R U OK? Day is a national day of action dedicated to encouraging all Australians to ask family, friends and colleagues ‘Are you OK?‘ The day is held on the second Thursday of September (13 September in 2018). R U OK? Day is designed to target the whole population, to help all people understand the role they…
Helping Children Cope With Loss by Leah Davies
The death of a parent, family member, friend or even a pet can be devastating to a child. Parental separation, divorce, relocation, illness or accident may be traumatic as well. Yet, there are actions teachers and school counselors can take to help children cope with loss. When working with hurting children, remember, they do not…
5 Ways to Combat Teacher Stress by Craig Kemp
Humour / Laughter I am a huge believer in bringing fun to my lessons and this is the major reason I don’t ‘stress out’ in my classroom. I believe that laughter is the best medicine – it always makes me feel better and a happy classroom reduces my stress! Research shows that laughter releases natural feel good…
Small Acts Create Big Ripples By Mandy Napier
Everyone in life needs help from time to time. Many people are afraid to ask for help. Some are too proud. Others have had experiences resulting in them placing a negative meaning on asking for help. However, asking for help can be beneficial for both parties – the helper and the beneficiary. Many people, do…
Getting Feedback From Your Students
Getting feedback from your students can help identify where you should focus your attention to improve your practice. If what you are doing in the classroom is not working from the student’s perspective, then making some changes is likely to be beneficial (for them AND for you). If students are disengaged, for whatever reason, they…
Life Balance: Myth or Possibility?
Stress is a fact of life, but it doesn’t have to be a way of life! How long have we talked about needing life balance and at that same time BEEN doing everything we can to go faster and to do more! At work and at home, people expect to do more with less and…
Helping Others Boosts Your Mood
We know that doing something to help others can make us feel good. Engaging in acts of kindness is one of the more reliable ways of boosting our mood. This is no surprise. But the science of positive psychology has furthered our understanding with these research findings on the impact of acts of kindness on…
10 Keys to Happier Living
Working in schools can sometimes feel as though we are running on a never-ending treadmill, constantly in pursuit of the lifestyle we aspire to. At times it can feel like our work is not appreciated. The website ActionForHappiness.org provides the following guidance on 10 keys to happier living. Awareness – Taking time to switch off…
Look After Your Health
Working in schools can be demanding for a number of reasons. Working with people can be stressful because at times they can be unpredictable. We never quite know what is going on in somebody else’s world. Whether we work in the school office, tuckshop, library, classroom or other area of the school, we can at…
4 Stress Busting Tools
What’s Important? We all lead busy lives and despite our character traits, our dominant brain hemisphere’s and our ability to handle pressure, we ALL suffer stress in some form or other at different times. If you feel as though you are becoming overwhelmed from a work perspective – STOP! No, we don’t expect you to down…