WELLBEING
Wellbeing is now more important than ever but finding the time to learn about it is challenging. If you’re new to whole-school wellbeing, or interested in wellbeing but short on time, our online programmes are for you.
Teacher Boost Online Community
We know educators work hard and need support. We have created an online community to share our work and ideas to support educators with:
- Resilience tips and strategies for right now
- Help to see the big picture and what’s working; and
- Hope for the future
If you want to join us head to Teacher Boost.
“Such a wonderful initiative to create this page. I’m looking forward to the sharing of stories from members and their experiences with wellbeing and resilience.”
Making the Case for Wellbeing
A three-part course exploring what wellbeing in education is, why there is such a pressing need for it today, and examples of how wellbeing is being promoted and protected in a range of different schools.
Priced to make it as accessible as possible, this course includes:
- Three short videos (approx 12 mins each)
- Downloadable summary of the key points
- Downloadable slide presentation – ready for you to share in your learning centre – we’ve done the heavy lifting for you!
- Supporting research and additional watch, read, listen resources
“Dr Lucy Hone and Dr Denise Quinlan are two of the leaders in the world’s positive education field.”
Ryan Niemic, VIA Institute on Character“Thank you for this first course, it has helped me to know where to start with my well-being team and how to approach our senior leadership.”
Navigating Wellbeing Change
Navigating Wellbeing Change is the course for educators who want to drive long-term, sustainable school-wide wellbeing change — and avoid overwhelm!
Tired of running scattered wellbeing initiatives that never seem to connect or add up to more? Worn out from being your school’s only ‘wellbeing person’? Looking for solutions that apply to your school’s context?
Navigating Wellbeing Change is for educators who want to:
- Deliver early wellbeing wins that matter most to your people
- Develop wellbeing plans that respond to your priorities, context and budget
- Put wellbeing firmly on the school agenda
- Give staff and community hope for the future.
“The stand out benefit we got from NZIWR is that the process that they embark on with you allows you to develop something that is specific to your organisation, they celebrate learning from failing and continuously leave you with snippets which are gems to inform and inspire your practice.”
Jess Patrick, Deputy Principal
Bite-Size Learning (BSL)
Bite-Size Learning (BSL) is designed for Wellbeing Lead teachers to run short professional learning sessions with staff – and they can be adapted for the classroom.
Activities in the sessions are designed to take approximately 15 minutes in a staff meeting, but can also be expanded to 45-60 minute sessions by using the discussion questions provided and sharing the recommended videos.
The topics in each series follow a logical order that builds on knowledge as you learn, allowing you and your staff to accumulate a deeper understanding around how wellbeing can be promoted in your place of learning.
Each session includes:
- An overview sheet for Wellbeing Leads (equipping them to run each session)
- A Teacher Activity sheet
- A short teaching video featuring Dr Lucy Hone, Dr Denise Quinlan and NZIWR colleagues who are experienced educators and psychologists working with staff and students on wellbeing
- Further resources for each topic including videos, readings, podcasts and articles
It’s easy to extend sessions with the extra activities, resources and discussion questions – so it can be used in a way that best fits with your centre’s priorities and focus.
“The staff at Hinds school have loved the BSL videos to help support our ongoing wellbeing PLD. The BSL videos are manageable chunks of professional learning that have fitted well into part of our staff meeting, Teacher Only Day or meeting before school. The videos, plus activity guides and worksheets, provide practical advice, in an engaging way, to use straight away in your personal life, school setting or classroom. It has made us realise that our wellbeing is up to us and that we can make small, manageable steps to improve it.”
Amanda Ferguson, Hinds School
Staff Wellbeing Workshops
Learn practical tools to build resilience and combat stress in our highly interactive and engaging workshops for staff.
From one hour to a half day, delivered virtually or face-to-face, get in touch for some flexible PLD to build wellbeing literacy and capacity in your school community.
The Educators’ Guide to Whole-School Wellbeing
A practical guide to getting started, best practice process and effective implementation, written by Dr Denise Quinlan and Dr Lucy Hone.
While many schools understand the need to promote and protect wellbeing, they often find themselves stuck, not knowing where to start. Who’s going to run the programme? Do we need a curriculum? Shall we buy one or create our own? Which is the best wellbeing model for our school? How will we fit in the required professional learning on top of everything else we already do? Is wellbeing just another fad? How do we get students involved?
This book provides companionship through rich stories from schools around the world that have created wellbeing practices that work for their schools. It guides educators through processes that help create individualised, contextualised school wellbeing plans. With chapters addressing ‘why wellbeing?’, ‘what is “whole school?”’, change dynamics, measurement, staff wellbeing, coaching, cultural responsiveness, and how to build buy-in, it is the first of its kind.
Balancing research and practice for each topic with expert practitioner and researcher insights, this book gives schools access to best-practice guidance from around the world in a user-friendly format, designed with busy educators in mind.
What sets the Lucy and Denise apart from the many school wellbeing practitioners globally is their substantial experience working alongside diverse school groups. While many have experience in one school, few work across a multitude of very different schools and clusters, giving these practising academics a unique appreciation for effective, cross-context processes.
A list of chapters is available here.
“Everyone working in this field will want a copy of this excellent book.”
Dr Sue Roffey, Director of Growing Great Schools Worldwide
“Denise Quinlan, with broad international training, is an experienced and highly motivated positive psychology researcher and wellbeing change leader who is clearly destined to make a difference.”
George Vaillant MD, Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
Deepen your learning with the Diploma
The 11069NAT Diploma of Positive Psychology and Wellbeing comprehensively covers important wellbeing topics such as strengths, resilience, optimism, creativity and excellence. Take your career to the next level with a recognised qualification in the science of optimal performance and wellbeing.
Discover This Course“As an educator I was grappling with my work on promoting wellbeing and health as I felt I needed a stronger foundation of knowledge, evidence, skills and tools to be able to do my work effectively… To say the course is life-changing would be an understatement. I use every part of what I have learnt not only in my professional life but also in my personal life… I would encourage you to make the most of this opportunity.”
Megan Martin
Whole-School Wellbeing Training
Our partnership with CORE Education delivers collective wellbeing to learning communities throughout Aotearoa New Zealand. This wellbeing programme is suitable for funding via regionally-allocated PLD and can also be delivered directly to your learning community (early learning, kura, schools, Kāhui Ako).
Learn from those who’ve gone before
There are three episodes of our podcast series Bringing Wellbeing to Life that we recommend to get you started:
- Building Whole-school Wellbeing with Dr Lucy Hone & Dr Denise Quinlan
- The First Three Years of a Wellbeing Agenda with Sonya Papps, Taipei European School
- Lessons from a Decade of Wellbeing Work with David Kolpak, St Peter’s School, Adelaide
We’ve Worked With Hundreds of Schools
I, along with a number of other Principals in the Bays Cluster, have had the privilege of working with Dr Lucy Hone over the past two years on a Ministry of Education funded Character Education and Wellbeing pilot programme. Lucy’s professional knowledge of positive education is outstanding. She has an innate ability to relate to a broad range of colleagues and has a sound appreciation of the complexities of schools. These qualities made her a very effect change agent in our schools and I would highly recommend her to others. Stuart Cameron, Principal, Sumner School.
Denise’s session was one of the most highly rated Keynotes at the Inaugural PENZ conference. We are looking forward to having her back again for next year’s conference. Thanks Denise for your impeccable, empathetic and practical work.
PENZ17
At our recent Year 11 Wellbeing Retreat, Lucy was one of the keynote presenters and she spoke passionately around building resilience in a real world context for our girls. Our students walked away with inspiration and tools that can be applied to their own lives, enabling them to develop self-awareness and resilience. Their feedback was resoundingly positive; her message was relevant, meaningful and inspiring.
Without reservation, we would highly recommend Lucy Hone to talk to any group – whether they be students, parents, educators – as a focus on wellbeing is absolutely vital in today’s hectic world.
Year 11 Dean, St Margaret’s College
For more than a decade, I have had the privilege of working first hand with Dr. Denise Quinlan in a wide range of venues—from elementary schools to executive leadership classrooms. She is one of the few individuals in positive psychology who have the acumen of sowing seeds of well-being by helping you to spot strengths of others— in real time– in classrooms, playgrounds and in corridor conversations. Dr. Quinlan’s approach is steeped in solid science, coalesced with compassion and spiced with whole lot of fun. She won’t do the work for you, but she will be with you to harness your strengths so that you can do the work of creating circles of wellbeing, resilience, creativity, kindness and indeed of connection.
Dr Tayyab Rashid, Clinical Psychologist, President Clinical Division, International Positive Psychology Association, and recipient of IPPA’s Outstanding Practitioner Award, 2017
Denise ran a three-day training program for our team of varied role, age, ethnicity, etc. Her attention to detail, tailoring the training to our specific needs and our story made the time extremely useful and relevant to each person in the room.
She has a warm way of communicating the science of well-being to people with varied knowledge and experiences of Positive Psychology.
There was a general consensus that we left the training wiser, more connected and energised for our work with young people. I would unreservedly recommend Denise as a trainer, coach, mentor, facilitator and educator of well-being, resilience and Positive Psychology.
Paul Tupou-Vea, Dilworth Rural Campus, Te Haerenga.
The New Zealand Institute of Wellbeing and Resilience is well qualified to make sure that schools get access to wellbeing training, support and resources that are backed by rigorous science, appropriate for your cultural context, and that understand the realities of NZ schools. Denise Quinlan, with broad international training, is an experienced and highly motivated positive psychology researcher and wellbeing change leader who is clearly destined to make a difference.
George Vaillant MD, Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School and Cofounder of Positive Psychology, University of Pennsylvania.
Dr Denise Quinlan has been a powerful advisor and mentor to the development of Positive Education and all related well-being and resilience programmes at King’s College. Since the formal inception of Positive Education at King’s in 2013, Denise has been a critical friend, mentor and facilitator. Her research-based expertise goes well beyond her professional knowledge – it is also her warm and engaging manner which sees her training practice informed with authentic care and commitment.
Initially it was the concept of Positive Psychology that was introduced, but Denise’s passion for broader wellbeing principles, along with a firm belief in the importance of connection and values, has enhanced the King’s programme in ways that have helped us create a unique and powerful approach. This is used in the classroom, in the Student Mentoring Programme, and the work of the Staff Wellbeing Working Group and our Student Advisory Panel. Denise has really become a vital part of the King’s community and my colleagues truly value her sincere and enthusiastic commitment to our school and our wellbeing aims.
Grant McKibbin, Head of Positive Education, King’s College, Auckland.
Denise has a warm manner, and her approach puts people at ease. She is very skilled in drawing information out, helping us to reflect positively. Denise demonstrates a thorough understanding of Wellbeing and was able to offer suitable models for us to explore. The webinar was well thought out with a slide presentation sent ahead of time to allow us to be conversant with terminology and direction. The presentation is all Kiwi – with language and meaning for us in our sector – i.e. it can be applied in a specialist sector just as well as the mainstream/general education sector. We feel confident that Denise has the skills and empathy/understanding that pertains to us… particularly as we work in a vastly different sector.
Allenvale Special School.
Denise was a great facilitator and helped the group feel connected, valued, and supported.
The course gave a great balance of challenge, relevance, feedback and enjoyment. Denise was such a great source of knowledge – thank you!
Participants from the LGI Diploma in Positive Psychology.
Hornby High School has engaged with Lucy Hone supporting staff to maintain and improve their own wellbeing. Her message is authentic, well grounded in solid research, and practical. I could not recommend her highly enough. This is ground breaking work for those of us at the chalk face confronting issues of wellbeing in our daily work as a matter of course.
Robin Sutton, Principal, Hornby High School.
