From the Head of School Operations - Acting

From the Head of School Operations - Acting Mrs Susan Lazenby

As a first contribution receptionists, the support staff, those in the to the newsletter in my cafeteria and the assurance that there will temporary, new role always be Thai Green Chicken Curry in the school as Acting every Tuesday! We go to Chapel every Head of School Monday at 9:30 am. In the fourth term, we start Operations, it seems our SynchSwim practice. There are many other fitting to think about regular, anticipated events and occasions that change and remaining mark the passing of the year, and even though resilient. I am grateful this year has been somewhat different, the for this opportunity to sameness is comforting. join the Executive and humbled by it. Nevertheless, it does come with a significant Then we have the other level where change is change and awareness of the best way to a constant. This is where we experience some manage it. I am sure that the 2021 Guild are, level of change every day whether it be small like me, also recalibrating their brains with the or considerable, planned or unexpected. Most changes to their school lives as they embark on of us find it easy to manage the minor changes their new leadership roles. I shall have to and more often than not, we adjust with little compare notes with them! awareness of how the change has an impact on Our young change does affect us is a good way of working school is out how to cope with it, especially when the growing and, of change is significant. This self-awareness gives us course, with this the capacity to develop resilience in the face of comes change. change. We must cater us or those around us. However, knowing how for the new When we, and students and especially our staff, create more teaching and learning spaces, students face reimagine what is possible, be creative and agile. change, it can be There is a flux in this process, yet some things exciting; it is stay the same. How can we harness this to our energising and advantage? motivating. For others it evokes fear and anxiety, they feel A school is an interesting place that, in my demotivated or exhausted. Most of us go estimation, has different levels of operation. The through the whole range of emotions as we foundation is the expected: our daily routine transition from one state to the next. I think with the timetable. For teachers, the constant is that it is in this transition phase that we, and the students in our classrooms, and for our students, can build our resilience. In a students, it is those who teach them. We also recent leadership course, we learnt about have the people we rely on daily such as our change management and the work of William 3 St George’s Anglican Grammar School Newsletter

Bridges, writer of Managing Transitions (1991). He believes that ‘transition is the psychological process people go through to come to terms with the new situation. Change is external, transition is internal.’ So, let’s think about this internal process and how it can build resilience. With change comes stress and we are mostly programmed to see stress as negative. If we can shift our internal monologue to accept that stress is inevitable and that a certain amount of stress is good, it can be a way to motivate and energise us. Then we have the capacity to work our way through the transition. The stress of exams, for instance, is a motivator – well, mostly! Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck draws a distinction between the fixed mindset and the growth mindset. The latter means that we can ‘change and grow to meet the challenges we face’. It is about choosing how we decide to learn from the experience which also helps us to build our resilience in the face of change and its accompanying stress. According to resilience expert Anne Grady in her article ‘Mind over Matter’, looking for things for which to be grateful is important. There is a close link between gratitude and our sense of well-being, which makes us more resilient when we are faced with change. Being connected, having a sense of humour, carrying out acts of service, optimism and taking some control over the situation are also what she advocates. The idea of optimism appeals to me. It is about the way we approach what is happening rather than looking at the world through rose tinted spectacles, although that is a tempting option! What we choose to take from our life experiences, the changes and challenges we face, and what we learn from them is what

builds resilience.

I trust that as we are evolving and improving, growing and developing, facing changes both small and significant, we are aware of the impact that the changes have on us. Moreover, that we can use the time and experience to become more resilient, remembering always to be kind to ourselves and one another.

Susan Lazenby Head of School Operations - Acting

Change: Image by Gert Altmann frim Pixabay Resilient: Image by Alexas Fotos from Pixabay

Be Optimistic: Image by Wokandapix from Pixabay