I’m not sure it is appropriate to say “Welcome back to term 3 at St Pauls” with everything that has happened in the past month.  I’m sure many of you have been somewhat overwhelmed with online learning kicking in again, in addition trying to satisfy your own work commitments from home as well as run a family household.  Personally, I felt “locked up” during the holiday vacation and things just seemed to get worse as the lockdown restrictions tightened.  That aside, I also experienced my son’s work life as he worked from home too.  Might I say, I learnt how complex our world has become since COVID19 reared it’s horrible influence on us all.  As can be seen from the start to this first newsletter for term 3, it is very easy to get into a negative mindset which doesn’t help things and I need to turn this around for the sake of the staff, children and my own wellbeing. 

Try and encourage optimism with your children during this time.  That was the key purpose behind Mr Reardon’s online assemblies (which will be back as soon as I can).  Helping your children to look on the bright side is a significant skill to develop with them during this challenging time.  When children think they can succeed they are more likely to give things a try.  Some children are natural optimists.  They are born with optimistic temperaments and have natural dispositions to deal with challenges and problems.  Others expect the worst and tend to see catastrophes where really small challenges exist.

To promote optimism during the time at home you might need to remind yourself to focus on a few fundamental strategies:

• Model positive thinking and optimism to your children.  Let your kids hear your positive self talk rather than just keeping it to yourself, which is what we normally do.
• Challenging negative or unrealistic appraisals.  For instance: “Everyone hates me, I have no friends”can be challenged with “Sometimes it feels like we have no friends but you spent last weekend playing with __________.”
• Teach your child to positively track.  Children should look for the good things they do and say them to themselves out loud.  They can look for the good things in life, no matter how small and say them to themselves out loud.
• Teach your child to positively reframe their words.  When something unpleasant happens or failure occurs they can look on the bright side.  Eg. “I pranged my bike but atleast I wasn’t hurt.”

The weeks of remote learning is the perfect time to practice some of these strategies with your child. One of my own children needed such support during their primary years.  The other one was so independent and didn’t want any fuss.  You will need to judge the situation and your child’s temperament well to determine whether they actually need support in this way.

I hope the coming weeks of remote learning aren’t too overwhelming for everyone.  Know we are here for you if things get too hard, we have tech support on site every day and can help you easily over the phone.

Go gently,

Michael Reardon
Principal