If you are in the Northern Hemisphere welcome to summer! It’s been a long time coming. The news around the world continues to be grim and it is hard to stay hopeful. But we need to focus on the little we can do and perhaps influence – words matter. Conversations create culture, determine the quality of relationships and either promote or inhibit our shared humanity and the world we live in. The organisation Words Matter is fronting a new campaign to prevent the verbal abuse of children.

Books

ASPIRE to Learning and Wellbeing for All in Early Years and Primary: The principles underpinning positive education. PLEASE HELP!

This is a big ask! If you were thinking of buying this book please could you pre-order as soon as possible after May 13 for delivery June 3. I am told that the more pre-orders there are the greater the interest from media and this will really help it gain some traction. It is full of reasons why these principles matter in revisioning education and examples across the world of how to do it. Here are just two of the many powerful endorsements:

This excellent book shows how to enable pupils to flourish in school now and how we can help all to thrive in future. The ASPIRE principles build social justice. I highly recommend it. Sir Anthony Seldon, Co-chair of the Times Education Commission Report: Bringing out the Best

Drawing on her deep experience and the best of educational sciences, Roffey gives a map of educational change to which we can truly aspire. This work should lead the way of educational change today. Richard M. Ryan Professor | Institute for Positive Psychology and Education, Australian Catholic University,

The secondary version will be published on August 1.

The launch of this book will take place in Innsbruck in July at the European Conference on Positive Psychology where I am running a pre-conference workshop on ASPIRE.

The Impossible Question of Living Well: Dr Helen Street has been running the Australian Positive Schools conferences and much more for well over ten years. This is her latest book. You can meet with her at this event on Monday May 20: Free on-line launch. The time is early evening in Australia and morning in the UK,

Mentor: Strategies to Inspire Young People: Robin Cox writes about many ways to engage and positively connect with young people.

Social and Emotional Learning

The OECD is a strong voice for social and emotional learning across the world. You can watch the webinar about turning schools into hubs of social and emotional learning. You can download the whole of their newsletter. Great information.

The latest copy of the International Journal of Social and Emotional Learning includes articles on SEL for students with disability, pro-environmental behaviours and SEL in pre-school. You can access this here.

The European Conference on Social-Emotional Competence (ENSEC) in Crete 5-7 September is on the theme Social-Emotional Learning for Lifetime Achievement. I am delivering a workshop on the ASPIRE Pedagogy for safe, solution-focused implementation and presenting a paper on Redefining Success.

Empathy Week has developed a new initiative – Empathy Studios. This is where you can download video materials to use in schools. You can try this for free.

Suicide Prevention: The Jordan Legacy is a suicide prevention charity. Their aim is a zero-suicide society. This year they are launching a Join the Dots conference which starts off in Scunthorpe on June 12 with more events across the country later that month. I am on a panel discussing mental health promotion.

Kindness and Social Justice: How do we help students think critically and develop these attitudes and skills. Read the Greater Good Magazine for ideas.

Research

A recent article in the New Scientist highlighted the value of solitude and how we might make the most of being alone to boost our mental health.

There are some academics who fear that taking part in social action will dent their credibility – an article in the BPS Research Digest suggests that the opposite happens, especially in relation to students,

Professor Ansie Kitching and I have been commissioned by Edward Elgar Publishers to co-edit the Handbook of Wellbeing in Education: Research Transforming Practice. If you want to know more please contact me directly sue@sueroffey.com.