All schoolchildren should have "happiness" lessons up to the age of 18 to combat growing levels of depression, according to a senior government adviser. "Pupils should study subjects such as how to manage feelings, attitudes to work and money, channeling   negative emotions and even how to take a critical view of the media," said Lord Richard Layard, a Labor peer and professor of economics at the London School of Economics. The proposal comes only days after the Government said that lessons in manners--including respect for the elderly and how to say "please" and "thank you"--should be taught in secondary schools to combat bad behavior. Lord Layard, the director of the wellbeing program at the LSE's Center for Economic Performance, said: "Learning hard things takes an enormous amount of practice. To play the violin well takes 10,000 hours of practice. How can we expect people to learn to be happy without large amounts of practice and repetition?" It is believed that at least two percent of British children under 12 now struggle with significant depression. Among teenagers, the figure rises to five percent. A UNICEF study involving 21 developed countries showed that British children were the least satisfied with their lives, while the World Health Organization predicts that childhood psychiatric   disorders will rise by 50 percent by 2020. In a speech at Cambridge University, Lord Layard said the Government's lessons in manners did not go far enough. "We need a commitment to producing a major specialism in this area, with a serious teacher training program," he said. However, happiness lessons have been criticized by academics. Frank Furedi, a sociology professor at Kent University and author of Therapy Culture, said: "In pushing emotional literacy, what some teachers are really doing is abandoning teaching. They are giving up and talking about emotions instead, so that children value all this non-discipline-led activity more than maths, English or science. What is amazing about this is that time and time again, research says that it does not work." Frank Furedi believes that   _  .
happiness lessons should be taught to children happiness lessons are just a waste of time formal teaching can go side by side with happiness lessons formal teaching should not give way to happiness lessons