A Social-Emotional Learning CurriculumFor children ages 3 - 6+ years including Foundation/Prep years
This program teaches the positive attitudes and social-emotional skills that develop young children's resilience, confidence, persistence, organisation and getting along. A team of teachers experienced in social-emotional learning along with Professor Michael Bernard have contributed many new lessons.
This extremely popular program has two short animations which introduce young children to Ricky Resilience, Connie Confidence, Pete Persistence, Oscar Organisation and Gabby Get Along.
The program includes:
It also includes a Survey of Young Children's Social and Emotional Skills covering different aspects of
A summary profile is also provided.
Ideal for surveying all students or at-risk students during the middle of the school year and at the end. Great source of information for parent-teacher conferences.
The Program Achieve Early Childhood is part of You Can Do It! Education Program Achieve. Please see our separate catalogue listings for social and emotional curriculum Program Achieve Primary (years 1 – 6) and Program Achieve Secondary (years 7-10).
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A Social-Emotional Learning Curriculum
The NEW Program Achieve Primary curricula contain lessons that teach attitudes, values/character strengths and social-emotional skills for success, relationships and wellbeing as well as for overcoming social-emotional blockers.
A scope and sequence has been developed based on this framework covering 8 lessons for each of four terms across years 1 to 6 (192 lessons).
The 32 lessons at each year level are organised to be delivered across four terms and cover the following topics:
1. Achievement: Work Confidence (growth mindset), Persistence, Organisation and Teamwork
2. Relationships: Values, Character Strengths and Getting Along Skills
3. Well-being. Resilience and Happiness (awareness, self-management, ABCs of emotions, cognitive restructuring, mindfulness) and
4. Social-Emotional Blockers: awareness and management of anger, not paying attention, procrastination, worry, feeling down.
Program Achieve has been recognised by the Australian government’s KidsMatter Mental Health and Wellbeing initiative as being a ‘best practice’ program meeting all essential criteria including evidence from research of effectiveness.
Lessons have been created based on the following framework.
Each social-emotional learning lesson addresses one or more aspects of the ACARA national curriculum's Personal and Social Capabilities.
The New Program Achieve curriculum has been written by 10 highly experienced teachers in social and emotional learning, along with Professor Michael Bernard.
Each lesson begins with a statement of Learning Intentions and Success Criteria followed by a lesson plan that includes the following elements:
1. Engage students
2. Share learning intentions and success criteria
3. Explicit teaching
4. Student activities
5. Students demonstrate success criteria and reflect
6. Weekly goal setting challenge
7. Coaching Points for the Week
This program is available online with teachers accessing digital lessons and being able to download Teacher Guides and Student Worksheets and a set of five hand puppets featured in the YCDI! Early Childhood Program Achieve (2nd Edition): Connie Confidence, Pete Persistence, Oscar Organisation, Gabby Get Along, Ricky Resilience
"We have found the You Can Do It program to be of even greater relevance during the COVID-19 remote learning period, in supporting the emotional wellbeing and resilience of our students. Thank you for the great resources!"Karen Hodgkins, Leading Teacher of Mental Health and Wellbeing, Mount Martha Primary School
The NEW Program Achieve Secondary is now available online providing teachers access to digital activity plans and downloadable Teacher Guides and Student Worksheets. This curriculum is deliberately designed to contain short, targeted activities delivered in 15 - 20 minute periods during the busy timetabled secondary school day.
The NEW Program Achieve - Secondary includes 32 activities to be taught to students in years 7 & 8 and an additional 32 activities to be taught to students in years 9 & 10.
The activities are organised to be delivered across four terms and cover the following topics
1. Achievement. Work Confidence (growth mindset), Persistence, Organisation and Teamwork,
2. Relationships. Values, Character Strengths and Getting Along Skills,
3. Wellbeing. Resilience and Happiness - (self-awareness, self-management, ABCs, cognitive restructuring, mindfulness), and
4. Social-Emotional Blockers. Anger, Not Paying Attention, Procrastination, Worry and Feeling Down (awareness and self-management).
Each social-emotional learning activity addresses an aspect of the ACARA national curriculum's Personal and Social Capabilities.
Activities take 20+ minutes of class time to present to students and can be offered flexibly throughout the school week in either Home Groups, personal and social development classes or health and physical education.
$950 ANNUAL SCHOOL LICENSE (from date of purchase)
The Successful Mind for School, Work and Life is a 10-session course designed for upper secondary students to prepare them for their final years in school, pre-employment and part-time work experiences and for life beyond school. A distinctive feature of this course is its suitability to be delivered in career education classes with content linked to the CORE Skills for Work framework.
The digital Leader's Guide contains background information and a session plan needed to conduct each of the 10 sessions.
Schools need to purchase a student handbook (4b. on the catalogue) for each participating student.
Sessions
There is a psychological and neuro-scientific research-based foundation of the successful mind course. The collective work of cognitive-behavioural psychologists (Albert Ellis, Aaron Beck, Martin Seligman, Carol Dweck, Angela Duckworth) has identified a range of both positive and negative attitudes that determine the ways people think (self-talk), feel and behave. CASEL and ACARA have identified core social-emotional skills incorporated in this program as well: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and social management.
A successful mind is strengthened in young people through a variety of learning activities employed in this course including structured learning activities combined with small group interaction, discussion and application.
This Student Handbook is required for students participating in 04a. The Successful Mind for School, Work and Life 10-session course. It contains a variety of content including activity worksheets students complete during each session and tips and individual action plans completed after a session.
The You Can Do It! Education Resource Book is an ideal resource for school leaders and YCDI! Education coordinators who have the responsibility for providing ongoing professional development in You Can Do It! Education.
The YCDI! Education Resource Book contains a set of classroom resources including handouts and surveys that teachers can employ with students whether or not they are implementing the YCDI! Education curricula, Program Achieve. Additionally, material to assist schools in implementing successful, school-wide implementation of You Can Do It! Education is presented.
Part 1 has five sections each of which provides teachers with background information to integrate and communicate to students the five social and emotional skills (Confidence, Persistence, Organisation, Getting Along and Resilience) and 12 Attitudes (e.g., Growth Mindset, Accepting Myself, Giving Effort, Goal Setting) now taught in YCDI! Education.
Part 2 presents YCDI! Education good practices from 100s of schools that have implemented YCDI! Education school-wide. A five-stage implementation model helps guide school leadership and YCDI! Education planning teams who have responsibility for decision making and school-wide annual and three-year leadership, management, accountability/assessment and professional development in YCDI! Education. The YCDI! Education School Audit is presented to facilitate a school’s self-assessment of its’ implementation of YCDI! Education, which can act as a guide for future planning.
Part 3 contains a list of tips teachers, and others can employ with students who demonstrate any of five Social-Emotional Blockers: anger-misbehaving, anxious, feeling down, procrastination and not paying attention.
The Appendix contains surveys teachers and students can use to assess students’ current development of attitudes and social-emotional skills. Additionally included, teacher self-surveys and student surveys that are useful for determining the extent to which teachers are effective and consistently communicating attitudes and social-emotional skills.
This prevention mental health cognitive-behavioural program provides students with strategies they can use when faced with bullying behaviour and other types of anti-social behaviour.
Recently published research has shown that this program has a powerful impact on strengthening students’ cognitive and emotional responses to bullying.
Delivery of this course is flexible and can be taught to classroom-sized groups of students or used with individual students who are currently being victimised by bullying.
The course consists of 4 lessons that include four animated videos covering four elements
Part 1. Bullying and its impact
Part 2. Thinking makes it so (can be presented over two class periods)
Part 3. Things to say and do
Part 4. Coping in action
Each of the four parts contains discussion topics, activities and a list of materials needed for running the group activities.
This program can be incorporated into school timetables. Alternatively, one session can be developed with students being shown the complete animated video program supplemented by activities drawn from the material in the teacher's guide.
The Attitudes and Behaviours for Learning Program (AB4L) is a staff development program for conducting in-house by a member of staff to relevant teachers. The program includes an online guide providing information and handouts for holding staff development sessions at school and a PowerPoint presentation demonstrating the background and content of the program including the different AB4L teaching practices.
International research continues to reveal that the quality of classroom instruction directly influences the development of students’ academic skills and achievement. However, as seen below the impact of instruction is enhanced (or inhibited) by students’ attitudes, and social-emotional skills for learning (SEL’s).
Goals of the AB4L Professional Development Program:
Published research indicates that the AB4L teaching program strengthens students’ attitudes and social-emotional skills needed for engagement, cooperative learning, independent classwork and homework and leads to an improvement in reading comprehension of students in the lower 50% of achievement.
AB4L enables a student to:
This program contains a collection of parent education skill-building sessions designed to:
The evidence is clear to see. Parent education has a positive impact on parent stress, parent effectiveness and directly impacts children’s achievement and wellbeing. As such, schools have an important role to play in connecting their parent community to the vast literature on effective parenting by offering regular talks and workshops on different parenting practices.
Presented to groups of parents during the day or after school, the sessions generally consist of a mini-lecture presentation, discussion, and activities.
We have also found that parents can also perform in the role of the leader in taking responsibility for the delivery of the sessions.
In consultation with their parent community, schools can select one or more sessions to offer parents throughout the school year.
Sessions are designed to be presented to groups of parents of any size and take between 60 – 90 minutes to present.
The topics and content covered in Investing in Parents fall into three categories: positive parents, effective parents, and positive children. The content included in each parent session is based on an extensive study of what international research in the fields of parenting, child development and related fields has discovered about ways that parents socialise and influence their achievement and wellbeing.
Positive Parents
The first sessions have a focus on parents, their goals and aspirations, the importance of their self-efficacy, parenting styles and their effects on children as well as how to manage stress and be resilient.
Effective Parents
The following sessions deal with different parenting practices related to parent-child relationships and communication, different ways parents can become involved with their children’s education, how parents can understand and cater for their children’s developing interests and different ways they can motivate their children.
Positive Children
The final sessions deal with how parents can teach their children social-emotional learning skills and develop character through teaching values and strengths.
This step-by-step program provides a complete set of tools (steps, surveys, coaching advice) which can be used with teachers and parents when a student has been identified by school staff as being ‘at risk’ experiencing a significant social-emotional blocker (anger-misbehaviour, anxiety, feeling down, not paying attention, procrastination).
The sections of this coaching program include
I. Background: Cognitive-Behavioural Coaching
II. Coaching Program
A. Pre-requisites for Coach
B. 6-step Coaching Program
Overview
Step 1. First Meeting. Evaluation of Student's Social-Emotional Needs (surveys completed). Relationship Building. Setting Goals
Step 2. Second Meeting. Coaching Teachers and Parents
Step 3. Brief Contact. Progress Monitoring
Step 4. Third Meeting. Additional Goals and Further Coaching
Step 5. Brief Contact. Progress Monitoring
Step 6. Final Meeting. Evaluation of Progress (surveys completed)
III. Coaching Student Social-Emotional Strengths
IV. Appendices, Social-Emotional Surveys and Blockers
This is a professional development resource for individual study (stress management booklets, audio programs and cards). Additionally, it is designed to be part of a staff wellbeing program with content shared regularly at meetings and coaching sessions by professional development and school leaders who have responsibility for principal, teacher and staff wellbeing.
Michael Bernard shares what he has learned from coaching stressed teachers and principals, conducting professional development stress management workshops at schools, his experiences in working with teachers and principals retired from teaching due to stress worked, his own published research on stress-creating attitude and his earlier book, Taking the Stress Out of Teaching.
In this stress management series, an emphasis is placed on what you can do to take the stress out of your work. It incorporates the latest research in the field of neuroscience that has identified the importance of the pre-frontal cortex of your brain –sometimes called your inner CEO - as the source of resilience you need to combat stress. Many of the strategies described for managing stress are designed to activate and strengthen the pre-frontal cortex.
WAYS TO USE THIS STRESS MANAGEMENT SERIES
Teachers and others can be made aware of the availability of the program and its content and can be encouraged to download booklets, listen online to audio programs and identify stress-cards for personal study.
Throughout the school year, professional development sessions can be held either at a staff meeting or as a stand-alone session on different topics covered in this stress management program.
If a first- or second-year teacher has had little or no exposure to stress management and best practices for it management, it is strongly suggested that as part of a school’s induction program, teachers with the support of a mentor work through the program and developing as part of their individual professional development plan, areas of stress management to strengthen (e.g., relaxation, classroom management).
DOWNLOADABLE BEST-PRACTICE STRESS MANAGEMENT BOOKLETS
AUDIO ELEARNING STRESS MANAGEMENT PROGRAMS
DOWNLOADABLE STRESS-RELIEF CARDS
“This series guides teachers and principals who want to take the stress out of their daily work life and the lives of others. The techniques and skills outlined here will make your workplace less stressful and more enjoyable. Promise!” – Michael Bernard
Schools sign up all families for the annual membership. The annual school membership provides each staff member and families with access to a wide variety of parent elearning programs, insight articles and audio & video programs for children and adolescents.
School-home benefits
Equipped with this knowledge and skills your parents can contribute even more to helping their children achieve to the best of their ability and to experience high levels of wellbeing.
All families and staff members gain access to the complete course catalogue of Parent E-learning courses including articles, audio and visual content. Modular and mobile-friendly it is easy for busy parents and teachers read at their own pace.
Short e-learning Parenting Programs
Parent Insight Articles
Child and Adolescent Elearning
Set of 5 character hand puppets featured in the YCDI! Early Childhood Program Achieve (2nd Edition): Connie Confidence, Pete Persistence, Oscar Organisation, Gabby Get Along and Ricky Resilience
A colourful classroom poster of an Emotional Thermometer that teaches students to reflect on their level of emotional upset and asks them the question “Are you keeping calm?” Each poster measures 119cm long and 41cm wide. The posters are folded and mailed in an A4 post bag. Posters can be laminated for display.
A colourfully illustrated poster that can be displayed in the classroom to provide a visual representation of a Catastrophe Scale that helps children and young people keep things in perspective.
Each poster measures 119cm long and 41cm wide. The posters are folded and mailed in an A4 post bag. Posters can be laminated for display.
This poster depicts 8 common stressful situations encountered by students of all ages that can create stress including feelings of inadequacy and low self-esteem. Students are encouraged to internalise the attitude of Self-Acceptance (“I am me and that’s OK”) an important element of the psychological armour needed for strong resilience. Self-acceptance inoculates students leading to protection from adversity and is the cornerstone attitude for preventing and reducing mental health problems and enhancing wellbeing and flourishing.
Each poster measures 59cm long and 84cm wide. The posters are folded and mailed in an A4 post bag. Posters can be laminated for display.
This poster illustrates a key idea that underpins student positive mental health and wellbeing; namely, Things are neither good nor bad but thinking makes it so. Once this principle is taught, students become aware of the power they have over the way they think leading to appropriate feelings and goal-directed behaviours. They feel less helpless and victimised and experience greater self-efficacy and confidence.
The Successful Mind in Study, Work and Life is a 10-session program designed for tertiary-level students to prepare them for university life, to cope with stress, engage successfully with their chosen course of study and to be prepared for the world of work. Based on the latest research and best practice from the fields of social-emotional learning, positive psychology and cognitive-behaviour, rational-emotive therapies, this program includes the following sessions:
In its’ present form, this program is designed to be presented by a mentor to one student or a small group of students (mentees).
The program assists mentors to help mentees become more aware of and develop their psychological strengths.
Mentors incorporate within their traditional role of listener, supporter and problem solver three areas in which they can influence their mentees:
Each mentee requires a copy of the 145 page Student Guide to The Successful Mind at Study Work and Life (author: Michael Bernard).
The Student Guide has been written using non-technical psychological language which is easy enough for mentees to understand. Rather than mentees who are non-teachers nor counsellors having to explain psychological content to mentees in their own words, the idea is for both mentor and mentees to review the ideas on the pages of the Student Guide, for the mentor to ask questions, seek comment and for mentees to complete one or more activity sheets that appear in each section of their Student Guide that will help them understand and use the elements of the successful mind.
The online, digital, Mentor’s Guide contains all information mentors need to present the program to mentees.