Wellbeing and Positive Education

 

 

At Golden Grove Lutheran Primary School, we have deliberately chosen Positive Education as a core foundation of our approach to wellbeing and are particularly focused on nurturing each individual. This approach places wellbeing firmly at the heart of everything we do and brings together best practice teaching and learning with learning the skills and mindsets to flourish. Central to the lens through which we see the Positive Education experience are learner profile attributes. The language of these attributes or strengths permeates our entire school community and show the pathway to living through the lens that God has a plan, a purpose and a future for us all, which gives us an amazing transcendent hope and optimism. Our approach to Positive Education respects and is consistent with our Christian ethos. It is also grounded on the research evidence about what works to improve wellbeing in schools.

Positive Education has been defined as “best practice teaching combined with an explicit focus on wellbeing, to support and encourage individuals, schools and communities to flourish”. The approach emphasises individual strengths to promote learning, builds awareness of a growth mindset and incorporates practice in mindfulness and gratitude. Positive Education emphasises the importance of training the heart as well as the mind in education.

The science of Positive Education has several key underlying principles:
* Student wellbeing is closely linked to academic success. When students feel connected, safe and happy, they are more likely to thrive in their learning;
* In today’s world, increasing statistics of psychological distress and mental illness are challenging, and such stresses impact on the young learner;
* Schools play a critical role in helping young people to develop cognitive, social and emotional skills, and are well placed to do this;
* Skills and mindsets that encourage positive relationships, positive emotions, resilience and character strengths can be taught.

These factors support the need to be proactive about wellbeing and to adopt a holistic approach that fosters the development of the whole person.

Positive Education at Golden Grove Lutheran Primary School offers a range of empirically validated approaches from the field of positive psychology which are delivered through interventions, programs and practices to promote the wellbeing of our students, staff and wider community.

As a Positive Education Schools Association Partner School, we appreciate the importance of tuning in to wellbeing and making something that is invisible seen, heard and felt. In addition to promoting the positive psychology principles of growth mindset, gratitude, resilience, grit, deliberate practice, flow and mindfulness we also believe in the importance of wellbeing literacy as a general capability.

The Golden Grove Lutheran Primary School model of Positive Education encompasses a holistic approach to wellbeing. In partnership with our students, staff, families and our broader school community, we strive to cultivate and nurture a learning community that enables individuals to thrive.

Golden Grove Lutheran Students
Students are empowered to learn, make decisions and take responsibility for their own wellbeing. They foster resilience, confidence and optimism in the pursuit of an authentic sense of self.

This approach achieved improved wellbeing literacy, as students know their character and learning attributes and strengths We are also encouraging a culture of ‘other person centredness’. Positive Education teaches us community-mindedness, that other people matter, and simple acts such as expressing gratitude and engaging in service to others and philanthropy can have positive and enduring benefits both to the receiver as well as the giver.

Golden Grove Lutheran Staff
Our staff team are committed to authentic, lifelong learning and flourish as resourceful, innovative, creative and respected educators.

Schools with engaged, energised and connected staff tend to be the most thriving institutions. In our school, staff are given the tools to grow their own wellbeing and allowed the time to observe the changes this can make in their own lives. This reaps enormous benefits when Positive Education is grown in students as staff can share their lived experience with authenticity and enthusiasm.

Golden Grove Lutheran Families
At Golden Grove, there is an authentic school/family partnership that empowers our students to build on their strengths and fulfil their potential.

Our Vision For Our Community
In years to come, our alumni and wider Golden Grove Lutheran community will continue to be increasingly powerful agents of positive change in society.

Together, we can all grow and thrive to be the best we can be.

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