June 2009 Archives

According to a new UK Ofsted report, excluding young children just passes on the problem - children need connection, not exclusion. It's a challenging notion for many teachers but we need to think through how to intervene to promote positive cycles of resilience and pro-social behaviour, not reinforce negative behaviours.

The Director of Education at Ofsted, UK Miriam Rosen, was on BBC Radio talking about their report and said that Nurture Groups were an effective strategy to prevent exclusions and a positive way to work with children.  There are items on the Times and BBC online news sites.

Our focus is on how to build friendly and safe school communities rather than addressing the problems of individual bullies and those that are bullied. Wellbeing Australia takes the view that bullying will only be properly addressed when whole school / whole class policy and practice support students (and others in the community) supporting each other. 

The focus is on children, education and developing resilient communities.

The new Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians can be downloaded here (pdf). The supercedes the 1999 Adelaide Declaration and is an important document which emphasises both excellence and equity.

Downloadable pdf copies of past newsletters.

A collection of reports on past, present and ongoing work in the field.

Forthcoming relevant events: please add to this list through the Comments.

A selection of useful programs, resources and materials for promoting wellbeing.

These texts either outline theory or look at ways in which social and emotional literacy might be put into practice. You are invited to submit reviews / comments or suggestions for inclusion.

A selection of useful articles on different aspects of wellbeing, including the recent special edition of the British Psychological Society's Journal Educational and Child Psychology.

Useful national and international links to other sites. Also see the All about Bullying and All about Resilience pages.

Response Ability has developed a wonderful resource entitled Children and Young People's Wellbeing: An Educators Guide. Click here, scroll down the page and you will see where you can download this excellent 6 page document. This organisation has been set up for tertiary educators and has many useful publications and resources to promote wellbeing.

The Gatehouse project has some excellent resources for both planning and implementing social and emotional learning in your school. Click on this link to download.

Click on the following link to find the resources provided for the UK SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning) Primary Strategy.

This network is interested in how we develop our understanding of ourselves and our relationships with others to promote mutual well being and healthier, more compassionate societies. This involves promoting relational values, focusing on emotional literacy and building resilience.

Wellbeing Australia is concerned with discovering what this means for different people, exploring ideas and sharing good practice. We hope that individuals, schools, organisations and communities will send information about what they are doing and what has helped them move forward. This will build a bank of knowledge, resources and ideas that will support and facilitate social capital across the region.

Wellbeing Australia is informally led by an Advisory Group, currently 14 people, who meet regularly to discuss how we can promoting wellbeing initiatives in Australia. Short bios of those 14 can be seen at the link below.

Inspiring stories from some of our members. Add your own in the Comments ...

Respect in Education: The Challenge of Emotional Literacy in Practice

The concept of emotional literacy in education is developing as schools take on board a range of initiatives which promote constructive relationships and the knowledge and skills which underpin these.

Planting the Peace Virus

Robyn Hromek

This book describes a systematic whole-school approach to creating an ethos of non-violence in primary schools. It is based largely on a program implemented at Byron Bay PS for which the school received an anti-violence award. Evaluation of the program indicated that violence and harassment declined and after several years was rare. The 'peace virus' had grown.

Mentoring programs to increase emotional literacy

Alison Soutter
NSW Department of Education and Training

Restorative Practices - Building Connectedness and Fostering Emotional Literacy.

Peta Blood
Circle Speak

Review of Roslyn Arnold (2005) Empathic Intelligence: Teaching, learning, relating. Sydney: UNSW Press