≥ 6 months. The results of all these trials were examined and discussed. CONCLUSION: Universal school-based RCTs to enhance emotional and social skills showed controversial findings, due to some methodological issues mainly. Nevertheless they show promising outcomes that are relatively far-reaching for children and youth wellbeing and therefore are important in the real world.