Resilience approaches in schoolProfessor Angie Hart

Boingboing social enterprise/University of Brighton

What do we want to do today?

• Using resilience ideas in schools • Focusing on complex needs• What is resilience?

• The approach we use to resilience building• Practical resilience-based approaches for schools

Resilience is about...

• Bouncing back/up

• Doing better than you think you would be doing in the circumstances

• Nurturing potential – not something you are just born with

• “…resilience is evident where people with persistently few assets and resources, and major vulnerabilities… have better outcomes than we might expect given their circumstances, and in comparison to what we know happens with other children [or adults] in their contexts” (p. 10). Hart, Blincow, with Thomas. (2007)

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Believe in the almost impossible

• 'I bumped into George's old primary school teacher the other day. I told her that George had left school now and was doing a plumbing apprenticeship. She couldn't believe it. "Would have thought he'd have ended up in prison" she said.‘

Teacher.

• ‘Good to see that Carl is on the school maintenance committee and has helped us paint those walls. He’d be getting up to all sorts of mischief at the weekend if he wasn’t doing this, and it’s great for his CV’

School caretaker.

CAPABILITY AND RESILIENCE: BEATING THE ODDSFIGURE 1: IDENTIFICATION OF RESILIENCE

Outcome Adversity

Low High

Positive A.Favourable experience of life

B. Resilience: Unexpected positive outcome

Negative C.Unexpected negative outcome

D. Risk and vulnerability

(reference and downloadable copy: www.ucl.ac.uk/capabilityandresilience. Capability and Resilience:

Beating the Odds Edited by Professor Mel Bartley, published by UCL Dept Epidemiology and Public

Health on behalf of the ESRC Priority Network on Capability and Resilience (2003-2007). )

Resilience is:–First, the capacity of individuals to navigate to resources that sustain well-being

–Second, the capacity of individuals’ physical and social ecologies to provide those resourcesand

–Third, the capacity of individuals, their families and communities to negotiate culturally meaningful ways for resources to be shared.

In the context of adversity,

Resilient moves:

• The kinds of things we need to make happen (e.g. events, parenting strategies, relationships, resources) to help children manage life when it’s tough. Plus ways of thinking and acting that we need ourselves if we want to make things better for children.’Source: Aumann and Hart 2009

Findings: resilient commonsense?

• Intelligence

• good looks

• good education

• ability to problem solve

• decent standard of living

• love and sense of belonging

• having had great parenting

Still commonsense?

• opportunities to contribute

• sense of purpose

• realising or setting up a talent/healthy interest

• a sense of self-efficacy

• reflective self-functioning

• one good adult role model, preferably over time

• having a ‘coherent autobiographical’ narrative

• Self-soothing/flow

Findings: Key resilience capacities

• Individual: self-esteem (7), autonomy (6), problem-solving (4), goals (6), sense of purpose (5), skills (8);

• Interpersonal: empathy (8), caring (5), social competence (8); • Family: connectedness (8), bond with adult (7), positive peer

relationships (7); • Community: social support (7), community connectedness (7),

school connectedness (4)

Professor Angie Hart & Dr Becky Heaver

Findings: Types of things people have done

• Flavour of schools based interventions in a review we’ve done:– Range: psychosocial group2, dance/drama competition4, skills &

training3, curriculum modification5,6 (2), recreation9,11 (2), teacher training1,12 (2), work experience10, tailored to individual7,8 (2)

– Intensity: from 12 x 1hr sessions over 5.5 mths8 to 1 week residential9

– Country: USA2,3,7 (3), Australia4,5 (2), South Africa6,8,11,12 (4), Russia9, Israel1, Scotland10, Zambia11

– Sample size: 2-1449– Example strategies: ccomplementary skills groups for kids, parents

& teachers 2; role-playing new skills3; reward points systems7

Professor Angie Hart & Dr Becky Heaver

Complex needs specific – esp LDs

• Much less published on this• Ferreyra, USA 2001 Facilitated group & one-

to-one counselling; life-skills & substance use prevention; disability awareness & rights; adult female disabled role models; responsive curriculum (1-3hrs a week for 2 yrs)

• Theron, SA 2006 School-based individualised program & group therapy; art, music, CBT, resilience curriculum, visualisation, role-play

• Innovative, evidence-based strategies: – Evoking images of family, obligation and responsibility2

– Vocational training & field trips3

– Mountaineering & survival skills9

– Organising a dance competition for younger children10

– Using same reward points system across home & school environments7

– Peer-pressure limbo dancing11

– School-family-community veggie garden12

Professor Angie Hart & Dr Becky Heaver

A Revised Model of Social Ecology: Small things can make a big difference

Micro-systemic level

Meso-systemic level

Macro-systemic level

Exo-systemic level

A Hierarchical Social Ecology A Complex Social Ecology

• Some kids do better than others having had very similar disadvantages in life – one thing that you do could make a big difference

• ‘Resilience’ gives us a framework within which to plan positive chain reactions and to fight back from negative chain reactions

• A resilient approach gives kids the opportunity to reinvent themselves

• For young people doing risky things it is especially helpful to get some protective processes going

• We need to focus on the fine grain – ‘management of effective detail’

• Use the resilience evidence base to challenge custom and practice in policy and organisations

• There is hope for everybody! Every little can help.

Professor Angie Hart

Suggest:

• Understand resilience for yourself and others you work with - don’t individualise resilience

• Be energised by complexity • Acceptance – ‘planning for, hoping not’• Prioritise what we know probably works• Make every thing you do a resilient move• Try to include YP and parents/carers in

resilience initiatives

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• A positive adult role model • A couple of good hobbies • Doing good for someone, at least once a week • Steer towards positive kids• Develop problem-solving skills • ‘Autobiographical narrative’ – find two positives• Point out meaning and joy in three small things• Keep their future in mind and help them to, too• Tackle inequalities in their life• Attend to your own resilience • If at first you don’t succeed, try again later

• A positive adult role model • A couple of good hobbies • Doing good for someone, at least once a week • Steer towards positive kids• Develop problem-solving skills • ‘Autobiographical narrative’ – find two positives• Point out meaning and joy in three small things• Keep their future in mind and help them to, too• Tackle inequalities in their life• Attend to your own resilience • If at first you don’t succeed, try again later

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• Talk about a “difficult” child with complex needs with whom you work (or know)

• Share information about the child’s problems and risks she/he faces (please change identifying information)

• What personal and social/economic/political resources are realistically accessible to this child/family?

• Given the context in which the child lives how is he or she doing when compared with other young in similar circumstances?

• Given the child’s strengths and access to resources in his/her family and community, how does the child cope (sustain well-being)?

Resilient Therapy (RT)(Hart & Blincow 2007)

• RT strategically harnesses selected therapeutic principles and techniques

• ‘Ecological’• Originally developed in relation to children, families and

young people• Now exploring relevance beyond that (adults – communities)• Developed for use across contexts and by different

practitioners, including parents and young people themselves• Designed to work with people as co-collaborators in the

development of the methodology rather than as recipients• Is user-friendly and readily accessible – you don’t need a

lengthy specialised training• Non-pathologising – ‘upbuilding’• Focuses on complex children and young people living in

challenging circumstances

Professor Angie Hart

Further reading:

• Hart, A. and Blincow, D. with Thomas, H. (2007) Resilient Therapy: Working with children and families. London: Routledge

• Aumann, K. and Hart, A. (2009) Helping children with complex needs bounce back: Resilient Therapy for parents and professionals. London: Jessica Kingsley

• Email: a.hart@brighton.ac.uk / • Website: www.boingboing.org.uk• Tedex:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPUzjyAoOK4

Professor Angie Hart