Every parent and carer wants the best for their child and hope that they are providing them with the building blocks for a healthy future – a future that is complex and complicated and so very different from the one that we as parents, carers and teachers grew up in. Our task to raise happy, healthy, resilient children who achieve their full potential has never been more challenging.

Resilience, is a word we hear more and more when discussing the emotional well being of children. It typically refers to their ability to bounce back after some adverse or stressful event.  It is recognised by educators as a key skill in personal development, not just in terms of coping with adversity and stress but in terms of empowering children to be successful in a globalized, digitalized world, full of uncertainties yes, but also full of opportunities.

Clevedon School is working on a research project related to resilience, with researcher, Dr David Troy at Bristol University and Bounce Forward, a national charity that specialises in practical resilience training in schools. Here’s a link to the Bounce Forward website https://bounceforward.com/

Founded in 2009, Bounce Forward was incubated in its early years within Hertfordshire County Council and became an independent charity in 2016. To date, they have trained 10,212 teachers and worked with 1,661 schools.

Bounce Forward believe that improving resilience is something that you can do at any age, from any background, no matter your education or family and they base their approach and training on solid research, theory and evidence. They teach skills and strategies that work in the real world and recognise the vital role of adults in helping children and young people be resilient and thrive.

They will be bringing their course ‘Raising a Resilient Child’ to the school for parents and carers of Years 7, 8 and 9. The course will provide free practical resilience training that could improve the mental health of parents and carers and their children and will take place over a six weekly block of evening sessions in April and May 2020. The University is funding this as an opportunity to research the impact of the course for the future.

To hear all about this very exciting research, here is the link to book a place at the information evening on Tuesday the 25th of February from 6.00pm – 7.00pm in the Main Hall at the school. https://bit.ly/383wG3D Dr. Troy will discuss what the course will entail, what commitment is needed to be involved and how you and your children could benefit. As you can imagine, there are limited spaces so early booking is advised Complimentary food and drink will be provided.

Taking action to improve levels of resilience will have very positive outcomes in terms of improving emotional health and preparing young people for adulthood.

Check out Bounce Forward’s ‘Healthy Minds Research Project’ which will give you some idea of these outcomes. https://bounceforward.com/healthy-minds-research-project/