Bounce BackTM
As part of our wellbeing and engagement strategies we use the BOUNCE BACK program to help us develop our social skills program. This program is used across the school and utilises the concepts and elements of Growth Mindset and Challenging Learning.
BOUNCE BACK is an acronym for
Bad times don’t last. Things always get better.
Other people can help if you talk to them. Get a reality check.
Unhelpful thinking makes you feel more upset.
Nobody’s perfect, not you and not others.
Concentrate on the positives (no matter how small) and use laughter
Everybody experiences sadness, hurt, failure, rejection and setbacks sometimes. They are a part of life. Try not to personalize them.
Blame fairly – how much of what happened was because of you, how much was because of others and how much was because of bad luck or circumstances?
Accept the things you can’t change but change what you can first.
Catastrophising makes your worries worse. Don’t believe the worst possible picture.
Keep things in perspective. It’s only one part of your life.
This acronym helps students to memorise and recall ten basic coping statements based around positive self-talk. Each year teachers revisit the key concepts of resilience and wellbeing each school year with age appropriate content in the following areas:
Self Knowledge
- Courage – developing the skills and perceptions that lead to being more courageous in many areas of one’s life
- Optimism (Look on the Bright Side) – having confidence in one’s own ability to solve problems and take positive action and developing skills in focusing on the positives, even in difficult situations
- Success (STAR, CHAMP, WINNERS) – identifying one’s own relative character and ability, strengths and limitations, setting and achieving goals, being organised and persisting, becoming self-disciplined and being resourceful in solving problems
Social awareness
- Core values – acting on important pro-social beliefs about how one should behave towards others
- Emotions – skills for responding with empathy to the feelings of others and recognising the feelings and intentions of others
- Relationships – skills for successfully interacting with others, making and keeping friends and avoiding and managing conflict
- Bullying – activities that encourage awareness of the harm that is caused by bullying and developing skills and attitudes that enables bystanders to support individuals being bullied
Social-management
- Emotions – recognising and managing one’s own negative emotions such as anger, sadness and worry etc and recognising and enjoying and amplifying one’s own positive emotions such as happiness, pride and excitement, changing a bad mood into a good mood
- Helpful thinking – using rational and helpful thinking and positive self-talk to cope with negative events and feelings in one’s life
- Humour – learning how humour can be used to assist with coping in hard times as well as supporting others.
(Summary taken from the Kids Matter website)