Senior Years and Wellbeing

We were very fortunate to welcome Professor Michael Carr Gregg to the College on Monday. Michael spent the morning with our Year 7-10 students where he spoke about Resilience. Michael has only just returned from Christchurch in New Zealand where he spent time with children who had been impacted by the 2011 earthquake and the more recent Mosque shootings. He spoke of the incredible resilience of these children and their ability make something good out of something so terrible.

Michael’s definition of Resilience: “the human capacity to face, overcome, be strengthened by and even transformed by adversity”

He then outlined to our students the 5 ingredients that go to into making a resilient person:

Access to a charismatic adult from whom they can draw strength. An adult they feel safe with, listened to and valued by.
High social/emotional competence. Someone who has good anger management skills, who can set goals and can manage conflict.
Self -Talk. The way in which you explain the world to yourself. “It would be nice if…….”
Islands of Competence – Do you have something in your life that gets you up in the morning. Music, Sport, Art?
Spirituality – Do you feel part of something bigger than you? Do you feel a connection to your school, to your sporting club?

The importance of diet and sleep were two other key areas highlighted in his talk. Our Year 7-10s should be trying for around 9 hours of sleep a night. His three tips for getting a good night sleep:

Dim the lights half an hour before you go to bed.
Try and go to bed and wake up at the same time.
Do not consume anything with caffeine after 12:00pm.

He concluded with a few tips on the best “brain foods”

Eggs, Yoghurt (Greek), Avocado, Fish Oil, Blueberries and Walnuts.

In the afternoon Michael spent time with our Year 11-12s focusing on tips to survive the VCE. He emphasized more than once that students are not defined by their ATAR Score.

The most important piece of advice he could offer the 11s and 12s was to keep their brain watered, fed, exercised and rested. He emphasized the need for our student to be sipping on water constantly, making sure exercise is included in their routine daily and the need for 8-9 hours sleep if information is to be retained in the long-term memory. He encouraged all our senior students to do 12,000 steps a day.

Many of the senior students found his study tips very helpful.

Get yourself a study buddy
Practice exams are the most important study you can do.
Any more than 12 hours of part time work a week is detrimental to results.
When studying, blocks of 20 min are the most effective with a 5 min break.
Say and think out loud, walk around the house revising your notes out loud.

Parents may not be too happy with his advice to our Year 12s that they should be exempt from all household chores in Term 4!

Resources Recommended:

Russell Foster – Ted Talk on Sleep
App – 3 Good Things. A way or recording each day what went well.
Smiling Minds – Relaxation/Meditation App.
Family Zone – A computer program that controls the devise usage in a home. Highly recommended!
Self Control – A free program students can add to a Mac computer that will allow them to use the internet but turn off all social media access.
Cold Turkey – Same program but for PCs.
Michael has a number of outstanding books on working with adolescents and new book on brain foods which are available online.

All parents of Years 7-11 students should have received “Your Child at Their Best” information

form. If you feel comfortable filling this in, we would be grateful if this could be e-mailed back to your child’s Mentor.

Kristen Waldron