POSITIVE WELL-BEING

OBJECTIVE

Using Educational Technology to Develop Positive Well-being

The purpose of these activities is to provide guidelines for the parents to help children develop positive well-being using educational apps. Positive well-being is a good experience of health, happiness, and prosperity. It includes having good mental health, high life satisfaction, a sense of meaning or purpose, and the ability to manage stress. More generally, positive well-being is just feeling well (https://www.psychologytoday.com).

The activities are divided into 4 sessions according to Cope and Kalantzis' (2015) Learning by Design framework.

MATERIALS

Resources

• Tablet/IPad

• Internet

• Video Recorder or Smartphone

• Video or Photo Editing apps

• The Allen Adventure,  The HappiMe Apps, so on.

SESSION 1 - EXPERIENCING/SITUATED PRACTICE

Duration - 30 mins (variable)

• In the first session, when using educational apps such as The Allen Adventure to teach children positive well-being strategies such as dealing with troubles or keeping optimistic in frustrations, parents can guide children to engage with the story using the following prompters:

  • What do you like about this story?

  • How do you feel towards the character?

SESSION 2 - CONCEPTUALISING/OVERT INSTRUCTION

Duration - 30 mins (variable)

• During the second session, as children start to become familiarised with the story in the app, parents can guide the children to adopt the perspective of the character using the following prompters:

  • Can you tell me how you think the character felt?

  • How did the character cope with the difficulties?

SESSION 3 - ANALYSING/CRITICAL FRAMING

Duration - 30 mins (variable)

• During the third reading, parents can perform a deep analysis of the narrative in the educational app with children. Parents can guide them to do some reflection and critical thinking:

  • If you were the character, what will you do?

  • Why is it important to remain positive when facing difficulties?

SESSION 4 - APPLYING/TRANSFORMED PRACTICE

Duration - 30 mins (variable)

• In the fourth session, parents can extend learning to the child's experience using the following prompters:

  • Will you show me what you will do when you are bullied by someone?

  • Can you tell me what are things that you do that make you happy?

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Contributor: JJX