Description
In today’s fast-paced and competitive world, students are often under immense pressure to perform and meet society’s expectations. As a result, their self-esteem and confidence can take a hit, leading to a negative impact on their mental health, overall well-being, and academic performance.
School teachers can play a role in this. As educators, they have a responsibility for the personal development of learners and can take action to contribute to increasing their self-esteem.
This course will help participants understand what self-esteem really is and discover effective tools for cultivating it. Against common sense intuition, it will show that self-esteem is not introjected social judgment about oneself, hence you can’t increase it with positive feedback.
During the course, participants will learn about the six pillars of self-esteem as outlined in Nathaniel Branden’s successful book, The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem: living consciously, self-acceptance, self-responsibility, self-assertiveness, living purposefully, and personal integrity. The course will bring participants to explore each of the pillars sequentially.
Participants will also be introduced to the framework of Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication to cultivate awareness of their own and others’ feelings and needs, better connect with their inner selves and others, and engage in effective communication.
Finally, participants will work with Dweck’s Growth Mindset approach to learn how to provide feedback that nourishes their learners’ development rather than creating performance anxiety and lowering self-esteem.
Participants will engage in various practical activities and exercises such as journaling, group discussions, and role-playing scenarios to help them apply the topics discussed to their own lives.
Although the focus will be on improving self-esteem in learners, many of the practical activities will ask them to work on themselves. This will give participants an experiential understanding of the dynamics of self-esteem and make them able to reproduce the same work on others. Nothing supports pupils’ and students’ self-esteem more than a teacher with high self-esteem!
By the end of the course, participants will have gained a solid understanding of the principles of self-esteem and how to apply them in their daily lives. They will have acquired practical tools to promote greater self-awareness and self-acceptance in their learners, to have them learn to take responsibility for their own life and become more assertive in social interaction.
Bibliography
Branden, N. (1994). The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem. Bantam.
Dweck, C. S. (2008). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Ballantine Books. Rosenberg, M. B. (2015). Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life. Puddledancer Press.
What is included
Learning outcomes
The course will help the participants to:
- Understand the importance of self-esteem in personal development and academic performance;
- Apply the six pillars of self-esteem to their own lives and to the lives of their learners;
- Master the basics of Non-Violent Communication and apply them in social interaction;
- Cultivate greater self-awareness and self-acceptance in themselves and their learners;
- Take responsibility for their own lives and help their learners do the same;
- Become more assertive in social interactions while respecting the needs and feelings of others;
- Provide feedback that nourishes learners’ development and enhances their self-esteem;
- Implement practical activities to promote self-esteem in their learners;
- Foster a positive and supportive learning environment that promotes self-esteem and academic success.
Tentative schedule
Day 1 – Course Introduction
- Introduction to the course, the school, and the external week activities;
- Icebreaker activities;
- Presentations of the participants’ schools.
Self-esteem: What it really is, and why it matters
- Misconceptions about self-esteem;
- What self-esteem is;
- The importance of self-esteem in education;
- The six pillars of self-esteem.
Day 2 – Living consciously
- Connecting to one’s feelings and needs;
- Activity: being conscious of our needs and expressing effective non-violent requests.
Day 3 – Acceptance and responsibility
- Accepting one’s feelings and needs;
- The Growth Mindset: constructive feedback and learning from mistakes;
- Activity: Identifying and challenging negative self-talk.
Day 4 – Assertiveness and planning
- The right to happiness;
- Walls, dips, and why they are there;
- Reverse planning;
- Reaching objectives 1% at a time.
Day 5 – Personal integrity
- Knowing one’s values;
- Cultivating self-esteem in the classroom.
Day 6 – Course closure and cultural activities
- Course evaluation: round-up of acquired competencies, feedback, and discussion;
- Awarding of the course Certificate of Attendance;
- Excursion and other external cultural activities.
