Reach for the Stars

How many times have you heard the expression: “It’s written in the stars?” What does this mean exactly? And by what power is fate written for each and every one of us? How can that be?

So are we all a little starry eyed when it comes to our destiny? Is it written down somewhere what we’re destined to do or to be? This timeless question has puzzled many great philosophers down through the ages and quite a few authors.

In Paulo Coelho’s, lyrical fable, The Alchemist, he tells the tale a young Andalusian shepherd boy, Santiago, who falls asleep in an abandoned, ruined church where an enormous sycamore tree grows. He tends his sheep during the day and at night he reads books. He dreams a recurring dream. He’s dreamt the same dream week after week but wakes each time, before the end of the dream. In this dream, he dreams that if he travels to the pyramids of Egypt, he will find his fortune.

So Santiago sets off on a journey to discover his personal legend.
Along the way he encounters many mysterious and magical people, surprising twists and turns, and omens and obstacles await Santiago on his quest. He meets a gypsy woman who tells him he must go forward on his journey to fulfil his destiny. He meets an old King, who tells Santiago to never stop dreaming and follow the omens and pursue his dream.

He buys a ticket to Tangier, but is robbed of all of his money when he gets there and so he must work for a Crystal Merchant who teaches the young boy about patience - following through and not giving up on his mission, his dream.
The girl of his dreams, he finds in the desert at an oasis and falls in love at first sight. He meets an Alchemist, rumoured to be 200 years old, who gives just the right amount of direction and encouragement to allow Santiago to find his Personal Legend on his own.

As he nears the end of his journey at the pyramids and digs, Santiago finds, in an ironic twist, that the treasure isn't what or where he thought it was. It was in fact back at home in the ruined church where he first began his quest. Life’s often like that, don’t you think? – you never know where you’ll find your treasure.

Have you ever dreamed of finding some long lost treasure? Yes? I did too. As a child I wanted to be an archaeologist to go exploring exotic places in the world, digging for never before seen ancient treasure – just like Indianna Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark. I’m not sure at what point I changed my mind. It may have been when my father pointed out to me that: “Archaeologists are underpaid publicity agents for deceased royalty.”

If nothing else my dad was pragmatic…. Not unlike Indianna Jones, come to think of it. Remember Indianna’s great line to his newly arrived, starry eyed archaeology students:

“Archaeology is the search for fact. Not truth. If it's truth you're interested in, Doctor Tyree's Philosophy class is right down the hall. So forget any ideas you've got about lost cities, exotic travel, and digging up the world. We do not follow maps to buried treasure, and 'X' never, ever marks the spot. Seventy percent of all archaeology is done in the library. Research and Reading.” And he’s right you know.

Treasure is not always buried. Sometimes it’s right under our noses. Don’t believe me? Imagine the surprise of an English brother and sister cleaning out their late parent’s house and happened upon a beautiful vase. Inquisitive as to its value, they took the vase to an antique auctioneer in London, only to be told that it was in fact a rare 18th century Chinese porcelain vase marked with the Imperial seal and was valued at $800,000. At the auction held last week, a fast and furious bidding war commenced and in less than 30 minutes the vase had sold to the shocked pair for $83 million!

I can see it in your eyes now – you’re thinking - If only I could have been that person…..but in a sense we are that person. We do have treasure right under our noses and sometimes we just don’t even see it. There’s a saying that ‘familiarity breeds contempt’ and I think this is true to some extent. We don’t value what treasure we have around us, and unfortunately, we find out too late, the value of something that we’ve lost or something that is gone forever.

For students, the treasure of your home and family life are things that you can take for granted. The one true thing I have learned in this life is that it can change in the blink of an eye. Treasure your parents. Respect your teachers and make the most of every opportunity to learn. Don’t leave it too late, don’t have regrets later in life that you didn’t make the most of the opportunities that you have at Caloundra City Private School.

For our graduating Year 12s, the class of 2010….
You have a wonderful new adventure ahead of you, just like Santiago. This journey may seem daunting to you now – wondering about your OP, or the university or a future career. You will have trials and tribulations along the way for sure but you only have one life. Follow your dreams to the nth degree. Don’t give up believing in yourself and what you can achieve. Dig deep when you need to and be courageous ; be bold. Reach for the stars – and as someone once quipped: if your boat doesn’t come into shore, swim out to meet it!
Seize the day. Carpe Diem.

For Parents

Continue to support your sons and daughters as they reach for the stars. We at the School will do all in our power to help these dreams come true.

For our school as a whole, we’re on a journey too. A journey to great achievements and great deeds. Thank you for your loyalty to the School. Thank you for your trust in us to help your sons and daughters grow and develop into young people of good character and it is our mission and our dream to allow every student to shine.

Paulo Coelho’s lyrical tale “The Alchemist” is a fable about following one's dreams, listening to one's heart. Coelho shows how easy it is to give up ever attaining one's dreams due to complacency - or not wanting to move out of one's comfort zone. "People are afraid to pursue their most important dreams, because they feel that they don't deserve them, or that they'll be unable to achieve them." "There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure."
Yet Santiago does want to pursue his dream of finding his treasure and yes, at times we see and feel his fear, but along his journey, he has learned to listen to his heart and to trust what his heart teaches him.

Santiago learns about love along the way and helps others to face their fears as well. Coelho states, "And that's where the power of love comes in. Because when we love, we always strive to become better than we are." Yes we do.

I would like to share this beautiful passage from Marianne Williamson’s “Return to Love”:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?.... Your playing small does not serve the world well at all.
There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. … It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. "

It's the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting.
Never stop dreaming.
Reach for the stars every single day.

Karon Graham

Life is Making the Most of Every Moment - Don't Sweat the Small Stuff

How many times do we lament what happens in a day - all the bad stuff - instead of focusing on the positives in our life?

Life is here to be enjoyed, not endured. We only have one chance to live the life we do, so make the most of every moment. Celebrate every new dawn, like it was your last and 'don't sweat the small stuff'.

Life is an opportunity, benefit from it.
Life is beauty, admire it.
Life is bliss, taste it.
Life is a dream, realize it.
Life is a challenge, meet it.
Life is a duty, complete it.
Life is a game, play it.
Life is a promise, fulfill it.
Life is sorrow, overcome it.
Life is a song, sing it.
Life is a struggle, accept it.
Life is a tragedy, confront it.
Life is an adventure, dare it.
Life is luck, make it.
Life is too precious, do not destroy it.
Life is life, fight for it.

(Mother Teresa)

Qualities of a Person of Good Character

“She’s such a character,” I hear people say and they’re usually referring to some larger than life, over the top person with quirky fashion sense or eccentric manner. Many famous characters of this kind come to mind. Think of comedian Phyllis Diller with her wild hair and ditzy laugh, or Jennifer Saunders and her outrageous fashion sense in Absolutely Fabulous, or Barry Humphries’ alter ego Dame Edna Everage and ‘her gladdies’, or English actor Rowan Atkinson’s, Mr Bean – what can I say about Mr Bean – he defies explanation. These characters all have this amazing ability to bring together both endearing and cringe worthy qualities that usually make us laugh and see the funny side of life.

What of a person’s character though? What are the qualities that mark a person of ‘good character’? History reveals many great men and women of character – people tested by difficult and dangerous circumstances beyond their control, but triumphing over extreme adverse conditions, by their very will and determination - India’s liberator, Mahatma Gandhi, England’s ‘mother of nursing’, Florence Nightingale, America’s Afro-American Civil Rights leader, Martin Luther King, Calcutta’s carer of the children of the slum, Mother Teresa, American President Benjamin Franklin, and New Zealander and Australian restorer of sight amongst indigenous people, Fred Hollows. Were these people perfect? No they were not. Did they have good character though? Yes, they did. So how do we measure a person’s character?

The giant Californian redwoods are amongst the world’s tallest trees and while they are the world’s largest trees currently living, it may surprise many people to know that an Australian Mountain Ash (Eucalyptus regnans) was the world’s largest tree ever recorded. According to historical records, the Ferguson Tree was reported at over 154m (nearly 500 feet high). It was measured by Surveyor Ferguson in 1872 in the Watts River Catchment near Healesville, in Victoria. The point about these giant trees is that they are supported by massive root systems, which represent almost two thirds of the tree’s mass. These root systems are of course hidden underground and out of sight. A person’s character, similarly, is often hidden from the visible eye; these intangible qualities lie deep within a person’s psyche but they are there, none-the-less, like an inbuilt moral compass. On the other hand, someone’s outward personal appearance and personality, is on show and there for all to see.

What is the difference between someone’s personality and his or her character? Personality is the natural or inborn traits of a person - the outward show of who they are, which could range from: extraverted, bright and bubbly, quiet and shy, confident and commanding, caring and compassionate to introverted and studious and all variations in between. This is very different though from someone’s character. Someone can be very charming (a personality trait) but a charlatan or a cheat (a character trait).

Character, is a learned behaviour and reflects someone’s attitudes and values. In a nutshell, character is a set of behaviour traits that define what sort of person you are. Your moral or ethical qualities if you like – qualities of honesty, courage, integrity, trustworthiness, respectfulness, responsibility, caring and compassion. People judge your personal character by their perception of how you respond to challenges. Someone who perseveres in the face of adversity and works persistently to complete a task or sees something through is generally thought to be someone of good personal character. By every measure Fred Hollows was such a man. He never wavered in his mission to bring sight to thousands of people suffering from trachoma, in aboriginal communities in Australia, Nepal, Eritrea and Vietnam. He organised manufacturing labs to provide low cost lenses (about $10 each) to the people of these countries and trained many ordinary citizens on how to complete the procedure in remote, often war-torn and inhospitable parts of the world. He was a humble person but a great visionary, a ‘giant’ among men – a man of great character.

It’s not easy though to be a person of good character all the time. Even Benjamin Franklin, one of America’s greatest Presidents who identified thirteen values to live by, and wrote to his son about these virtues, (including them in his autobiography), was often unable to live by these very virtues, succumbing to gout, excessive drinking and other less virtuous behaviours. As I say, no one is perfect but, the reality is that:

“You can’t discover light by analysing the darkness.”

All of us can learn how to be a person of good character, or to be a better person. It’s something we can all strive to achieve. I will be the first to admit that it’s not always easy, particularly when you’re a young person and facing enormous peer pressure to do something that you know is not right. Part of learning how to be person of character is being able to show integrity – doing the right thing in a difficult situation under pressure. Admitting when we’re wrong, owning up when we’ve done the wrong thing and being honest about it is one of life’s toughest challenges. Hiding the facts, deceiving others to ‘protect our own skin’ is no way to develop into a person of good character. Taking the consequences and learning from our mistakes is the only way that we can move forward as a person of character.

Our aim at Caloundra City Private School is to develop good character – traits of honesty, respect, trustworthiness, integrity, responsibility, self-discipline, compassion and care - in every single student. Together, the School and parents can achieve this goal. Our students, like the great Mountain Ash and Redwoods, can one day be ‘giants’ among men and women, if only they continue to learn from their mistakes and make good choices, that ultimately develop within them, a person of integrity – a person of great character. This timeless verse from Samuel Smiles captures the essence of ‘building’ character in young people.

“Sow a thought, reap and action;
Sow an action, reap a habit;
Sow a habit, reap a character;
Sow a character, reap a destiny”

Karon Graham

Books that Matter to Me: "The Element"

Sir Ken Robinson's book: "The Element" is a book about finding your passion in life.

Don't be put off by the title, that sounds more like the discovery of some mystical chemistry compound, than the lyrical series of stories it tells about people - ordinary people who discover within themselves, extraordinary talents and gifts.

Sir Ken Robinson is a life force to be reckoned with - he has all the educational credentials (been there - a Professor in England's most prestigious universities, and done that), and is an internationally recognised leader in creativity, innovation, education and human capacity. He was knighted in 2003 for his contribution to education and the arts and in 2008 received the Benjamin Franklin Medal from the Royal Society of Arts, awarded to a global 'big thinker' who has energised public discourse about human progress. One of the best short clips you are ever likely to see on creativity is on youtube, from his TED lecture on creativity: http://www.ted.com/ or just google Ken Robinson.

Back to the book though ...... Robinson tells us story after story of people, who for all intents and purposes, were a little different from their families, their peers and for want of a better term, the 'norm'. Robinson contends, that all of us have unique gifts and talents; sometimes these gifts have been stymied by 'industrialised education' - we have had the creative juices sucked dry by old fashioned methods and attitudes to education. (my words...) Sadly for us educationalists, Robinson is somewhat disparaging of what we do to children through the educative process. (I should reassure readers, that this is not the case at my school!) He points out that some of the most brilliant, creative people he knows did not do well at school and most of them did not find out, who they really were 'until they had left school and recovered from their education.' A sad indictment indeed!

He tells the story of how Gillian Lynne's mother (and successive teachers) worried that she could not sit still at school and stay focused. As a last resort, her mother took her to a psychiatrist who told her, "You know, Mrs Lynne, Gillian isn't sick. She's a dancer. Take her to a dance school." Gillian Lynne went onto dance for the Royal Ballet School in London, and became a highly successful choreographer with Andrew Lloyd Webber, including 'Cats' and 'The Phantom of the Opera'.

Robinson tells story after story of people rejected initially for the one thing that they were to become famous for in the future: Paul McCartney was rejected by the choir of Liverpool Cathedral, John Cleese went through school and university where no teacher recognised he had a sense of humour. Creativity is like intelligence, we all have it, but sometimes we doubt our own abilities to the point where we no longer see or believe in our own intelligence and creativity. As Robinson points out: "when people say they're not creative, it's often because they don't know what's involved or how creativity works in practice."

Robinson claims that you can be creative at anything - not just in the arts, design or advertising, but also in science, maths, engineering, business, athletics - just about everything. It's all about recognising the 'unique powers of imagination'.

Key messages from Robinson's book for me:

• We can all be imaginative, if we step back and release our minds from the immediate here and now - we can hypothesise, speculate, suppose and conjecture. We can all do this!


• We sometimes need to find 'our tribe' - people with like interests and passions - they can be collaborators or competitors. What connects a tribe is a common commitment to the thing they feel they were born to do.


• Creativity is a step beyond imagination because it requires you to do something rather than lie around thinking about it.


• At some point, to achieve, we need to be 'in the zone'. Doing what we love does not necessarily mean that we will be 'in the zone', sometimes we have to develop our own ritual to get the creative juices flowing and these rituals, don't always work!


• You sometimes have to overcome extraordinary barriers to find your 'passion'; sometimes there are 'circles of constraint' - personal ones, social ones and cultural ones.... but don't give up on your dream! Overcoming our own demons and thinking, is the toughest battle.

• The Element is about transforming your life - a roadmap if you like - encouraging stories of how other ordinary folk have changed their lives by following their passion.


• Finally, it's never too late! Be inspired! Be committed! Follow through!

• FOLLOW YOUR PASSION!
  

Maybe reading books is not your thing, but this is one book everyone should read. If you want to be inspired, with a healthy helping of humour, with strategies to meet the challenge of inertia or self doubt; if you want to find your real passion or 'your element', then this is the book for you.

Or for the 'time poor' or those of you lacking motivation, try watching the youtube clip on my blog site. It's like the 'reader's digest' version of the full story.... maybe enough to tempt you to discover your own passion, or if you have discovered your own passion, to follow that dream and do something about it!

Good Luck!

Be True to Yourself

Be yourself - Truthfully

Accept yourself - Gracefully

Value yourself -Joyfully

Forgive yourself - Completely

Treat yourself - Generously

Balance yourself - Harmoniously

Bless yourself - Abundantly

Trust yourself - Confidently

Love yourself - Wholeheartedly

Empower yourself - Prayerfully

Give yourself - Enthusiastically

Express yourself - Radiantly

Above all, be gentle on yourself. No one is perfect and some days you will rather forget, but there are lots of days and lots of moments that we can rejoice in and be happy about.

Don't lose sight of the big picture in life. What's important right this minute may not be important in the long term - in a week's time or a year's time. Keep life in perspective. Enjoy life!

Be true to yourself.

The Times, They Are a Changing

Nothing stays the same. Time marches on whether we like it or not. Remember the dinosaurs that dominated the earth millions of years ago? These gigantic creatures reigned supreme for millions of years – 200 million to be precise, from the Triassic period 240 million years ago until their cataclysmic demise in the late Cretaceous period, 65 million years ago. Many theories abound on the fall of the dinosaurs, but as a species they survived for so long, and yet it is a stunning reality, that within a very short period of time, they all disappeared. Why?

During a similar time period, and even older, are the ancient ancestors of the common cockroach – the Archimylacris eggintoni , which has survived and evolved over 300 million years. This insect scuttled around forest floors during the Carboniferous period 359 - 299 million years ago, which is sometimes referred to as the age of the cockroach because fossils of Archimylacris eggintoni and its relatives are amongst the most common insects from this time period. They are found all over the world.

Yes I realise that this is not everyone’s favourite topic, but it’s amazing that this pesky creature has survived for so long – many scientists would argue (and some people joke) that if there was a nuclear explosion, the cockroach would be one of the rare survivors. Why?

The history pages are full of the rise and fall of great cultures and great cities and even great countries and empires. Think about the classic rise and fall of the Roman Empire from 201BC until AD476. Ancient history is a lesson in life – never ending phases of growth, successful adaptation, cultural or anthropological peaks, population explosion, excess, decline and extinction. It begs the question:”Why?”
What we know is that nothing stays the same and those things that do stay the same, simply don’t survive. Anything that fails to adapt and change to new circumstances is doomed to oblivion. As famous politician and statesmen, Harold Wilson once said:
"He who rejects change is the architect of decay. The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery."

I could be facetious and say that education is one of the few industrial age survivors; some schools never seem to change – they’re like islands where the drawbridge comes down at the start of the day, students enter and the drawbridge goes down again at the end of the day and the students go home to the ‘real world’. Any semblance to preparation for the real world is purely coincidental and accidental.

Caloundra City Private School is not one of these schools. Technologically, the School has led and will continue to lead the way in educational innovation on the Sunshine Coast and in Queensland. The introduction of the Apple iPad is in keeping with the latest developments in digital evolution and points to the future direction of digital education with internet based applications on mobile devices. While the introduction of the Apple iPad coincides with the launch of the new School name, it is in itself, a trial of the new technology.

Unlike the dinosaurs that failed to adapt to the new conditions, the School is embracing the new and evolving direction in technology. The one area that has grown astronomically in recent years has been in the area of internet based applications on mobile devices. Apple leads the way in educational applications (Apps) and the introduction of iPads to Years 10, 11 and 12 as well as in the Junior School, will allow the school to more fully explore the best way forward for students and teachers. In life, it is those who change most successfully with the changing times that are the real winners. As was once said of the rise and fall of the Roman Empire :
“The winds and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators.”

The new School name has been one of evolution rather than revolution and the Board has taken into account a number of factors in deciding on the new name. Because the School’s name is already well known on the Sunshine Coast and has developed its own distinctive ‘branding’, it was obvious that this would be lost if there was a wholesale change to the name. Coupled with the fact that the real issue with the previous name was that no one was really sure about the School’s status, the Board decided that the best course of action was a simple but effective change to the name of the School by adding the word ‘private’. No one is any doubt now, that the School is an independent, private school. Yes a good outcome, because the change will not require any immediate changes to be made from a parents’ perspective and the transition to new badge and logo will be gradual, as uniform items need to be replaced.

Technology, on the other hand, leaps forward at a breakneck pace without any sight of relenting. If anything, technology seems to be growing and re-inventing itself at an exponential pace. The bottom line is that technology, like most things in life, is evolving and it is because of this rapid evolution, that Caloundra City Private School will not be relegated to the history pages, like the dinosaurs or the litany of old world schools and cultures, but will continually seek to be at the forefront of technological innovation. We are preparing our students for a world very different from ours. As Yogi Berra said: “The future ain’t what it used to be.”

iPads coming to Caloundra City Private School

Press Release:

Mr Roy Henzell, Chairman of the Board of the Caloundra City School, announced today that the name of the school was to be changed to the “Caloundra City Private School”. In making this decision, the Board considered that the name change was necessary, given the amount of uncertainty in the wider community about the status of CCS, with many people not realising that CCS was a private, independent school. To avoid this confusion, the Board has decided to add the word “Private” to the school’s name. The Board felt that the new name would more properly reflect the vibrant and exciting nature of this school, located at Pelican Waters on the Sunshine Coast.

The first Year 12 students to graduate from the school this year, will graduate as students of the “Caloundra City Private School”.

“There would be minimum financial impact on existing students and parents as a result of the change of name, there being no immediate change to badges. There will be a transition period of a couple of years before any uniform changes become necessary”, Mr Henzell said.

“To celebrate the name change, the Board has also decided that in 2011, every student in Years 10, 11 and 12, will be given, free of charge, an Apple iPad, while they remain enrolled at the School. Caloundra City Private School will be the very first school in Australia and maybe the world to offer such an amazing educational experience to its Senior students.

“This will add yet another dimension to the students’ learning at School and at home. Rather than hide from new technology at CCPS, we will continue to embrace the opportunities that are afforded by new directions in technology. Even our Prep Year level will have a class set of iPads to use at School in 2011”, the School’s Principal, Mrs Karon Graham said.

“Caloundra City Private School has led and will continue to lead the way in technology on the Sunshine Coast and in Queensland. The introduction of the iPad is in keeping with the latest developments in digital evolution and points to the future direction of digital education with internet based applications on mobile devices”, said Mrs Graham.

Any parents interested in hearing more about this innovative school should contact the School’s Administration to organise a tour of the School and meeting with the Principal.

Say 'NO' to Underage Drinking!

“Thank goodness my child doesn’t do drugs,” you say with a sigh of relief. It scares me to say this, but many parents believe, rather misguidedly, that if their teenage son or daughter drinks alcohol, then they are not ‘doing drugs’. Many parents don’t actually appreciate that alcohol is a drug, nor do they understand some of the very real dangers of underage drinking.

“It is a shocking and worrying statistic that one teenager between the ages of 14 and 17 dies each week as a result of alcohol abuse. Many more are hospitalised. Binge drinking can lead to violence, high risk sexual activity, depression and in some instances, brain damage and alcohol dependence” according to Dr Christine Bennett, Chief Medical Officer, MBF, Australia.

Research reveals that binge drinking has reached epidemic levels in Australia as alcohol consumption has now become the biggest single social issue for teens facing our country. Professor Margaret Hamilton from the National Drug and Alcohol Council reports that binge drinking is a term given to the dangerous practice of consuming large quantities of alcoholic beverages (more than five standard drinks) in a single session. Binge drinking is an Australian phenomenon and contrary to popular belief is a greater problem in Australia than in any other country. It’s as if Australians see this as some kind of ’rite of passage’ and accept teenage drinking as inevitable. There’s a worrying complacency in this attitude that must be addressed by all families.

Here’s some of the cold hard facts about teenagers drinking in Australia:

• By age 18, more than 70% of teenagers have had a least one drink (MBF)
• 25% of those aged 14-19years drank alcohol on a daily or weekly basis in the last 12 months (ABS: Alcohol Consumption in Australia 2004-05 Report)
• Over 80% of all the alcohol consumed by 14-17 year olds is drunk at risky/high risk levels for acute harm (National Drug Research Institute, Curtin University)
• 1 in 10 teenagers binge drink
• More teens drink alcohol than smoke or use drugs (MBF Report)
• Alcohol kills more teenagers than deaths from all illicit drugs combined
• Over 3000 Australians die each year as a result of harmful drinking (ABS)
• Over 3000 14-17 year olds were hospitalised for alcohol-attributable injury and disease 1999-00 (NDRI)
• 28.5% of high school students nationwide rode in a car driven by someone who had been drinking - one or more times in the 30 days prior to the NSDU survey
• 51% of alcohol consumed is drunk at levels that pose a risk of short-term harm (ABS)

What do we know about the development of the teenage brain?

We don’t know everything but we do know that drinking during the adolescent years interrupts brain development. (Dr Susan Tapert, University of California) and in particular:
• Alcohol is a toxin and disrupts this crucial window of development.
• Alcohol can lead to problems such as learning difficulties, cognitive deficits, memory impairment and emotional problems like depression and anxiety.
• Teenage drinking is dangerous. Alcohol inhibits teenager’s ability to think through consequences of their actions causing them to take silly risks like getting into fights, drink driving, unwanted sex and serious accidents.

The best advice that doctors and experts in the field of adolescent development suggest is that parents delay teenage drinking for as long as possible, at least until 18 years old. Don’t give alcohol at home to underage teenagers and don’t buy alcohol for your teenager, in some misguided hope that they won’t take drugs.

What does the research tell us?

Research shows that children are less likely to drink when parents are involved in their lives and when they and their parents report feeling close to one another. It also tells us that teens who begin drinking by age 15 are five times more likely to become dependent on alcohol than those who start at 21. The chances of becoming dependent decrease by 14% for each year the introduction of alcohol is delayed. (drinkwise.com.au)

Tips for Parents: Delay, delay, delay!

• Drink responsibly yourself and don’t glorify drinking and intoxication. Be a good role model and be consistent in your attitude and behaviour in relation to drinking alcohol. Explain the importance of ‘drinking responsibly’ to your child.

• The more you talk to your son or daughter about alcohol before they are of an age to drink alcohol, the less likely they are to drink to excess. It’s important to talk to young people about enjoying life without relying on stimulants such as alcohol – after all it’s addictive - the brain becomes accustomed to the stimulus and requires more and more to be satisfied.

• Talk to your son or daughter’s friends’ parents about drinking alcohol and get a consensus about not allowing underage drinking.

• Talk to your child about peer pressure and drinking alcohol. The more strategies young people have before the ‘peer pressure’ the more prepared they will be to handle the situation.

• Use this newsletter as an opportunity to talk to your (pre) teenage son or daughter about drinking alcohol. It's very important that families share a meal together at the dining room table each night. Don’t underestimate the power of this simple practice to reinforce good messages to your children and research shows that it also reduces the risk of young people using drugs.

Research shows that the partnership between parents and the school is one of the best protective factors for young people; working together we can help mould our young people into fine, upstanding and responsible adults. Trust me, it’s definitely worth the effort!

Prayer for Busy Times

A dear friend recently sent me this prayer, which I thought I would share with all of my busy friends..... hope you enjoy it as much as I did and don't cringe too much if you see yourself in some of these situations ...... no one's perfect ! Well, then again ...... :)

Prayer for Busy Times
(and for those who are just a little too controlling...)

Lord help me to relax about insignificant details beginning tomorrow at 5:45 am
God help me to consider people’s feelings, even if most of them ARE hypersensitive.
God help me to take responsibility for my own actions, even though they’re usually NOT my fault.
God, help me to not try to RUN everything. But, if You need some help, please feel free to ASK me!
Lord, help me to be more laid back, and help me to do it EXACTLY right.
God help me to take things more seriously, especially laughter, parties, and dancing.
God give me patience, and I mean right NOW!
Lord help me not be a perfectionist. (Did I spell that correctly?)
God, help me to finish everything I sta
God, help me to keep my mind on one th — Look, a bird — ing at a time.
God help me to do only what I can, and trust you for the rest. And would you mind putting that in writing?
Lord keep me open to others’ ideas, WRONG though they may be.
Lord help me be less independent, but let me do it my way.
Lord help me follow established procedures today. On second thought, I’ll settle for a few minutes.
Lord, help me slow down andnotrushthroughwhatIdo.

Amen.

Facebook: Friend or Foe?

There’s no getting around it, Facebook is here to stay. Facebook has become the greatest phenomenon of our time, following hot on the heels of the invention of the Internet and the answer to all our questions: Google. In 2004, Mark Zuckerberg and three others launched the site from Harvard University, as a way for university friends to stay in touch with one another. Since this time, Facebook has grown at such an unbelievable pace that six years later, a staggering 500 million people worldwide now have Facebook accounts. According to a recent Time Magazine article (May 31, 2010) more than one in four people who browse the Internet, have a Facebook account and return to the site frequently. Facebook dominates the social networking scene, and leaves in its wake, other social networks such as MySpace, Twitter and Linkedlin.

In the USA and Canada, over 40 percent of the population has a Facebook account and Australia is not far behind with over 30 percent of Australians with Facebook accounts. For many people, Facebook has become a ‘second home’. According to Time reporter, Dan Fletcher, Facebook users share more than 25 billion pieces of information with Facebook each month and 1 billion unique and very personal images are added each week! With over 48 billion unique images, Facebook holds the world’s largest photo collection, which is for all intents and purposes, shared with millions of others. Yes you can untag your name, if you find an unflattering image of yourself that someone else has posted on Facebook, but there’s not much more you can do to remove it.

Social networking has taken on a ‘life’ of its own. Gone are the days of face to face meetings with friends, now, it mostly happens, rather ironically in a ‘faceless to faceless’ world called Facebook. Some critics would go as far as saying that Facebook is not really a social networking site as much as it is an ‘anti-social’ network. ‘Isn’t it ironic…..don’t you think’, sings Alanis Morisette and she could very well be singing about Facebook, because it’s the one place where you can have hundreds of “friends”, who aren’t really friends at all. Now don’t get me wrong, I know that Facebook is a wonderful way to stay in touch with real friends, far-flung friends and family but equally, it poses a potpourri of potential problems.

So what are some of the problems and pitfalls that come from using Facebook and what can you do as a parent? The list is long but here are some of the major concerns and more importantly what parents can do to better educate their teenagers about Facebook. As a parent, I know there’s a natural inclination to want to ban the use of Facebook, for all of its problems and issues, but seriously it’s not the answer. Like most things in life, young people have to learn for themselves, sometimes through trial and error, with lots of guidance from caring parents, the most effective way to use this form of communication.

I would like to stress at this point, that like all forms of communication, social network sites are not dissimilar to other written forms of communication such as email, text messaging, tweets and the like, in that, there are polite and socially acceptable forms of communicating and there are rude, anti-social, disrespectful, illegal and defamatory forms of communication too. It’s important that parents discuss basic social etiquette of written communication and encourage young people to reflect beforehand rather than regret afterwards, what can’t be undone.

Teenagers can be very impulsive and write comments that can be hurtful, upsetting and in some extreme cases, bullying or defamatory. Recent tragic events of youth suicides have stemmed from postings on social network sites and the consequences of unthinking, thoughtless comments or photos or video can be devastating to individuals and their families and friends. Young people need to learn the basic skills of social responsibility and the possible consequences of irresponsible behaviour and actions.

Teenagers should take great care to not share too much personal information in their ‘public profile’. Anyone who uses Facebook is leaving a digital ‘footprint’ that can live forever on Facebook. Once something has been posted on the site, it’s out of their control and can be copied, pasted and forwarded to others. So called ‘friends’ can suddenly become their worst enemies.

Parents should set rules about what should and should not be posted on Facebook; no one wants to have something like a compromising photo or comment to come back to haunt them, months or even years later. Similarly, it would be wise to talk to your son and daughter about ‘time limits’ and insist that they keep within these set limits. Facebook can be addictive and many young people will spend in excess of four hours a day on Facebook. Do the maths; this is far too much time being spent on questionable ‘conversations’ that could be better spent in the real world on more productive activities.

Young people should be made aware that it’s not just their ‘friends’ who go onto Facebook to see what’s going on in their world. Unfortunately there have been hundreds and probably thousands of people around the world who have lost their jobs because of careless, rude, crude and derogatory comments made about co-workers, bosses and the organisation with whom they work or photos and comments which compromise the character of the employee. Employers will often search the profiles of prospective employees to establish whether they are the sort of person that they would be happy to employ. Parents would be wise to discuss this possibility with their teenager.

Your name and photo are always publicly viewable, and even though it’s possible to limit who sees all of your personal information, Facebook has a bad habit of changing its privacy settings. This means that the onus is on the Facebook users to reset their privacy settings. Parents should sit down with their teenager and go through the privacy settings on their Facebook account to ensure that the strictest privacy settings are in place. Unfortunately, even with these privacy settings, it’s possible to ‘hack into’ someone else’s Facebook account, so for this reason alone, young people should be circumspect about what they post on their site. Facebook continues to find ways to share individual person’s details with commercial third parties. It’s no accident that more and more ads appear as you use Facebook.

‘Time out’ or closing the Facebook account can be a last resort measure to better educate your son or daughter or to protect them. Blocking people, who have not done the right thing, of have shown themselves to be untrustworthy might be an effective way to minimise potential problems and avert a ‘war of words’ which seems to be part of the norm of ‘soap opera dramas’ that unfold in the world of teenage life.

Remember that young people need guidance and advice. Never assume that they can sort out all of their own problems. At CCS we take the matter of educating each child on appropriate social etiquette in the real world as well as in that other world of the social networking very seriously. Much of what happens on Facebook, happens in the privacy of your own home, but I have noticed increasingly with the use of sophisticated, web enabled mobile phones, that students are accessing Facebook at all times of the day. This is one area where the School and all families should work in concert to better educate our young people.

The fact is that people like to share, how else can you explain the phenomenal growth of Facebook? What our young people need to realise and understand though is that there’s a difference between sharing with ‘real friends and family’ and sharing personal information, photos and stories that will be used and abused by others. Always err on the side of caution and remember: everything in moderation, with a good dose of common sense, a healthy social responsibility and respect for self and others and the pitfalls and perils of Facebook may be averted or at the very least minimised.

Whether Facebook is friend or foe, largely depends on how people use Facebook. In the end, it boils down to who uses it and what the purpose of using Facebook is. Staying in touch with real friends and family members is a great use of Facebook, which can bring much joy and delight but like most of life there is a polar opposite - a dark side if you like - not just to Facebook but to all forms of communication. Used wisely, Facebook is a real friend, used unwisely, Facebook is your worst nightmare! Ultimately, you decide.

September Holiday Plans 2010

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Eat that frog now!

“Eat that frog”, brings to mind all sorts of connotations and most of them, not good for sure. Now before you go thinking I have lost the plot, I should explain exactly why you should ‘eat that frog’. According to author Brian Tracy, your frog is your biggest, most important task, the one you are most likely to procrastinate on if you don’t do something about it. ‘The frog’ part comes from Mark Twain who once quipped:

"Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day."

There are lots of reasons why we put off doing the biggest, most important task. Some of us are perfectionists and let our desire to have the task or the outcome to be so idealised and perfect that it stymies our ability to actually start the task. Some people suffer inertia because the task seems too large to deal with, while others are so lacking motivation or drive that they fail to start, or there is another group of people who mean to do the task (and know that the task has to be done), but let the myriad of little, unimportant things get in the way so that they never have time to even start, let alone complete the most important task. You’re not alone if you recognise yourself in one of these groups.

Stephen Covey has a great method of sorting the important from the unimportant tasks. He says that all tasks fall into one of four categories or quadrants. Important tasks are the activities that represent your values, mission and high priority goals and urgent tasks are activities that require immediate attention.

• Important and urgent e.g. Crisis, deadline driven projects, meetings, reports
• Important and non-urgent e.g. Preparation, planning, relationship building, prevention, values clarification and re-creation
___________________________________________________________
• Unimportant and urgent e.g. needless interruptions, unimportant meetings, email, phone calls, and dealing with other people’s minor issues
• Unimportant and non urgent e.g. ‘busy’ work, phone calls, email, excessive television, internet and relaxation

Many of us focus on the tasks below the line, that is, the unimportant ‘busy stuff’, which consumes us and occupies our minds, most of the time, most days. Covey argues that we would be more productive and have better outcomes if we focused on and live “north of the line”, that is on the important and urgent, but also the important and non urgent. If we were to spend more of our productive time on preparation, planning, and the most important tasks, then it’s more likely that we will achieve far more and be more successful in the long term.

Remember John Lennon’s line: “Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans” Well, yes, this is true to a point, but keep in mind that doing the ‘unimportant busy stuff’ can be a sheer waste of our time and energy and at the end of it all, we have not achieved or moved closer to our more important goals and achieving our most important tasks.
It’s time to reclaim back part of our life that may have gone astray and divest ourselves of the ‘busy unimportant’ parts of our life. Some ways you might do this, is to:

• Limit the amount of time spent watching television
• Limit the time spent writing and answering emails
• Limit the time spent on interruptions, phone calls and the like
• Do the most important tasks first – prioritise them
• Keep going on these tasks until they’re completed
• Allocate time to planning and preparing for the day, week and rest of the year
• Write down your top three priorities or tasks each day and work on these
• Spend time each day working on your ‘real’ priorities – number them, so that you know what’s most important to you at that point in time or in the future
• Spend quality time but more importantly, spend more time with your family
• Ask yourself, “If I could do only one thing all day long, which task would contribute the greatest value to my life, or my career or my happiness?”; that’s what you need to focus on that day, according to Brian Tracy.

It's not a perfect world and sometimes our best intentions come unstuck by the 'busyness' of life but it is within all of us to make some small changes that might yield amazing results in what we can achieve in life. It's worth the effort to make some simple changes, apply some easy strategies that can exponentially improve our productivitiy and ultimately our happiness and sense of achievement. What are you waiting for? As Brian Tracy would suggest: Eat that frog now!

How Can One Person Make a Difference?

I think deep down in all of us, we want to ‘make a difference’ in this world. Some people are able to affect change on a global scale, like Bob Geldof and the Live Aid Concert which raised millions of dollars to help ease poverty and famine in Ethiopia. Geldof did not start out with a noble mission of changing the world’s attitude to famine, but appalled by images of famine in Dafur he took action. In his own words, Geldof says that momentum built faster than he could ever imagine or organise: “ hundreds of people dropped everything to do this one thing…..No one particularly stood in my way; on the contrary, doors impenetrable a week earlier swung open effortlessly.”(Geldof, Is That It?, 281)

In the book, 'Getting to Maybe: How the World is Changed', authors Westley et al, discuss at length this notion of change and the growing social conscience and the need to take action on matters that affect all of humanity and how momentum can build quickly to bring this about. Famous author and poet, Victor Hugo once said: ‘There is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come.’ and this has been the case, time again, in the turning points of human history. Think of the change that Gandhi brought through his ‘passive resistance’ which led to the liberation of the people of India or the changes wrought by the great humanitarian and politician, Martin Luther King to the African Americans, or Mother Teresa whose impact on the poorest of the poor in Calcutta was profound in establishing the Missionaries of Charity.

How can one person affect this kind of change in society? It bears thinking about because, so often, it is the vision or impetus of a single person that is enough to bring about not only change at the local level but significant change globally, too. Al Gore may not have been the most successful of modern day American politicians, but he certainly brought the world’s attention to the issue of climate change with his book, documentary and presentations based on “An Inconvenient Truth”. As one individual, he was the catalyst for a global shift in thinking about the impact of humans on the rate of climate change.

The concept of momentum or what psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (no - that’s not a spelling mistake) calls ‘finding flow’ is a science in itself. He describes the ability of any person to focus entirely on a project which becomes far more significant than their own well being. Translated, I guess this means ‘being in the zone’, where we are totally focused on a bigger need than our own needs. This kind of focus or flow builds momentum too. Others are drawn into the project resulting in an increased energy level by everyone, who shares the common idea and a strong common sense of purpose.

Millard Fuller makes the point that:
“For a community to be whole and healthy, it must be based on people's love and concern for each other.”
A community built on trust, love and concern for one anther and wanting the very best possible outcomes is a powerful motivator. This is surely the best way to bring about change in our society..... starting at the local level is the most effective way to start building momentum and change for the good of all.

One of my favourite poems is one written by George Bernard Shaw. I will leave you with a little quote from this poem:

“I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can. I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live.”

What better purpose can there be in life but to make a difference to someone else’s life and to make a difference in this world.

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Predicting the Future

Wouldn’t you love to be able to predict the future? Wouldn’t it be good to know what’s coming next or to have a jump start on everyone else and secure a place in history like Nostradamus? Since time immemorial there have been people who have claimed to have a ‘gift’ to foresee the future. Sometimes these people have been true visionaries, like the great 15th century painter, inventor, sculptor, naturalist and scientist, Leonardo da Vinci, while others have been nothing short of charlatans, like the infamous, Rasputin.

Predicting the future can be a perilous pastime. Take for instance, the famous ‘last words’ of Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, who in 1943 said:
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Or the quote from Bill Gates who said of the computer:
“640k ought to be enough for anybody.”

Weather prediction is one of those fundamentals, which despite the best efforts of meteorologists, satellite tracking and computer modelling, still defies accurate predictions. Many is the time that the so called experts get it wrong. I was reading a book recently which tells the story of how there was a world wide competition to see who had developed the best and most successful computer program to accurately predict the weather. They received dozens of entries in the competition, with everything from sophisticated weather pattern modelling to complicated computer software programs with thousands of lines of code which required supercomputers to run all of the calculations.

Each day, the competing models were required to make predictions as to what the weather conditions would be on the next day in thirty different cities across America. After six months, the results were tallied to see which program was the most accurate. Guess what won? It was a simple one line code that had the following words: “Tomorrow’s weather will be the same as today’s weather.”

If you think about it, weather often changes gradually and so there is a very strong possibility that the next day’s weather will be exactly the same as today’s weather. Sure it’s not sophisticated but the odds are that more often than not, the weather will be the same. Of course there are major weather events and abnormalities that are difficult to explain with such a simplistic model, but it’s not a bad method and it’s certainly a lot cheaper than satellites and computer modelling. Long range weather forecasters use the data from the weather records kept for over a hundred years to make predictions about the future weather patterns, with surprising accuracy.

Even animals have the ability to predict and know what’s coming in the natural world. Many animals have an innate sense of impending natural disasters like earthquakes, tsunamis or severe storms. Immediately before major earthquakes, animals have been observed to take on very strange behaviours (jumping vertically) and trying to escape the local region; before major storms and tsunamis, birds fly away and animals disappear to higher ground and most of us have observed how ants come indoors en masse just before severe rain depressions.

What can we conclude from all of this seemingly unrelated information about making predictions for the future? Much of what we can predict can be deduced from the status quo, or from our current observations or pattern of behaviour. What are the implications of this? For all of us, we need only look at what we do and say today to have some sense of what the future has in store for us. I know we don’t have the power to know with any certainty what other events will happen in our lives but in terms of our own destiny, ‘the writing is on the wall’.

For students it is very straightforward, if they are to succeed in their studies (or sport or music or anything for that matter) they need to commit now. The foundation for future success lies in the groundwork that you do today. The prediction of potential success may not be as much a mystery as we think. There are many people who argue that life becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you work consistently towards a goal then chances are that you will succeed in this. If you are half hearted and doubt your own ability well then chances are that you won’t be successful.

Whether it’s in a study program or application in class, the best predictor of future success is success today. Even the universities recognise this and after years of high drop out rates in first year university, they’ve found that those students who can successfully complete a unit or two of a particular university course in Year 12, are more likely to succeed in that course when they commence full time university study. At CCS we give all students in Years 11 and 12 the opportunity to commence university study or vocational education Certificates II, III, or IV.

Often the students who have the highest results at the end of Year 12 are not necessarily the most intelligent students – these students certainly have an advantage – but the students who achieve the best results are the ones who do the hard work day in day out, in class and at home. They are students who ask lots of questions of their teachers. They are the students who have a well planned and well organised study program and forward planning process in place for assignments and upcoming assessment. It takes time and commitment to succeed. As Beverly Sills, famous American operatic soprano once flippantly commented:
“There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.”

Shifting the Way You Think

A shift in our thinking is not always as easy as you might imagine. Sometimes we are so entrenched and indoctrinated in the way we think and learn, that it’s difficult to change our way of thinking or perceptions. This is why listening to new ideas and opening our minds to new possibilities is so important and like Stephen Covey suggests, we need to regularly ‘sharpen the saw’. All of us from time to time, should step back from our work environment or home environment and consider other possibilities in our way of thinking. This came in a surprising way as I was returning recently from the Expanding Learning Horizons (ELH) conference in Victoria.

I was travelling on a bus to the airport and happened to be sitting next to a astrophysicist (and trainee teacher by the way) who was explaining to me that he was working on a new theory of gravity because the current way of thinking about gravity did not allow for the many anomalies that exist in space. He went into some detail about quantam mechanics and how mathematically the current theories just don’t add up. One of the areas that he believes requires a change of thinking was in relation to light. He and another professor are collaborating on a hypothesis to prove that light travels at different speeds when coming from opposite ends of the universe, because the movement is fluid and not linear.

To say that I was lacking in some scientific knowledge would be an understatement, but I found this concept quite intriguing. He explained that proving such scientific theories was an incredibly long and arduous process and as a scientist it was very difficult to get funding and research grants to investigate and prove any hypothesis. (This is a poor reflection on our current commitment to research in Australia.) Convincing the so called experts in the field of quantam mechanics was nigh on impossible and I was reminded of poor Charles Darwin and the initial ridicule he encountered with his Theory of Evolution.

It seems that it's human nature to always doubt and be suspicious of something new. Whole books have been written on human’s basic distrust of something new. Why should we change our way of thinking? Why should we change the way we do things? Isn’t it easier to stay with what we know? Well the answer is an emphatic ‘no’. Albert Einstein, one of the greatest thinkers and scientists of our time, once said that in developing his theory of relativity he use to imagine sitting on a moonbeam travelling through space. Divergent thinking is necessary, if we are to arrive at a new place, a new understanding and a new paradigm.

How do people come up with these new ideas? Observations maybe or perhaps through sheer speculation? Do people work alone or do they learn from others and build on the knowledge that already exists? Does new learning come from a quantam leap or from gradual changes in our perception? Or is collaboration the key? The wise ones amongst you will immediately surmise that new learning and new ideas come from all of these ways and there is no one method that accounts for new ideas and thinking.

Even in teaching and learning there are many new theories about how people learn. There is a growing body of research that points to the fact that learning is not passive. Gone are the days of students sitting in front of a teacher and learning simply by listening to the teacher. Collaboration among students and teachers is now seen as an important way for young people to learn, particularly when it is an active discussion in the class or even with students in other countries or experts in different parts of the country or the world. No more are we limited by the classroom. Technology at CCS allows us to bring the world into the classroom and collaboration is going to be one of the most powerful learning tools of the next generation.

In his recent authoritative book, "Grown Up Digital", Don Tapscott (2009)makes the point that the Net Generation has grown up collaborating, sharing and creating together online. Students start internalising what they've learned in class only once they start talking to each other. Tapscott goes on to say that collaborative learning to be the more effective learning to be more effective in increasing academic performance than individual or competitive learning.

Why is collaboration so important to the discovery of new understanding and new ideas? Isaac Newton hit it on the head (no pun intended) when he said:
“If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.”

Coping with Life's Struggles

STRUGGLES OF LIFE

Sometimes, struggles are exactly what we need in our life.
If we were allowed to go through our life without any obstacles, it would cripple us.
We would not be as strong as we could have been.

I asked for Strength…
And I was given difficulties to make me strong.
I asked for Wisdom ….
And I was given problems to solve.
I asked for Prosperity …
And I was given a brain and brawn to work.
I asked for Courage ….
And I was given obstacles to overcome.
I asked for Love ….
And I was given troubled people to help.
I asked for Favours …..
And I was given Opportunities.
I received nothing I wanted ….
But I received EVERYTHING I needed.

Top Ten Tips to Parents of Teens

As adults we look back on our teenage years with mixed emotions - some fond memories, some humour, some angst, some discomfort of what we did or said or how we dressed, (Looking at old photos that captured the latest fashion fad or hairstyle twenty years ago, can be a source of great amusement to our children.) Some of us actually only remember happy childhood memories by blotting out our more painful memories and experiences of our youth and the trials and tribulations of growing up. It’s fair to say that teenage years can be the most trying years of our lives – not just for adolescents but for parents too. One very droll person wrote:
“Adolescence is a period of rapid changes. Between the ages of 12 and 17, for example, a parent ages as much as 20 years.”

Teenage years are about hormones kicking in, growing independence and autonomy, trying on different personalities and testing boundaries to the ‘nth’ degree. Teenagers question everything – every rule at home or at school. Hard to believe that your obedient and happy child at 12 years of age turns from a compliant, caring and understanding person into something very different. So different that it can seem like you’re living with an alien from ‘Star Wars’ for a while – very tensing – no-one speaks the same language and it seems like there is a ‘battle a day’. A parent asked me recently to write a little about this stage of adolescent behaviour and what they could do as a parent.

When I googled ‘advice to parents about teenagers’ I was surprised to see over 34 million sites listed. Not all of them good sites mind you, but there was some comfort in knowing that so much information about parenting and teenagers was on line. One site that I thought might be useful to parents is: http://www.byparents-forparents.com/

Having survived the perils of parenting teenagers and having had some contact with teenagers over the last 35 years in secondary schools, I thought I would share some useful things that I’ve learned along the way.

My top ten tips are:

• Listen attentively and be reflective. Listen attentively to what your teenager has to say (even if it’s monosyllabic). Be reflective in your responses so that they understand that you’re listening – it’s often helpful to use some of the same language in your response. Avoid giving advice and immediate solutions. Lead them in a way that allows them to suggest solutions of their own.

• Don’t lecture or yell. The best advice I can give, is to give no advice. Teenagers turn off listening very quickly, and so to go over an issue time and again, is a sure way to have your teenager ignore you. Keep it short and simple and be very clear on what you expect to happen. It’s amazing how someone else can say exactly the same thing as you the parent, but your teenager listens and seems to appreciate the other person’s point of view more than yours. (Don’t get upset about this - this too will pass in time.) Never, ever yell; there’s nowhere to go from this loss of self control and do not say anything that you might later regret. Find a quiet place for you (and your teenager, if necessary) to cool off and calm down before talking again.

• Set boundaries. Your teenager may make out that everyone else is doing something and you’re the only parent (in the class, the school or the whole world), who is not letting them go out or go to a particular social or whatever it is. Don’t be fooled by this ‘timeless ploy’ of your son or daughter. Talk to other parents. Teenagers don’t like it when parents talk to other parents to find out who’s at home or supervising the party. Ask the other parent, if it’s okay for your son or daughter to sleep over or go out with their teenager. Just because you want a positive relationship, doesn't mean your teenager is in charge. Parents, you have to take control here. Your teenager should agree to a time to be home. If they don’t arrive on time, they should be grounded or have some other consequence.

• Say ‘no’ and mean it. As one comic said: “No,” is a complete sentence. Don’t’ cave in to constant nagging or emotional blackmail. It’s tough not to give in to your child, but it’s worth it in the long run, your children will respect you. As Randy Pausch said in The Last Lecture: "Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted."

• Give your teenager responsibilities and let them take ownership. It’s important that everyone has a job to do at home and as your teenager grows older, giving them more responsibilities, like cooking the family meal, is a good way to help them become a ‘master chef’ in their own right. Praise your child – but don’t overdo it! Praise for real achievements and hard effort. Make it genuine and keep it simple.

• Teach your teenager to persevere. If things come too easily to teenagers, they don’t treat it with respect and they don’t value it. Some parents can be overprotective to the detriment of the child’s social-emotional growth. Don’t fight your teenager’s battles. Teenagers need to experience the ‘ups and downs’ of life, the setbacks and the wonderful sense of accomplishment when they succeed all by themself. Bill Gates once gave a lecture to graduating students and this memorable quote: “Life is not fair -- get used to it!”

• Reward after the good deed – not before. Make sure you are not rewarding your teenager for something you would normally expect them to do. Setting some goals and rewarding the achievement of these goals is good positive reinforcement. It’s an important lesson in life to teach your teenager to set goals and have a plan of action to achieve what they want in life. Doing without something is character building, don’t think your child is disadvantaged if they don’t have the latest gadget, mobile phone or clothing.

• Always treat your teenager with respect. If your teenager is in trouble, no matter how bad the situation, always treat them with respect. Ensure that they know that you’re upset with their behaviour and what they have done. Let them know how you feel and give them a specific example so they understand completely. Keep in mind that each of your children is very different and will react differently to you, so don’t assume that what worked with one teenager will work for another. Sorry, but it rarely happens this way.

• Demand and expect respect from your teenager. The attitude of teenagers at times can try the patience of a saint, let alone us mere mortal parents. Teenagers need to be told when they are out of line; don’t shy away from expressing your disappointment or expressing your expectations. Life in the real world is a lot tougher, if they don’t respect you, they will not respect anyone. Reinforce politeness and good manners at home, expect it always.


• No one is perfect – teach your teenager to learn from their mistakes. You may wonder if your teenager will ever ‘get it’. Some teenagers take longer than others to ‘do the right thing’. Some teenagers are a dream, but most parents experience serious emotional pain during the teenage years and doubt their own parenting skills, but in spite of this self-doubt, never give up or give in. I know this from first- hand experience. Bill Gates made this point very clear to his teenage audience:

“If you mess up, it's not your parents' fault, so don't whine about your mistakes, learn from them.”

If it’s any consolation parents, keep in mind Mark Twain’s famous quote:

“When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years.” ~Mark Twain, "Old Times on the Mississippi" Atlantic Monthly, 1874

Success means different things to different people

Success comes in many shapes and forms. What is success to one person may be less significant or unimportant to another. One thing is for sure though, position or money does not necessarily measure success. Many would agree that Mother Teresa was an outstanding humanitarian and more successful in her mission than anyone else – but she held neither position nor wealth. She stands as a beacon to our generation of what one person is capable of achieving and how we might best measure success.
Theodore Roosevelt, former President of the USA wrote:

“There are two kinds of success. One is the very rare kind that comes to the person who has the power to do what no one else has the power to do. That is genius. But the average person who wins what we call success is not a genius. She is a person who has merely the ordinary qualities that she shares with others and has developed those ordinary qualities to a higher degree.”

Young people can learn a great deal about success by applying themselves to achievable goals. Small successes can build confidence in their ability to achieve. By putting in extra effort to any task, whether in school, in sport or in a cultural program teaches young ones and older students about the concept of ‘no gain, without pain’. Success for most people is incremental…. It happens in small steps, small gains that over time realise much greater gains. It happens with dedication, committed practice and it happens because of perseverance in the face of adversity.

Noted author Dr Kerry Spackman tells the story in “The Winner’s Bible” of Loretta Harrop who like many young Australians enjoyed sport. Very early she decided that she wanted to be a professional athlete and set about training for triathlons. In order to receive funding she had to go through a process of ‘being measured’ by the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) to see if she ‘had what it took’ to be a successful triathlon athlete. When the AIS finished its testing of Loretta they returned the verdict, that not only was she not championship material, but she was ‘below average’.

Rather than taking this to heart, Loretta decided that even if the AIS didn’t think she was champion material, she believed that she would be a champion. She had incredible self confidence and self belief that she would be successful. Loretta didn’t get her funding and almost in defiance of the AIS and so called experts, she continued her punishing regime of exercise and running – even after competing and not winning any competitions, she never doubted her ability to succeed. She had plenty of reasons to give up and try something different, but she didn’t. She stuck with it and continued the rigorous and painful training day after day.

This was not the only obstacle that Loretta Harrop faced. Bike racing is a dangerous sport. To toughen up, Loretta use to train with her brother, who was a top triathlete who had great bike control. She would learn more by riding with her brother. Tragedy struck, however; only months before the World Cup, her brother was killed while out training on his bike.

Devastated, Loretta went through a total loss of confidence and for the first time in her life, feared riding her bike. In her own words though, Loretta realised that she “had to face this fear head on.” She realised that she was more afraid of having to live with this stupid fear beating her, than she was in crashing. Facing up to her fear and riding competitively again, Loretta went on to win the gold medal at the World Triathlon Championships and a silver medal at the Athens Olympics. What an outstanding feat and a lesson to us all on determination and courage?

Life is not always a bed of roses and often there are many obstacles to overcome before we experience success. Working through these difficulties is one way that we build up our resilience – our capacity to ‘bounce back after a setback’. If young people don’t learn to overcome these obstacles independently and rely instead on parent or adult intervention, they often miss developing this important life skill. This is true of both school and interpersonal relationships.

Inspirational true life stories like that of Loretta Harrop make us realise what is possible within all of us. Others may doubt our ability or skills, experts may measure our potential and make judgements or guesstimates about our future, but when it’s all said and done, if we have confidence, and unshakeable self-belief and determination to succeed, we will.

Sea of Problems or a 'Pink Bat' of Solutions

Do you sometimes feel as though you’re awash in a sea of problems? They seem to be everywhere we turn and regardless of how much we try, there always seems to be a never ending supply of them. It’s interesting how most of us see only problems while some people have the great ability to look at things differently and see that what appears to be a problem isn’t or to look at something and see a solution. It’s the way we think about what we see that determines whether we see a problem or a solution, whether we see a problem or a new possibility.
John Lennon’s lyrics in “Watching the Wheels” sums this up quite nicely:
Ah, people asking questions, lost in confusion,
Well I tell them there’s no problem, only solutions.

I recently read an extraordinary book “Pink Bat: Turning Problems into Solutions” written by Michael McMillan. I don’t want to spoil your enjoyment of the book so I won’t tell you the story about the pink bat, but I do want to share with you a little of this new way of thinking about perceived problems.

McMillan tells the story about a perceived problem: The amenities were great but the elevators in a new office building were extremely slow and it became a major problem with people getting frustrated, angry and annoyed as they waited for the elevator. The building’s developer hired consultants to assess the problem and ended up with a short list of solutions which were: add a couple more banks of elevators, make the doors open and close faster, stagger business starting and ending times and have visitors come during off-hours. Everyone was so focused on the problem, no one was able to see it as a solution…. Well, almost no one.

So what was the solution to the slow elevators? Simple really: a large crowd still waits outside the elevators, but now the crowd is happy as they gaze up to look at the new video monitors that showed the latest stock market information, checking the weather and reading employee related news. The ‘pink bat’ solution was that the perceived problem became a solution. No one minds waiting for the elevators any more.

Solutions are all around us, we just have to think about things differently. Step back from the perceived problem and apply a different kind of thinking. Isaac Newton was sitting under an apple tree when the apple fell on his head. Rather than considering this a problem he saw it as a solution – the Universal Law of Gravitation. While most people would see the falling apple as a problem, Newton saw it as a solution.

As McMillan points out:
For every problem, there exists a solution… and at the very least .. an opportunity. But it takes an open mind to see it… and intelligence and imagination to create it….. You can live each day in a world filled with “problems” or rise each morning and embrace a world filled with unseen solutions… eager for you to find them. The decision is yours… both worlds exist. The one you choose is the one you will create.

Karon Graham
Principal CCS

What mothers really want....

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What mothers really want....

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What Mothers Really Want

My children are now grown up but I still get asked each year what I want for Mother's Day. While I pondered the many possible gifts in my mind - perfume, great book, cd and the like, I started to think about what I would really like .... and I hope all mums who read this agree with some of the sentiments found in the attached powerpoint. I created this for Caloundra City School's Mother's Day Assembly and I would like to acknowledge the beautiful photos from Anne Geddes.

The power of positive self belief

Student achievement in school is as much about self belief and confidence, as it is in academic endeavour and aptitude. Whether it involves preparation for NAPLAN testing or Years 3,5,7 and 9, or Queensland Core Skills Tests for Year 12, or assessment of any kind for each of the Year Levels, students need to believe that they can achieve well and have the confidence in their own ability, that comes from setting ‘learning’ goals rather than ‘performance’ goals. Learning goals requires students to practise and focus on improving their ability rather than setting a goal of achieving an ‘A’ result.

According to Bandura (1999) and other researchers, how people behave and achieve can often be better predicted by the beliefs they hold about their capabilities, what he calls self efficacy beliefs, than by what they are actually capable of accomplishing, because these self-perceptions help determine what individuals do with the knowledge and skills they have.

Researcher and author, Frank Pajaras (2003) has found that judgments of personal efficacy affect what students do by influencing the choices they make, the effort they expend, the persistence and perseverance they exert when obstacles arise, and the thought patterns and emotional reactions they experience.

A strong sense of confidence, for example, may serve students well when writing an essay because it engenders greater interest in and attention to writing, stronger effort, and greater perseverance and resiliency in the face of adversity. Confident students are also likely to feel less apprehensive and have stronger feelings of self-worth about their writing.

Clearly both teachers and parents should pay attention to students’ perceptions, because it is the perceptions that may more accurately predict students’ motivation and future academic outcomes. Working with students to point out their successes and achievements will help boost their confidence. Yes it sounds simple, but it does require ongoing reinforcement by both teachers and parents, of actual accomplishments. ‘Over the top praise’, contrary to some people’s beliefs, does not build self confidence in the student.

Student achievement, as well as their confidence and competence, improves with practice, and also by setting some clear and concise goals as well as by timely feedback on their work. Students respond more confidently to small progressive steps towards an end goal and will achieve at a higher level with this strategy. Difficult and daunting challenges tend to discourage students, de-motivating them and causing them to lose confidence in their own ability. So it’s important to build confidence over time with small successes in order for them to achieve at a higher level.

There is an excellent article on the topic of Supporting Students’ Confidence as Learners with more detailed advice, at the following URL address:

http://books.google.com.au/books?id=gD7_VSNmu7cC&pg=PA55&lpg=PA5&dq=achievement+and+confidence+of+students&source=bl&ots=nUUtMhtxHU&sig=bjOi-4Dpe9-JhT-dWFrdtS5GIZ8&hl=en&ei=64ipS6mhIZDc7AP_qyuBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CBkQ6AEwBTgK#v=onepage&q=achievement%20and%20confidence%20of%2students&f=false

Remember:
“Our aspirations are our possibilities."
(Samuel Johnson).

There was a time.....

Parenting was never meant to be easy. Effective parenting takes tons of love, understanding, patience, empathy, sympathy, care, concern and firmness. Yes, firmness. Young people need boundaries and they need parents to be specific about what they can and can’t do. As someone who has three grown adult children and with over 30 years teaching young people, I know firsthand how difficult it can be to stay firm on matters of principle, moral standards, discipline and boundaries. It’s not easy and I would be the first person to admit this!
Parents are subjected to relentless pressure to give in to their children’s demands and threats. This pressure comes not only from their own children but also from family friends, other people’s children, mass advertising on television, music video clips on Saturday morning television, movies, radio shock jocks, the internet, social networking like Facebook and msn; the list is endless. The barrage and onslaught can overwhelm even the hardiest of parents.
Don’t get me wrong, I see the positives of some of these media too, but let’s face it, somewhere over recent years, momentum has swung away from the adults and parents at home and moved more towards appealing to and satisfying the needs of youth. It’s not surprising then, that young people can have an overstated opinion of their place in the world, in the scheme of things and even in the home.
Values and standards are by no means sacrosanct, yes they do change over time, but over the last twenty years there has been a worrying trend. Some battle weary parents, or parents who don’t even try to make a stand, take the line of least resistance in dealing with issues of good behaviour, appropriate standards, and boundaries. Some parents find it difficult to simply say ‘no’ to their children – ‘anything for a quiet life’ seems to be the unwritten law of the household.
There was a time:
• When parents were in charge of what happened at home
• When denying a child some material possession or ticket to an event was seen as an opportunity to teach frugality and discrimination;
• When not having or doing what everybody else was having or doing was seen as a good thing;
• When a consequence at school was followed by a consequences at home, and the teacher was always right. (Educators tell us that it is rare when a parent thanks a school administrator for imposing discipline or punishment);
• When a child would not dare to scream and shout at a parent with impunity.
As parents at CCS, you have made a deliberate choice to send your sons and daughters here for nurturing, excellence in learning opportunities and for the values, moral and ethical standards, good manners which we believe will better prepare them for the future.
At CCS we know each child well and work with you the parents to bring about the best possible outcomes for every single student. This means that we have very fair and firm expectations for all students and we do have consequences for those students who do not meet our expectations. We need your support in ensuring that the same values and standards at our school are your expectations at home.
Please contact us if you are concerned about any pressure that your son or daughter might be expressing about ‘what everyone else is doing, and why can’t they do it too.’ We will work with all parents and support you in ensuring that your son and daughter understand fair and reasonable expectations and the right of the parent to make the decision, not the child.
I give you the commitment that we, as a school community, will work with parents to instil values of good character in your son or daughter. Yes, I agree with you, effective parenting is not easy, but I ask all parents to consider the following:
• Who makes the decisions in your household?
• Are you consistent and fair in your expectations of your son or daughter?
• Are you making decisions for the right reasons or are you being worn down by constant arguments and upsets?
• Do you discuss the reasons for your decision?
Noted psychiatrist Jung once said:
If there is anything that we wish to change in the child, we should first examine it and see whether it is not something that could better be changed in ourselves.
(~C.G. Jung, Integration of the Personality, 1939)