Self Care > Stress

This year I am excited to have a Senior class again. I really enjoy teaching Seniors for a variety of reasons. Majority of the time they have chosen to be in that class and I like being able to have 'real' conversations with the students. I have a Year 12 SACE Health class - which is the equivalent of a Year 13 NCEA class. My biggest challenge for this class is learning about SACE and the Health course on the go, especially because Health as a SACE course is new in general, not just to Marryatville.

The first unit of the year is based around stress and stress management. Over the last few weeks the students have been involved in an Australian online learning platform called This Way Up. This website has been developed by a myriad of medical professionals, with the aim to help support people and their mental health. There are several programs people from anywhere and of any age can access for support, resources, strategies and tools for several areas of mental health. The creators of the website intentionally designed This Way Up to be accessible, to help reduce the barriers some people may face for self help.

My class have been individually completing the 4 lesson Coping with Stress program. I completed the program before the students, so that I could determine what the in-class activities and tasks were going to be. The program is scenario based and throughout there are several strategies taught and 'implemented' to help the character to identify, prevent and reduce stress. 

To encourage students to apply their knowledge of the tools and strategies they learnt from the program, I gave students tasks to do after each of the 4 lessons, as can be accessed here. These lessons are screenshots of One Note pages students received. One Note gives me real time information about what the student is working on (like Google Docs), which I have really missed! This has helped me to give more feedback to students and to track their progress. These tasks gave students the time to reflect individually on their stress levels, created opportunities for peer conversation and provided a foundation for class discussions, so were a great addition to the Coping with Stress Program. (Sidenote: I am finding it really challenging to ignite full class discussions with this group of students, but they are great chatting within their tables... watch this space!).

There are several great learnings from the program, but I did find there could have been some adaptations to make it more accessible and engaging. For example, the program could be available in multiple languages, there could be a variety of audio and video added and/or there could be interactive tasks throughout (it was mostly a story to click through). I did like that the students were able to access and complete the program at their own pace, which directly impacted on how much they 'got out' of the program. Students commented that the program itself 'wasn't very memorable' and that it was 'too long', but overall the stress unit (combination of the program and the additional tasks) was 'beneficial towards helping [them] to reduce [their] personal stress factors'. If you would like to learn a little more about stress and stress management in general, I blogged about this a few years ago.

I would recommend any teacher to complete this program to determine whether it may be beneficial for your students to also complete. If not, you will still learn/reflect/create/ponder some key thoughts/ideas/tools that you may be able to embed within your teaching. Irrespective of teaching though, these programs have been created with a great intent and will be helpful for anyone who would like further support for their mental health.

Remember, if you need help, don't hesitate to ask for it.

Australia: 1300 22 4636 (Beyond Blue)

New Zealand: 1737 (Need to Talk)

Discovering the Wonders of Kaurna Seasons

Weather is obviously an integral part of the outdoors and Outdoor Education. Not only do we want our OUED students to be aware of weather, we also want them to be aware of the environment and its history. The traditional custodians of the Adelaide Plains are the Kaurna people, and the Kaurna people have different seasons than we recognise in the Western world. 

The four seasons (Warltati, Parnati, Kudlila and Wirltuti) directly relate to weather patterns that we may recognise as summer, autumn, winter and spring and determine the lifestyle choices the Kaurna people make during that season. Here is a short video with a little more information. I met with our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education officers to learn a little more about the seasons, as well as how to pronounce the Kaurna language. Check out the video below for the correct pronunciation. Sidenote - I have noticed and reflected on how ahead New Zealand is with the inclusion of our indigenous language and customs - Aussie is still very much in the early stages and as a result the language is not yet embedded within day-to-day chat. So, others were learning with me too, not only the students.

Rather than having seasons linked to specific dates throughout the year, the times of the Kaurna seasons change. The general time of year is somewhat predictable, but the seasons actually start and end based off what the weather is doing and how the animals are acting and interacting with each other and the environment. For example, during Warltati the yabbies come out of the mud, during Parnati skin rugs and seaweed cloaks are made to prepare for the cold, the ducks and water birds are nesting during Kudlila and crustaceans are collected during Wirltuti. I really enjoyed teaching about these seasons and feedback from the students was that many thought it was interesting too.

Here is the task that I gave the students to encourage them to learn more and compare the Kaurna seasons to the Western world seasons. To extend this learning further, students researched another cultural perspective around seasons and weather around the world. Turns out there are heaps! Some cultures have 2 and others have 7+! 

To learn more about the Kaurna seasons, check out this detailed website.