In Case You Missed It: Some of Our Best from 2017

Fighting the Don’t You Look Pretty Syndrome

The New Puberty by journalist Amanda Dunn explores how children are going through puberty earlier than ever before. This extract from the book examines how we unconsciously value girls by their appearance, ‘Don’t you look pretty’. Rarely do we say to boys, ‘Don’t you look handsome.’

From Can’t Do to Can Do

Andrew Fuller is one of Australia’s best-known voices on the wellbeing of young people. In this post, he provides some great tips for parents to help their children develop a positive approach to life. A key message is that mistakes are part of learning.

The Power of Curiosity

Diane Bourke, an experienced educator from our team at Independent Schools Victoria, explores how fostering curiosity in children will help create a love of learning. And although it requires a conscious and sustained effort, parents can play a huge role in developing their children’s curiosity.

Kids Read All About It

Traditional print media may be declining, but a newspaper aimed at young Australians is building a popular following. The professionally-produced Crinkling News has the motto, ‘We tell all the news, without the boring or scary bits’.

Letter to My Teenage Self

Grace Halphen, a talented Wesley College student, is the editor of Letter to My Teenage Self, a collection of letters from more than 50 prominent Australians giving advice to their teenage selves. Grace featured in this year’s Melbourne Writers’ Festival.

How To Be A Strength-Based Parent

In this extract for her book The Strength-Based Parent, the popular Dr Lea Waters argues that society is getting it wrong when we focus on children’s weaknesses as a way of making them optimistic and resilient. Rather, her approach is all about focussing on their strengths.

Parents and Homework: Tips for Homework Harmony

Does the tension rise when you decide to ‘help’ your child with their homework? In this post, psychologist Lawrence J. Cohen says children often interpret ‘help’ as criticism. He offers some useful tips to take the stress out of the situation, such as playtimes and frustration breaks.

‘The Arts – Who Needs It’

Sally McLean created the short film Speaking Daggers for the inagural Arts Learning Festival, presented by Independent Schools Victoria. In her address to our AGM, she made an inspiring case for the importance of the arts in education.

Required Reading: the Books that Children Read in 28 Countries Around the World

The amazing people at TED asked their community around the world to come up with a list of books children are asked to read and why. Not surprisingly, the choice for Australian students was Tomorrow, When the War Began, by John Marsden, the acclaimed writer and Principal of Alice Miller School, a Member School of ISV.

‘Your teen is likely to lie to you’

This is a challenging article by Paul Dillon, a drug education expert who gave a seminar this year to Independent school parents about teens and alcohol. Parents need to be prepared for their child to ‘let them down’ at some time or another, he says. Blind trust is dangerous.

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