Wellbeing Literacy Leader - Emily Murcott

Friendships

Do you often find yourself at a loss for advice when your children come to you with their friendship issues? Don’t worry, you’re not alone and we’re here to tell you about what Rolling Hills is implementing throughout 2021 and beyond. URSTRONG provides simple but meaningful language and skills to open up a dialogue with your kids.

URSTRONG is an organisation that has created a whole-school strategy that empowers children with friendship skills to create cultures of kindness in schools. It will provide parents and teachers with the language to better support their children/students.

How will URSTRONG help my child and me?

URSTRONG knows how heartbreaking it is to watch your child struggle with friendship issues and we’re here to provide support and answers to those tricky questions.

URSTRONG's kid-friendly approach creates a common language to open up those lines of communication, helping you feel closer to your child while building trust.

Through practical skills and effective coaching techniques, you will have more confidence to support your child through friendship dramas. Gone will be the days of resorting to saying, “Just ignore it!” or “Suck it up!”.

You will learn how to empower your child to make healthier decisions in their friendships and put out Friendship Fires® (resolve conflict) in a respectful way.

Why are we implementing URSTRONG's strategies?

Research shows that children with healthier friendships perform better academically, have higher self-esteem; get involved in more leadership roles, and make smarter decisions in future relationships.

Friendology uses kids’ language for kids’ problems ensuring a high rate of knowledge retention. It includes skills-based, practical, kid-friendly concepts and it reinforces language through role-playing.

Friendology teaches students to learn how to put a voice to their feelings, what’s normal in a friendship, the difference between healthy and unhealthy friendships, and how to put out Friendship Fires (language used throughout Friendology). Students also learn the difference between normal conflict and mean-on-purpose behaviour.

For further information click here to watch Dana Kerford, the founder of URSTRONG, explains in a short time what Friendology is all about.

In this next video, Dana will introduce you to URSTRONG’s simple framework for guiding children towards healthy friendships. Sit back and relax while Dana walks you through URSTRONG’s unique, kid-friendly language to teach friendship skills and conflict resolution!

Click here

For those who visit Eastland, a shop has been transformed into a URSTRONG information centre. It gives you an opportunity to see and learn about some of the concepts included in Friendology. If you are at Eastland, please pop in and have a look around and learn about the Friendology language. You will find this space opposite the Maternal and Child Health Centre on level 1.

Check out the Prep page to see what they have been learning about Friendology.

Rolling Hills Primary School is incredibly lucky to have such dedicated, kind and nurturing Extra Support Staff (ESS). On Sunday was Education Support Staff day week. However, we celebrated this on Thursday with thank you cards and morning tea to show our gratitude.

Here is what some of our students say about our wonderful ESS:

Chloe (34M) - "I feel safe with them around".

Cooper (34M) - They are always nice and supportive.

Bobbi and Alayna (56H) - They're very sweet".

Alicia (56V) - "They are awesome".

Abbi V (34S) - "They are extremely helpful".

Hamish S (34S) - "They are nice and pretty".

Sadie (1KH) - "Really kind and nice".

Lily S, Madi W and Shifa P (56H) - "They're all very supportive and encouraging and make RHPS and better place".

Please take the time throughout the next week to show appreciation to our wonderful ESS by saying thankyou. They support all students in this school and we would not be the school we are today without them.

You might say, “Kindness means you are concerned about other people. Kind people think about another person’s feelings and not just their own, they help someone who is in need, and they are kind even when others are not. Kind people never expect anything in return. They just treat other people kindly because they want to help make someone’s life better. Kindness makes the world a nicer place because it makes people happier.

Our school Lily S and Bianca P have noted kindness around the school...

Thalia K (5/6H) assisted another student with her work when this student was feeling challenged. But that's not all... Thalia is always a great friend, she is very kind and is willing to help a friend in need.

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