05 February 2021
Martin Seligman states that Positive Psychology is the ‘scientific study of optimal human functioning [that] aims to discover and promote the factors that allow individuals and communities to thrive’. Literature is a wonderful way to discover and promote the factors that help people to thrive. Within our Junior School Wellbeing program our students explore themes and character development in a variety of texts from picture books to class novels. Throughout this year I will be sharing a picture book each week with the boys across the Junior School, providing them with an opportunity to consider characteristics that contribute to wellbeing and resilience.
I will be placing these books on display in the Junior School Function Room to remind students of the messages shared through our readings. If you would like to highlight a book for me to share, please contact me.
The first book I have shared this week is ‘Be Your Own Man’ by Australian author Jessica Sanders. This is an outstanding read and challenges students to explore the idea of being free to be themselves and connect with a male identity where, as it states in our School Prayer, to be boys who are ‘strong and lovely’.
Ben Storer
Deputy Head of Junior School – Wellbeing and Administration