Wellbeing and Self Management for Senior Students

Jim Carrey's Inspiring Commencement Speech

It has come to the end of the term. Check out the video below for some inspiring and powerful words by everyones best friend Jim Carrey.

Create An Inspiration Goal Board

Using Be Funky create an inspirational goal board filled with pictures that drive and inspire you to reach your dream.

Below is an example of one made by someone who's goal is to one day become a professional surfer.

Once completed print it out and put it up where you will see it everyday.

Goal Setting Part 2

Using the bigger picture goals you developed last week fill out the table below. Identify what short and long term goals you need to set to start heading towards your bigger picture.

Intention	Specific	Measurable	Achievable	Relevant	Timely
What is it that you want to achieve?	Who? What? When? Why? Where?	How much? How often? How many?	Is it attainable and realistic?	Is it important to you what you want to achieve?	When?

Congratulations! You have made the first step towards achieving your goals. Keep this timetable up near your study table, near your bathroom mirror or on the fridge so you don’t forget about those big time goals that we know you will achieve.

Sources:
http://professional.opcd.wfu.edu/files/2012/09/Smart-Goal-Setting.pdf
http://www.relaxfocusenjoy.com/7-benefits-of-goal-setting/

Goal Setting Part 1

Goal setting is a key ingredient in life and will enable you to successfully achieve things you may not have thought possible like owning a car, hitting a new PB at the gym, achieving an A on your math’s exam or getting a promotion at work. Understanding the importance of goal setting and how to do it effectively will allow you to be less stressed within the classroom and begin to prepare for what may arise once you graduate. Being able to efficiently goal set will set you up with a lifetime skill that you will be able to reflect on each day and continually progress and change.

Goal setting has many benefits:

- Clearer focus

- Peace of mind

- Motivation

- Clarity of decisions

- Wellbeing

- Focus on what’s important

- Control your future

- Be more positive

Goal setting involves thinking about you current situation, your future and what you would like to achieve. It allows you to set realistic goals that you can progress through to achieve your main goal. The point of setting goals helps you to achieve and get where you want in life. So where do you start? With SMART goals.

SMART:

Specific

Measurable

Achievable

Relevant

Timely

Specific:
The first step in writing achievable goals is being specific. Write down exactly what you want to accomplish. (“I will set aside 2 hours every evening for study”)

Measurable:
You need to be able to measure your goals or they are not going to be successful. You must be able to see where you are at and check that you are on check. (“I’m going to raise my B- to a B+ by the end of the term”).

Achievable:
You must set goals that are actually going to be achievable. There is no point picking a goal that is physically impossible. (“I am going to be in the top 10% of my grade in PE by the end of this year”).

Relevant:
When setting your goals you should be looking at the bigger picture. For example you might want to finish year 12 with a GPA of 6 or you might want to get into a specific University. Setting these goals will help to achieve the bigger picture.

Timely:
You need to set goals that you can actually complete. You might set a goal to be done in one week, another goal to be completed after 60 days, one that needs to be completed after 6 months, a year and so on. Setting multiple small goals will create motivation and a feeling of accomplishment when you finally hit that goal.

ACTIVITY:

- Identify 2 or 3 bigger picture items you want to achieve

Sources:

http://professional.opcd.wfu.edu/files/2012/09/Smart-Goal-Setting.pdf

http://www.relaxfocusenjoy.com/7-benefits-of-goal-setting/

Get Organised! Timetabling and Scheduling

“if it isn’t written down, it doesn’t exist”

To make a busy life a successful life we need organisation. Managing stress is about making a plan to be able to cope effectively with daily pressures. Being organised allows you to balance all aspects of your life including personal, study, and work without the feeling of being overwhelmed and stressed, you are more able to deal with daily stress triggers and meet challenges head on. Being organised allows you to constantly perform and deliver high quality work within set timeframes and is the key to student success.

Balancing the demands of a busy lifestyle is not an easy thing to do, but is best managed by regularly reviewing and assessing your priorities. So how can you get organised?

• Set goals around what you value highly,

• Manage your time effectively—review job activities, priorities and success factors,

• Create a boundary between balancing study and personal time,

• Build resilience and have a positive attitude,

• Avoid stress, mental exhaustion and burnout—fatigue affects your ability to work productively,

• Maintain a healthy lifestyle—look after yourself, eat well, sleep well and set aside a little time to exercise or pursue an activity that you enjoy,

• Enlist a good support system—we all need a little help sometimes.

ACTIVITY:

Make a list identifying what assessment tasks you have during this term and their due dates

Create a monthly chart as a table in a word document and write in your assessment tasks in the due dates.

Schedule days you will focus on completing the task. For example you might schedule Monday afternoons for working on your English assessment in the weeks leading up to your assessment being due.

Save this as a picture and set it as your desktop background. Stick to this schedule, and watch your stress levels reduce and your quality of work heighten.

Sources:
https://online.scu.edu.au/blog/organisation-the-key-to-success/
https://www.qld.gov.au/health/mental-health/balance/lifestyle/

PUNCTUALITY vs Procrastination

Procrastination: “the challenge of accomplishing tasks on time. Putting off school work to the last minute increases stress and makes completion of assignments harder to do well or even do at all.”

Punctuality: “is the characteristic of being able to complete a required task or fulfill an obligation before or at a previously designated time.”

Procrastination gets the better of us all at one stage or another but the key is to not let it take over and not let it become a habit. Procrastinating takes us away from the task at hand and can distract us in any form for example Facebook, youtube videos, watching tv, reading a book and even cleaning the house. Putting off things you need to do will later become stressful and will start affecting your health. It will also damage your wellbeing and start affecting not only school but home life and can then carry into your work life. As you would have noted from the above video it is not a productive habit that you want to keep, but how do you know if you are a serial procrastinator?

ACTIVITY:

Tick the boxes that relate to you. If you get more then 3 you’re a serial procrastinator.

You get up late
Anytime is your bed time
You are getting addictive
When it’s too hard you give up
You never keep promises to yourself
You envy hard workers
You have a messy room/workplace
You are easily stressed
You focus on non-essential schoolwork instead of what needs to get done
Setting another time or date for things that need to be done
Unnecessary eating

ACTIVITY:

Bring Your Challenges has a fun interactive quiz for you to take and it will tell you exactly what type of procrastinator you are!!

TAKE THE TEST!

So what do you do if you are spending all your time neglecting work and watching cat videos on youtube. Well you need to start small set your goals like you have done in the previous weeks and stick to them. If you don’t know where to start, start really simple – Finish reading 5 paragraphs of a book and walk away come back and do another 5 and so on. Set the goals, achieve them and become punctual instead of a procrastinator.

Sources

http://www.bringyourchallenges.com/procrastinator

The Melbourne declaration served as a catalyst for schools to embrace wellbeing as fundamental to students schooling lives and futures (MCEETYA, 2008). Through this catalyst several programs and models have been developed, one such is CASELs approach to SEL (Social and Emotional Learning) that highlights self-management as part of the holistic wellbeing model.

Today’s youth are part of an age of technology, and as such it is important to provide information and resources that are relevant to them (Barnes, Marateo, & Ferris, 2007). In recognition of this, a blog has been developed that will inform, educate and develop students self-management skills and through this improve their wellbeing. The resource is designed to be implemented once weekly over a 10 – 20 min lesson (pastoral care/home room) over the course of a term. By minimising the amount of time required students are more likely to engage with the resource and also less likely to be negatively impacted by an increase workload. It then becomes standard routine practice for students to participate in and further enhances their opportunities for improved wellbeing (DET, 2012).

Students are learning valuable lifelong skills they can use to manage stress and improve their wellbeing during year 12 and after(Morris, 2013). The resources are student focused and this strategy enables them to interact with the resource but also take control of the learning that is taking place. Providing these opportunities to maximise student participation is critical in developing children and young people’s sense of belonging, wellbeing, self-worth and self-awareness.

References

Barnes, K., Marateo, R. C., & Ferris, S. P. (2007). Teaching and learning with the net generation. Innovate: Journal of Online Education, 3(4), 1.

DET. (2012). Learning and Wellbeing Framework. Retrieved from http://deta.qld.gov.au/initiatives/learningandwellbeing/resources/learning-and-wellbeing-framework.pdf.

MCEETYA. (2008). Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED534449.pdf.Morris, I. (2013). A Place for Well-Being in the Classroom? Research, applications, and interventions for children and adolescents (pp. 185-198): Springer.