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Your opinion counts in helping to create positive teaching and learning communities where student wellbeing is a high priority. 465 of you filled in this survey - many thanks! We will publish the results soon ...

The Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AISTL) has released a draft Australian Charter for the Professional Learning of Teachers and School Leaders. The Charter focuses on improving teacher and school leader professional practice through ongoing professional learning, directly assessing and supporting the National Professional Standards for Teachers and Principals.

Updates from the Vajrayana Institute on the September Mind and its Potential conference in November: contains many useful links ...

There are only a few more days left to comment on the General Capabilties consultation.  If you haven't already, go to: http://consultation.australiancurriculum.edu.au/

The Centre for Analysis of Educational Futures at Flinders University has published a large volume of materials on the evaluation of aspects of the KidsMatter programs. The papers are all available at the CAEF KidsMatter Evaluation website. Download the Evaluation Report Executive Summary here (1MB pdf): kidsmatter-exec-summary-report

How many times have you seen a story about a high-performing school and thought to yourself, "That's nice for them, but I couldn't possibly do that given the constraints at my school."

The George Lucas Educational Foundation website, Edutopia, has a section called Schools That Work, which publishes stories and articles on how you can do that. The latest report shows how a rural school district in northwest Georgia transformed the way its students learn, using the inspiration and mentorship provided by San Diego's acclaimed High Tech High.

ECA WebWatch is an eclectic mix of the best websites and information on:

• early childhood development, growth and learning
• early childhood practice, programs and policy
• emerging issues and research.

It's an easy way to stay interested and up-to-date ... and it's free.

Researchers from the Cooperative Research Centre for Young People, Technology and Wellbeing supported a group of young people as they developed and delivered a cybersafety education workshop for a group of parents with teenage children. This research demonstrated that young people are much better equipped to deal with online risks than adults assume and that young people themselves are the most valuable resource for adults concerned about the online safety of their children. The interactive media release is available here: http://www.interactivemediarelease.com/ogilvy/yawcrc. It contains short explanatory videos and links to the research reports.

The Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth (ARACY) has started a regular blog on Social and Emotional Development "to exchange information, post relevant research and reports and share their ideas and expertise on how we can better meet the social and emotional developmental needs of children and young people."

The Spring 2009 Wellbeing Australia newsletter includes an invitation to a breakfast in National Child Protection Week early September and encouragement to complete a survey linked to the prevention of child abuse. You will also find information on other organisations promoting wellbeing, upcoming conferences, cyber safety and a new circle time trainer program.  Feel free to distribute.

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare have released a report entitled "Making progress: the health, development and wellbeing of Australia's children and young people" You can download specific sections from this website.

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.

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