Strengths

 

Research shows that character strengths can help children succeed at school and in life. Strengths are the positive qualities individuals have, as reflected in their thoughts, feelings, and actions. They promote the well-being of themselves and others. 

Have a watch of our latest little vignette - this time an introduction to Character Strengths 

Positive Emotions: Identifying emotions, what makes us feel those and noticing when other people are feeling them

We have been spending a lot of time in Autahi talking about different emotions, what kind of emotions they are, how we can tell when someone is feeling a certain way, what makes us feel these emotions and what we can do when we need to shake off a not as pleasant emotion.  

We looked at different emotions and sorted them onto a grid looking at the energy and pleasantness of the emotion.
Then we played a game with our Empathy boots where we had to step into the boots, act out an emotion and the rest of us had to guess which emotion we were seeing.

We have been doing some writing about what things make us feel emotions from the different quadrants.

Here is some writing about emotions in the Blue zone
 

 

Here is some writing about emotions from the Red Zone
 
 

Here is some writing from the Green Zone
 
 

Savouring

"Savouring is the capacity to attend to, appreciate and enhance the positive experiences in one’s life. (Hefferon and Boniwell, 2011). Take a walk with nature, enjoy a meal with friends or sleep in late on a cold Sunday morning. The important point is to be present in the moment, grateful for the experience and to use all of your senses to develop a heightened awareness of how that moment makes you feel. In-the-moment present mindedness allows us to take a more detailed mental photograph that we can relive or share with others at a later time.  Research tells us that people reporting higher levels of gratitude levels experience lower levels of envy and depression, improved social integration, increased life satisfaction, and increased academic performance (Froh, et al., 2010). Allowing yourself these little moments of happiness can have a big impact on your wellbeing." (Institute of Positive Education  Tara Clark)

In Autahi we have been exploring the idea of savouring a little bit.  We started by thinking about a memory from our holiday that we really enjoyed, that brought us happiness, calm, joy or excitement.  Then we did some art representing that memory, thinking about capturing the moment.  We then wrote about the moment.  Next we shared our happy memories and then we practised visualising the moments.  We closed our eyes, pictured where we were, who we were with, what we could see around us and what emotions we and the others were feeling.  After doing this everyone in the class reported back that they were feeling happier in that moment.  

Have a look at our savoured moments.

We are working hard to stop, breathe and appreciate the small moments.  Even stopping for an aesthetic break to appreciate our beautiful surroundings helps to increase our gratitude and overall wellbeing.  Have a think about the last time you stopped to do this and if it's been a while, we encourage you to give it a try today! 

Swimming: Positive Health and so much more!

Positive Health: The Positive Health domain focuses on supporting students and staff to develop sustainable habits for optimal physical and psychological health. With the inextricable link between physical and psychological health, we know that practising mindfulness and resilience techniques will promote greater health outcomes. Mindfulness and resilience are also supported by the quest to help students to develop broader healthy behaviours in terms of exercise, nutrition, and sleep. (Geelong Grammar School)

As we know, physical wellbeing is a huge part of our overall wellbeing, and if we can do things that are good for our bodies and health, we can get closer to flourishing.  One of the ways we focus on our Positive Health this term is through swimming, not only does it improve our physical fitness, but it also tests our bravery, resilience and mindfulness.  

We're a bit scared, can we get in the pool anyway? We're afraid of swimming from one platform to the other and we didn't make it the whole way last time, can we keep trying anyway?  We are in the water, can we savour the feeling we have and be present with our instructors? These are all the things we are talking about before and after swimming.  

Today we did a little bit of talking about 2 things:

*What emotions swimming makes us feel 

*What strengths we have to use when we're swimming

Then we did some writing about it.  Take a look at our fantastic writing (and might I add, that all of the kids implored such impressive growth mindsets around their writing, not giving up and giving their ideas a go!)    

I walked the whole way to the platform in the pool. But it was hot!

I went in the pool!

I was scared because I was under the water in the deep water! Eeek!

I was the fastest swimmer in the pool.  I passed Mackenzie and I was the fastest.

I can swim faster than I used to!

I did not go into the pool because I was sick.

I am swimming!

I was scared for the first time and then I got brave.

I felt happy when I got in the pool.   

I stepped back and I fell in the deep end and I was brave!

I like to do floating in the pool.

I swam all the way in the water.  I was happy.

I am floating on my back in the pool.  It was deep. (Not written here, but discussed that he had to use bravery because the water was so deep.)

So there you have it,  the intersection of positive health, positive emotions, character strengths and literacy.  Our experience of swimming is helping us to grow our positive health and we used those experiences to unpack our emotions, think about what character strengths we need and which we used and that gave us purpose for our writing!