Weekly Wellbeing Focus – Positive Self-talk / Self-determination

Welcome to the Weekly Wellbeing Focus. The focus for this week is Positive Self-talk / Self-determination

Parent Wellbeing: What is something that you are passionate about doing? If you haven’t, then find something to give you a reason to get out of bed
every morning. To accomplish it you will need to stick at it show grit.

To learn about how gritty you are, do Angela Duckworth’s free Grit Scale Score at http://bit.ly/gritscale

Often some of the most negative messages students receive come from their own mind chatter. This tends to happen when they are under pressure and have a fixed mindset that there is nothing they can do about their issues and which are beyond their control. Combine this with the turbulence of the adolescent brain and the ingredients are there for frequent stress and anxiety attacks.

One of the most effective positive coping strategies that we can teach students is the power of positive self-talk. In fact, it will benefit our state of wellbeing to use it often too. Positive self-talk are I can and I will statements, which students say over and over to themselves. Doing this, contests the negatives and moves their thinking from pessimistic to optimistic outlooks. It also focuses them to start looking for what is right in what they are doing. See the Positive Selftalk page which we can encourage students to use often.

The key to making positive self-talk most effective in maintaining growth mindsets, is to use it immediately they notice themselves having negative thoughts entering their minds. When used well, these statements act as excellent off ramps for negative thinking and fixed mindsets. Positive self-talk is using their strengths to believe in their internal control of themselves.

Acknowledgement: Ryan & Deci

Some useful videos that discuss this week’s focus:

Jake McIntosh
Assistant Head of Secondary – Wellbeing