This game-changing book reveals the extraordinary results of focusing on our children’s strengths rather than always trying to correct their weaknesses. By showing us how to throw the ‘strength switch’, Dr Lea Waters demonstrates how we can help our children build resilience, optimism and achievement.

As a strength-based scientist for more than 20 years, Waters has seen how this approach enhances self-esteem and energy in both children and teenagers – and how parents find it an exciting and rewarding way to raise them. With many suggestions for specific techniques to interact with your children, Waters demonstrates how to discover their strengths and talents, use positive emotions as a resource, build strong brains, and even how to deal with problem behaviour and talk about difficult situations and emotions. The Strength Switch will show parents that a small shift can yield enormous results.

Mindful awareness works by enabling you to pay closer attention to what is happening within you—your thoughts, feelings, and emotions—so you can better understand what is happening to you. The Mindful Child extends the vast benefits of mindfulness training to children from four to eighteen years old with age-appropriate exercises, songs, games, and fables that Susan Kaiser Greenland has developed over more than a decade of teaching mindful awareness to kids.

These fun and friendly techniques build kids’ inner and outer awareness and attention, which positively affects their academic performance as well as their social and emotional skills, such as making friends, being compassionate and kind to others, and playing sports, while also providing tools to manage stress and to overcome specific challenges like insomnia, overeating, ADHD, hyper-perfectionism, anxiety, and chronic pain.

When children take a few moments before responding to stressful situations, they allow their own healthy inner compasses to click in and guide them to become more thoughtful, resilient, and empathetic. The step-by-step process of mental training presented in The Mindful Child provides tools from which all children—and all families—will benefit.

If there was a new wonder drug on the market that got kids to behave better, improve their grades, feel happier, and avoid risky behaviors, many parents around the world would be willing to empty their bank accounts to acquire it. Amazingly, such a product actually does exist. It’s not regulated by the FDA, it has no ill side-effects, and it’s absolutely free and avail­able to anyone at any time. This miracle cure is gratitude.

Over the past decade, science has shown that gratitude is one of the most valuable and important emotions we possess, and it is a virtue that anyone can cultivate. In fact, researchers have developed many different methods people can use to foster an attitude of gratitude, and the science shows that many of them really work.

In Making Grateful Kids, two of the leading authorities on gratitude among young people, Jeffrey J. Froh and Giacomo Bono, introduce their latest and most compelling research, announce groundbreaking findings, and share real-life stories from adults and youth to show parents, teachers, mentors, and kids themselves how to achieve greater life satisfaction through gratitude. Most importantly perhaps, they expand on this groundbreaking research to offer practical and effec­tive common-sense plans that can be used in day-to-day interactions between kids and adults to enhance success and wellbeing.

Their unique, scientifically-based approach for producing grateful youth works whether these kids are very young ele­mentary school students or troubled teenagers. Not only does the purposeful practice of gratitude increase their happiness, but the research indicates that grateful kids also report more self-discipline, fulfilling relationships, and engagement with their schools and communities when compared to their less grateful counterparts. After reading Making Grateful Kids, parents, teachers, and anyone who works with youth will be able to connect more mean­ingfully with kids so that all parties can focus on the things that matter most and, in turn, create a more cooperative and thriving society.

This groundbreaking book reveals that courage is more about managing fear than not feeling it, and that courage can be learned. The author explains that most courageous people are unaware of their own bravery, and all of us have some form of courage in our lives now, to start with. The book is filled with illustrative examples, studies, and interviews from Greenland to Kenya, and defines the types of individuals who demonstrate general, personal, and civil courage. The author includes clear guidelines and suggestions for increasing our ability to be courageous.

SMART Strengths is a proven, definitive research supported guide for athletic coaches, parents, and teachers to help them find new pathways to their most important goals of building character, resilience, and relationships in youth and their adult mentors, while patiently nurturing the change, one person at a time, until the community has become contagiously positive and productive.
It contains both science and stories of how teachers, coaches, and parents who have used the SMART Strengths approach have achieved greater personal success and well-being and have helped their students, players, and children to achieve greater well-being and more success. It provides specific, tested ways that the authors and other SMART Strengths pioneers have developed and proven in their own lives and their teaching, coaching, and parenting.

In this must-read book for anyone striving to succeed, pioneering psychologist Angela Duckworth shows parents, educators, students, and business people both seasoned and new that the secret to outstanding achievement is not talent but a focused persistence called grit.

Why do some people succeed and others fail? Sharing new insights from her landmark research on grit, Angela Duckworth explains why talent is hardly a guarantor of success. Rather, other factors can be even more crucial such as identifying our passions and following through on our commitments.

Drawing on her own powerful story as the daughter of a scientist who frequently bemoaned her lack of smarts, Duckworth describes her winding path through teaching, business consulting, and neuroscience, which led to the hypothesis that what really drives success is not genius, but a special blend of passion and long-term perseverance. As a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Duckworth created her own character lab and set out to test her theory.

Here, she takes readers into the field to visit teachers working in some of the toughest schools, cadets struggling through their first days at West Point, and young finalists in the National Spelling Bee. She also mines fascinating insights from history and shows what can be gleaned from modern experiments in peak performance. Finally, she shares what she's learned from interviewing dozens of high achievers; from JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon to the cartoon editor of The New Yorker to Seattle Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll.

Winningly personal, insightful, and even life-changing, Grit is a book about what goes through your head when you fall down, and how that not talent or luck makes all the difference.

Based on Stanford University psychologist Kelly McGonigal's wildly popular course The Science of Willpower, The Willpower Instinct is the first book to explain the science of self-control and how it can be harnessed to improve our health, happiness, and productivity.

Informed by the latest research and combining cutting-edge insights from psychology, economics, neuroscience, and medicine, The Willpower Instinct explains exactly what willpower is, how it works, and why it matters. For example, readers will learn:

- Willpower is a mind-body response, not a virtue. It is a biological function that can be improved through mindfulness, exercise, nutrition, and sleep.
- Willpower is not an unlimited resource. Too much self-control can actually be bad for your health.
- Temptation and stress hijack the brain's systems of self-control, but the brain can be trained for greater willpower
- Guilt and shame over your setbacks lead to giving in again, but self-forgiveness and self-compassion boost self-control.
- Giving up control is sometimes the only way to gain self-control.
- Willpower failures are contagious--you can catch the desire to overspend or overeat from your friends­­--but you can also catch self-control from the right role models.
In the groundbreaking tradition of Getting Things Done, The Willpower Instinct combines life-changing prescriptive advice and complementary exercises to help readers with goals ranging from losing weight to more patient parenting, less procrastination, better health, and greater productivity at work.

In The Optimistic Child, Dr. Martin Seligman offers parents, teachers, and coaches a well-validated program to prevent depression in children. In a thirty-year study, Seligman and his colleagues discovered the link between pessimism -- dwelling on the most catastrophic cause of any setback -- and depression.

Seligman shows adults how to teach children the skills of optimism that can help them combat depression, achieve more on the playing field and at school, and improve their physical health. As Seligman states, 'Teaching children optimism is more, I realized, than just correcting pessimism . . . It is the creation of a positive strength, a sunny but solid future-mindedness that can be deployed throughout life -- not only to fight depression and to come back from failure, but also to be the foundation of success and vitality.'

The Optimistic Child offers parents and teachers the tools developed by the author to teach children of all ages, life skills that transform helplessness into mastery and bolster self-esteem. Learning the skills of optimism not only reduces the risk of depression but boosts school performance, improves physical health, and provides children with the self-reliance they need as they approach the teenage years and beyond. 'A world of optimists is a bigger world, a world of more possibilities', says Seligman.

Filled with practical advice and written in clear, helpful language, this book is an invaluable resource for caregivers who want to open up this world for their children.

Grit―defined as our perseverance and passion for long-term goals―is now recognized as one of the key determinants for achievement and life satisfaction. In an age that provides us with a never-ending stream of distractions and quick-and-easy solutions, how do we build this essential quality? "This book is designed to help you screen out the spam of life and cultivate authentic grit in every setting," writes Caroline Miller.

With Getting Grit, this bestselling author brings you an information-rich and practical guide for developing the qualities needed to persevere over obstacles―not just toughness and passion, but also humility, patience, and kindness. Join her as she shares research-based insights and practices on:

• Learning grit―how you can enhance your willpower and rewire your brain for resilience
• The key traits of gritty people―what the latest research reveals
• The three kinds of "false grit" and how to recognize them in yourself
• The courage to fail―tools for turning your setbacks into your greatest teachers
• Daring to dream big―guidance for building your capacity to take risks and aim higher
• No one succeeds alone―tips for gathering your support team and inspiring others
• The role of self-compassion, gratitude, and spirituality in building grit

"I’ve come to believe that gritty behavior is a positive force that does more than help us rise to our own challenges," writes Caroline Miller. "When we embody the best qualities of grit, we become a role model for others who want to become better people, and help them awaken greater possibilities for themselves." Whether you’re seeking to grow beyond your limits at work, at home, on the sporting field, or in any leadership role, Getting Grit is a powerful resource to help you bring out the qualities that will help you succeed and thrive.

Grounded in mindfulness and neuroscience, this pioneering book redefines discipline and outlines the five essential elements necessary for children to thrive: unconditional love, space for children to be themselves, mentorship, healthy boundaries, and mistakes that create learning and growth opportunities. In this book, you will also discover parenting practices such as setting limits with love, working with difficult emotions, and forgiveness and compassion meditations that place discipline within a context of mindfulness. This relationship-centered approach will restore your confidence as a parent and support your children in developing emotional intelligence, self-discipline, and resilience―qualities they need for living an authentic and meaningful life.

In this groundbreaking book, one of the world's foremost academic psychologists- and founder of the Positive Psychology movement- offers a new theory on what makes people flourish and how to truly get the most out of life.

Eight years have passed since the publication of Dr Seligman's internationally bestselling Authentic Happiness. As a highly esteemed psychologist, Dr Seligman has been on the cutting edge of psychological research for over two decades, pioneering a science that improves people's lives. And now, with his most life-changing book yet, Flourish, he offers a new theory of individual satisfaction and global purpose.

In a fascinating evolution of thought, Flourish, refines what Positive Psychology is all about and offers inspiring stories of Positive Psychology in action- innovative schools that add resilience to their curricula, with a case study of Geelong Grammar in particular- a new theory of success and intelligence; and evidence on how positive physical health can turn medicine on its head.

Building on his game-changing work on optimism, motivation, and character, Dr Seligman shows us how to flourish and bring well being into our own lives.

In Parenting from the Inside Out, child psychiatrist Daniel J. Siegel, M.D., and early childhood expert Mary Hartzell, M.Ed., explore the extent to which our childhood experiences shape the way we parent. Drawing on stunning new findings in neurobiology and attachment research, they explain how interpersonal relationships directly impact the development of the brain, and offer parents a step-by-step approach to forming a deeper understanding of their own life stories, which will help them raise compassionate and resilient children.

Born out of a series of parents' workshops that combined Siegel's cutting-edge research on how communication impacts brain development with Hartzell's decades of experience as a child-development specialist and parent educator, this book guides parents through creating the necessary foundations for loving and secure relationships with their children.

very parent knows the importance of equipping children with the intellectual skills they need to succeed in school and life. But children also need to master their emotions. Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child is a guide to teaching children to understand and regulate their emotional world. And as acclaimed psychologist and researcher John Gottman shows, once they master this important life skill, emotionally intelligent children will enjoy increased self-confidence, greater physical health, better performance in school, and healthier social relationships. Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child will equip parents with a five-step “emotion coaching” process that teaches how to:

-Be aware of a child's emotions
-Recognize emotional expression as an opportunity for intimacy and teaching
-Listen empathetically and validate a child's feelings
-Label emotions in words a child can understand
-Help a child come up with an appropriate way to solve a problem or deal with an upsetting issue or situation

Written for parents of children of all ages, Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child will enrich the bonds between parent and child and contribute immeasurably to the development of a generation of emotionally healthy adults.

You see here a different kind of happiness book. The How of Happiness is a comprehensive guide to understanding the elements of happiness based on years of groundbreaking scientific research. It is also a practical, empowering, and easy-to-follow workbook, incorporating happiness strategies, excercises in new ways of thinking, and quizzes for understanding our individuality, all in an effort to help us realize our innate potential for joy and ways to sustain it in our lives. Drawing upon years of pioneering research with thousands of men and women, The How of Happiness is both a powerful contribution to the field of positive psychology and a gift to people who have sought to take their happiness into their own hands.

This book is open access, which means that you have free and unlimited access.

Provides a landmark introduction to the growing field of positive education.

Includes a range of theoretical, applied, and practice-focused chapters attractive to academics and practitioners.

Considers the implications of positive psychology research for public policy, curriculum, pedagogy, and teacher training.

How can the latest breakthroughs in the neuroscience of emotional learning transform the classroom? How can teachers use the principles and practices of positive psychology to ensure optimal 21st-century learning experiences for all children? Patty O'Grady answers those questions. Positive Psychology in the Elementary School Classroom presents the basics of positive psychology to educators and provides interactive resources to enrich teachers' proficiency when using positive psychology in the classroom. O'Grady underlines the importance of teaching the whole child: encouraging social awareness and positive relationships, fostering self-motivation, and emphasizing social and emotional learning. Through the use of positive psychology in the classroom, children can learn to be more emotionally aware of their own and others' feelings, use their strengths to engage academically and socially, pursue meaningful lives, and accomplish their personal goals. The book begins with Martin Seligman's positive psychology principles, and continues into an overview of affective learning, including its philosophical and psychological roots, from finding the "golden mean" of emotional regulation to finding a child's potencies and "golden self." O'Grady connects the core concepts of educational neuroscience to the principles of positive psychology, explaining how feelings permeate the brain, affecting children's thoughts and actions; how insular neurons make us feel empathy and help us learn by observation; and how the frontal cortex is the hall monitor of the brain. The book is full of practical examples and interactive resources that invite every educator to create a positive psychology classroom, where children can flourish and reach their full potential.

This book offers practitioners working with 11-14 year olds, a highly practical education resource for running well being lessons.

Positive psychology is a rapidly expanding area of study that is of great interest to students at the graduate, undergraduate, and high school levels. But the field is so broad that teachers who want to cover all the bases when designing a positive psychology course may have difficulty locating and selecting materials.Activities for Teaching Positive Psychology addresses this problem by presenting a comprehensive set of fun, interactive classroom activities devised by contributors who are experienced teachers as well as leading scholars in their areas.Chapters cover all the topics typically included in existing positive psychology textbooks, emphasizing the hands-on experience that makes positive psychology courses so powerful. Extensive reading lists point interested readers towards a fuller understanding of the topics.The book is a rich source of ideas for all teachers of psychology, from novice to experienced instructors.

Practical, actionable information about the positive, behavioural approach to education is in desperately short supply, and yet when implemented properly the impact on school behaviour and achievement can be enormous.

Positive Psychology for Teachers aims to address this gap. Written by experienced practitioners, it gives teachers simple and direct advice on how they can use the positive behavioural approach for the benefit of their pupils and schools.

Based on the authors’ own experiences of intervention in school settings and evidence of its effectiveness, this practical guide includes a number of vignettes and case studies illustrating how the behavioural approach has been used by teachers in a wide variety of classrooms to make their teaching more effective. Each case study will be followed by a number of suggested practical activities for classroom implementation. Throughout the book, background theory is explained in a concise and easily digestible manner and activities are clearly explained with benefits and end goals clearly signposted.

Can we teach others how to lead a fulfilling life? The notion of personal well-being has recently shot up the political and educational agendas, placing the child's well-being at the heart of the school’s task.

With his renowned talent for distilling the most complex of philosophical arguments into accessible laymen's terms, John White addresses the maze of issues surrounding well-being, bringing clarity to this dissension and confusion. This accessible book expertly guides you through the conflicting perspectives on well-being found in the educational world by

* Examining religious and secular views of human fulfilment and of a meaningful life.
* Analysing the appeal of celebrity, wealth and consumerism to so
many of our children.
* Asking what role pleasure, success, autonomy, work, life-planning and worthwhile activities play in children's flourishing.
* Showing how proposals to encourage children's well-being impact on schools' aims and learning arrangements.

Whether you have little background in education and philosophy or are reading as a teacher, student or policy maker, this engaging book will take you right to the heart of these critical issues. It will leave you with a sharply-focused picture of a remodelled educational system fit for our new millennium, committed to helping every child to enjoy a fulfilling life.

This updated edition is a theoretical and practical guide to implementing a well-being programme in your school. The book covers three areas: well-being as a philosophy of education, the teaching approach to well-being and the content that might form a well-being programme in a school. It is also a manifesto for a meaningful aim to education.

There has recently been an explosion of interest in positive psychology and the teaching of well-being and 'happiness' in the PSHE world in schools and many teachers are looking for clear information on how to implement these potentially life-changing ideas in the classroom. This book provides an introduction to the theory of positive psychology and a practical guide on how to implement the theory in (primarily secondary) schools. It is written by Ian Morris who worked under Anthony Seldon at Wellington College which is well-known for its well-being and happiness curriculum.

Positive psychology focuses on building strengths and developing creative and positive thinking in order to boost happiness, well-being and achievement. It helps people to be motivated, maintain positive mental health, and to flourish in all areas of their lives.

This resource is a fully-formed positive psychology programme designed to promote happiness, resilience and motivation in young people aged 11-18. It introduces the theory and research behind positive psychology, and includes a guidance section for facilitators on how to deliver the programme.

The programme itself is made up of 24 chapters which reflect each of the 24 'character strengths' identified by Martin Seligman, the founder of positive psychology. These strengths include creative thinking, kindness, fairness, leadership, forgiveness, and teamwork. Activities teach students how to develop these strengths and skills in order to initiate positive change in their lives.

This resource provides teachers, counsellors, psychologists, social workers and others working with young people with a complete programme to promote well-being in young people and help them flourish in their lives.

The book “ 72 Research – based Activities for Teaching Social and Emotional Skills (Preparatory - Grade 3) ” is presented in a series of short and easily implemented lesson plans that can be taught over a single school term. The activities included in this program are based on real life situations that are fun, interactive, engaging and meaningful to the students. Simple desk activities, scenarios, role-plays, questionnaires, and structured discussions teach and reinforce the concepts and encourage a sense of mastery. A CD with printable worksheets complements the book. This book will be an especially valuable resource for teachers, counselors and educators working with young children as it provides research –supported ways to support children’s social and emotional development in their early primary school years.

This accessible guide advises teachers on creating classroom environments that promote healing and growth for all students, particularly the most vulnerable. Grounded not only in trauma-informed education but in positive psychology, this book helps teachers to set up the most vulnerable students to heal from trauma, build resilience and fulfil their full academic potential.