The Friday Mindset - Issue #39

It's been a draining week for us. Steve's in the classroom or leading his sixth form, or madly scribbling new activities for the next book, Martin's been running sessions on motivation/revision, staff training for schools in Powys, or madly scribbling activities for the next book. We're exhausted and ready for the weekend.

Wait, though. Before we get out of here, let's take a moment. Somehow in all the chaos we found the time to pull a newsletter together and we won't rest until we know you've had a quick skim through the thing!

Off we go.

Something to try...

We've been working with lots of students who are feeling down this week. The pandemic seems endless, there's insecurity around end-of-year exams, university offers haven't arrived yet, relationships at home are strained...

If you're in the same boat, why not try giving this exercise a go? It's one of Steve's favourites from back when his kids were younger, and we've found it can work well in classroom settings too. It's stolen from the work of Martin Seligman, one of the founders of positive psychology. It's very simple, and it's called Three Good Things. It works by raising awareness about our attentional spotlight, then asking us to look out for positive things that are happening in our lives.

We've put together a very short powerpoint for you, with some interesting video clips to watch. Feel free to give it a try!

A quick activity about attentional spotlight and positive psychology

Something we're (re)reading...

Alison and David Price's Psychology of Success, a Practical Guide has been a great starting point for activities similar to the one we've shared above. The book is small, simple and very easily read - the kind of thing you could share with students at KS4 and KS5 and they'd blow through it pretty quickly. (It's also the book that inspired a couple of the activities in The GCSE Mindset; The Ten Year Grid and K-SPA both started out as ideas we got from this book.)

It's small and cheap to buy too - the kind of thing you might have ten copies of so that students can borrow them whenever they need a mental pep-talk. The attitudinal element of study is such a big one it's well worth normalising difficulties and sharing solutions in an easy and accessible way like this. Check it out here:

Introducing Psychology of Success: A Practical Guide (Practical Guide Series)

Our latest offer...

We have a book giveaway this week! Sometimes as we're tidying offices, we unearth old or spare copies of books we've enjoyed or ones we've read so often we know them back-to-front.

The procedure is super-simple. As soon as you read this - like now, do it now - email us at [email protected] and stake your claim. Sometimes they're gone by 3:30pm, other times they're still hanging about by 4:30pm so who knows, it might be worth a go. (Remember, these are books we've bought and read, not free gifts we've shelved and ignored, so they're going to be a bit rough around the edges, OK?)

This week:

  • One copy of The Decisions Book, Krogerus and Tschappeler.

  • One copy of The GCSE Mindset Student Workbook. This one's in mint condish as luck would have it.

And that's it for now, everyone - have a great weekend. Broaden your attentional spotlight, stay positive, head outside and look for signs of Spring. Surely there's something, like a single daffodil or a snowdrop or the discarded foil of a Cadbury's Creme Egg.

Let's hope so. All the best,

Steve and Martin

p.s. this article is years old... but on our minds this week