CALLAGHAN College Wallsend teacher Cale Wallace believes getting students to “change their relationship with failure” is key to helping them build resilience.
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The campus head teacher of Human Society and Its Environment has just returned from a “life-changing” five-week overseas study trip visiting some of the world’s top centres of education.
There he got to examine the most up-to-date information from research and practice in the field of resilience and how that research has been applied across a range of settings from schools to business organisations.
He is now in the process of putting together a resource of strategies to help teachers, parents and organisations gives students the tools to be able to self-regulate, which he says is vital to resilience.
“There certainly have been some flaws in the implementation of resilience programs in the past,” Mr Wallace said.
“One being having programs that are simply transplanted and do not consider the culture or the context of the setting.
“The programs that have had a lasting impact on students have specifically been catered to the unique context and culture of the setting.”
Mr Wallace was one of 19 teachers from across the state to be recognised with a 2015 Premier's Teacher Scholarship for his work in building the lifelong resilience of students at his school.
He was a recipient of the Anika Youth Depression Awareness Scholarship.
As part of the scholarship he travelled to New York, Canada, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Paris and London to learn how and why programs to build resilience have succeeded in other schools.
Mr Wallace believes viewing failure in a different light and helping students find their “unique strengths” are paramount to helping them succeed in school and life.
“Students need to develop resilience in order to navigate their way in day-to- day life,” he said.
“There is a vital need to reconfigure the perceptions attached to failure. Failure needs to be seen as a checkpoint not an endpoint.
“We must be better skilled at providing students with opportunities for self-discovery and support them in the quest to ‘operationalise hope’ across a range of settings.”
Mr Wallace will present his findings to the Minister of Education, NSW Department of Education, Black Dog Institute, Beyond Blue, Hunter Institute of Mental Health and Professional Teacher Associations.
He is in the process of putting together his resource and is excited by its potential to empower students.
Find out more about his work at: soarwordpresscom.wordpress.com