Practicing gratitude is one of the simplest tools that you can use to improve how you are feeling.

Research has shown that the positive side effects of using gratitude include physical benefits such as better sleep and psychological benefits including less anxiety and increased happiness and resilience.  Social benefits include; fewer feelings of loneliness and isolation, increased forgiveness and greater helpfulness and generosity.

When thinking about the things that we are grateful for, the benefits will be greater if you don’t think about the “things” you have, such as toys but rather, look for kindness from others, or a kind deed that you have seen or been involved in.

Sone of the ways in which you can practice gratitude is to write a gratitude journal, make a list or share with others, three things which you are grateful for.

Another way of practicing gratitude is to be a gratitude detective by watching for kind and caring behaviour from other people.

How about boosting your wellbeing by setting yourself a challenge to show gratitude in some way every day?

Gratitude is my Superpower

My Attitude of Gratitude

The Science of Gratitude

Did I Ever Tell You How Happy You Are? Dr Seuss

The Gratitude Tree Guided Meditation

The Gratitude Experiment

What are you grateful for right now?

Self-control is about being able to control your actions or behaviour. For some people, self-control is easy, but for others, it takes practise to have self-control. Similar to self-control are self-regulation and self-managment and one strategy that teachers can use to help their students is the “Zones of Regulation”. This helps students to be aware of their reactions and behaviour and helping to regulate and take control of behaviour. Use of mindfulness and the Stop, Think and Breath strategy is helpful.

Self-control explained

The word “resist” is connected to self-control in this clip!

The marshmellow test – what would you do? Do you think you’d have the self control to wait and get two?

Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus – can you identify the zones of regulation of the pigeon?

Teamwork comes under the Relationships arm of the BHPS wellbeing model which means; I accept, understand and empathise with others.

We can also relate teamwork to Voice and Agency because being part of a team means working “for the good of the whole“.

The VIA Institute says of those who have, or aspire to have, teamwork as one of their character strengths: “I am a helpful and contributing group and team member, and feel responsible for helping the team reach its goals.”

An oldie but a goodie!

Swimmy is about a group of ingenious little fish who come together, literally to solve a problem!

The Grizzly Bear who lost his GRRR

Just because everyone loves a meercat!



I bet you know which arm of our PERMA model Persistence fits into? Yep – It’s the accomplishment area.

Being persistent means working hard to finish what we set out to achieve and not giving up. It means setting and achieving goals despite challenges and difficulties. Being persistent involves “grit” which is similar to stamina and effort. People who show persistence have a growth mindset, they know that if they practise and put in effort, they can achieve their goals!

Do you remember when you were learning how to read or ride a two wheeler bike? It was tricky at first, but you used your grit and kept trying until you’d got the hang of it. What happens is that is new (neural) pathways are created, and, like muscles, these help your brain to grow and you to become good at things.

Lessons on Grit

It pays to be persistent!

The Most Magnificant Thing

A Little Spot of Perseverence

(Perseverence is a synonym for persistence!)

Have you set your goals for this term?

What is your main takeaway from “Lessons on Grit?”

How are you going to use grit this week?

“I forgive people who hurt me and give people a second chance. I put my sadness behind me and move forward”.

Forgiveness means letting go of hard feelings like anger, sadness, or frustration that happen when you or someone else makes a mistake. It’s saying “Thank you” or “That’s okay” when someone apologises and not staying upset about what they did. It’s having patience with yourself and others, and recognising that no one is perfect—everyone makes mistakes.  It’s letting go of hurt feelings, and moving ahead, ready to do things. It doesn’t mean that all of a sudden what someone did doesn’t hurt or isn’t wrong. It means that you find it in your heart to give the person another chance.

In many ways Forgiveness is about taking power back by “flipping” the mood/situation. I use the analogy of the sparkle jars. Harbouring hurt or anger as a result of someone hurting your feelings can feel like a whirlwind in your tummy but as soon as you forgive it can lead to a sense of calm like when the sparkles fall to the bottom of the jar.

Forgiveness comes within the “Relationships” part of our PERMA model because being able to forgive those around you is one of the building blocks to successful friendship.

Little Life Message: The best revenge is to move on and find your happy.

Forgiveness Activities:

• Take 20 minutes and write about the personal benefits that resulted from a negative incident.
• Think of someone who wronged you recently. Put yourself in their shoes and try to understand their perspective.
• Write a forgiveness letter. You don’t have to send it, but read it to yourself each day for a week.
• If someone hurts or upsets you, try to understand things from their perspective, then think about whether your reaction is hurting them or you.
• Think about all of the picture story books that have at their core, the message of the importance of being able to forgive. Write a list and send to Mrs Kebbell to add to the list on this blog!

Blue Sky, Yellow Kite is a favourite of mine and as I read it I like to stop and infer the many emotions that the characters in this book are feeling due to the actions of the other person.

Elmo didn’t mean to…

I love my new toy by Mo Willems

Enemy Pie by Derek Munson

Stress is a normal part of life, especially as we get older. If we learn to cope better with life’s stressors it can help us develop good mental health and wellbeing. This week at school we will be learning how to recognise our personal signs and symptoms of stress and to develop strategies that will help us deal with those effectively and to cope with challenges in the future.

Here are some ideas for how you can cope with stress.

Mindfulness is a great way of coping when things become overwhelming.

Mindfulness is often defined as living in the moment without judgment. But many of us don’t always function that way. When a thought pops into our heads, it’s usually coloured by what has happened in the past or what we think might happen in the future. Even if the thought isn’t accurate, we may react to it as if it were.

What is Mindfulness?

The practice of mindfulness can help us stay focused on the present. In addition to calming us down, mindfulness can teach us to view our thoughts in a more neutral manner. Here are some ideas for how you can practice mindfulness.

There are many different ideas you can try to help you to focus on your breathing. Try a few and work out which suits you the best.

Learning about your thoughts

My Magic Breath

This is Mrs Jordan’s Favourite! The Sloth Who Came to Stay

Mindful Looking

People who are prudent think carefully and make sensible and smart choices. Prudent people plan carefully and think before they act or speak.

Prudence sits within the “Meaning” arm of the BHPS starfish and there are quite a few goals that  people who are keen to be more prudent can aspire to. These include:

• Doing things that make a positive difference,
• using the character strengths of positive role models and
• helping others.

Being prudent can also mean making sensible decisions about where you can seek help if needed and knowing who you can help.

Motto: Think before you act.

“Make smart choices,” is a rule that can be easily applied to primary school students. There are many ways to see how it works. Think about the smart and foolish choices made by characters in a story, famous historical individuals and/or students in the playground.  Prudent decisions are wise decisions and making thoughtless choices without thinking before acting are the opposite.

Some examples of books wherein the characters display prudence (or not!) include:

“The Ant and the Grasshopper” is a fable wherein the organised ant plans for the Winter while the arrogant and lazy grasshopper makes fun of the ant. The grasshopper regrets his not so prudent decision making later!

“Can I Join Your Club” shows the main character being rejected by the other animals and making the decision to make his own club where everyone belongs.

Finally, “How to Heal a Broken Wing,” by Bob Graham shows a little boy in a sea of adults making the prudent and kind decision to help a bird lying injured on the pavement.

An activity that you can do is to trace your two hands. On each finger of one hand, write the names of 5 people who can help you should you need it and 5 people who you can help.

People who are strong in the character strength “appreciation of beauty and excellence”  notice and enjoy the beauty, skill and excellence involved in things around them including nature, art and architecture.

These people notice and enjoy beauty in many places and they notice and enjoy watching people who are talented or very skilled in what they do. An example of this is when you admire a classmate who is awesome at drawing or writing.

An inspirational person who I would say posesses this strength is David Attenborough. He shares his love of the natural environment through his films. I love this quote by David Attenborough:

“People must feel that the natural world is important and valuable and beautiful and wonderful and an amazement and a pleasure”.

A message of hope and celebration of nature from David Attenborough

The Curious Garden by Peter Brown

The Dot by Peter Reynolds

Henri Matisse was a famous French artist who painted and made collages. Maybe you will feel inspired to make your own colour block collage after watching this!

The beauty of nature

Draw, or describe a time when you were in nature and felt a sense of wonder because of your surroundings.