A social enterprise providing education and information to protect and enhance the mental health of young people
In last week’s newsletter I wrote about the sense of relief that students feel upon the completion of their studies and how the media exacerbates this by reporting on the HSC every day. You can set your watch by it can’t you? Seriously. Well, twenty-four hours before NSW student sat for their first [...]
We all know the general message that "Student wellbeing is important as it impacts on their ability to learn and achieve." But just as wellbeing affects education, I believe it is crucially important to understand how education affects wellbeing. How we educate our students can have a direct impact on their wellbeing - and ours! It's [...]
How much sport should children do? One hour a week? Two? More? What parents believe their child ought to be doing is greatly influenced by their own experiences of sport, and as a PDHPE teacher I’m only too aware that sport isn’t necessarily everyone’s cup of tea. One of the messages we convey in our [...]
In an attempt to address bullying in schools, ClubsNSW are piloting Bully Check. This program involves those who apply for jobs with ClubsNSW in the Murray region, being investigated as to whether or not they were bullies at school. If they were, then ClubsNSW will not employ them. On the surface at least, this seems [...]
Paul Dillon, author of "Teenagers, Alcohol and Drugs"and Generation Next speaker says that in today's society children are introduced to drugs from an early age; if they have a cough we give then ‘medicine’ for it. So there is no reason why we can’t introduce the idea of drugs at an early age and build [...]
When psychiatrists, psychologists and other clinicians discuss the use and overuse of computer-based technologies in schoolchildren and young people, it is tempting to assume that there is a near-exclusive focus on the negative, pathological and undesirable aspects of this rapidly evolving domain. Such pop-cultural terms like ‘internet addiction’, ‘cyberbullying’ and ‘sexting’, seen in the media [...]
There is more to life than the cold numbers of GDP and economic statistics – This Index allows you to compare well-being across countries, based on 11 topics the OECD has identified as essential, in the areas of material living conditions and quality of life. via OECD – Your Better Life Index.
Approximately 5000 young people per year have their first contact with the juvenile justice system, but of particular concern is the rate of recidivism of those juveniles brought before the courts. Of the 4938 juveniles who came before NSW courts in 1999, over 2600 of them reoffended, on average four times before 2010. For Indigenous [...]
I read with interest this week an opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Herald by John Weekes, the headmaster of Knox Grammar. He was discussing the concept of Positive Education. Essentially, Positive Education embeds the tenets of Positive Psychology into the curriculum, both explicitly and implicitly.* Weekes says, “Our focus on academic outcomes such as [...]
Education has been widely documented by researchers as the single variable tied most directly to improved health and longevity. And when people are intensely engaged in doing and learning new things, their well-being and happiness can blossom. via Why Learning Leads to Happiness - chicagotribune.com.
