Monthly Archives: March 2020

Our ability to connect with students has a direct impact on our stress level and happiness. Behaviour management guru Bill Rogers uses the term WarmDemanding to describe the ideal demeanor of staff in schools. Rogers argues that our interactions with students should be characterised by a balance between the ‘warmth’ that shows we care about them as individuals and the‘demanding’ that shows we have expectations of them and their behaviour. I find it helpful to see this as a continuum. I have worked with staff in schools who have been too far to one end of the spectrum. Some staff have presented as being ‘too warm’. They are clearly very keen to be friends with students and work very hard…

This great parable from an unknown author encourages us to reflect on how we cope with adversity. A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up; she was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose. Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and turned each hot plate to high. Soon the pots came to the boil. In the first pot she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs and in the last pot she poured ground…