Welcome to Well-Being: Homepage - Outside the Box Learning Resources

Welcome to Well-Being is a new 3-level well-being programme for Junior Infants, Senior Infants and First Class (ages 5 to 7+). It is based on Positive Psychology, which is the science of well-being and is designed to be implemented as part of the SPHE curriculum.

The programme aims to enhance young children’s wellbeing and resilience through developing specific skills including emotional intelligence and regulation, boosting positive emotions and enhancing social skills and self-confidence.

The theme of the programme is that two small aliens called Mo and Ko arrive from a planet called Zo to help children feel happy, strong, kind and brave, loving and well. Each week they introduce children to a new idea and they set a challenge for the children to try it out for the week – at home as well as at school. By default, the characters Mo & Ko are gender-neutral. A gender-specific version is also available which can be ordered HERE.

Each of the three levels of Welcome to Well-being comes with a Teacher Resource Book (with a comprehensive online Digital Companion Page – DCP) and a Pupil Book (Reflective Journal). The DCP contains PowerPoint presentations for each lesson, supplementary worksheets, classroom posters and much more. The pupil book has two activities per lesson as well as a homework activity. A pull-out Parent Information Guide is included in each child’s Pupil Book to support parental involvement.

The programme has been written by Fiona Forman, co-author of the extensively used middle to upper primary school programme Weaving Well-Being and author of the Secondary school programmes Wired for Well-Being (Junior cycle) and Tools to Thrive (Senior cycle).

The Welcome to Well-Being programme uses the approaches and methodologies outlined in the SPHE curriculum guidelines (DES, 1999). These are based on the concept of active learning; as the children engage with the lesson, they are encouraged to actively apply the skill or idea in their own lives, through the weekly challenge. Other activities include talk and discussion, responding through art, visual organisers, reflecting, poetry and mindfulness activities. Each lesson also contains a multi-media component, usually a song or video story.

Each level has 10 lessons covered in the Teacher Resource Book, Digital Companion Page and Pupil Book (Reflective Journal) containing the following elements:

• Lesson plan – containing relevant SPHE links, supplementary photocopiable resources and classroom posters
• PowerPoint slides – containing all relevant material for the presentation of the lesson, including a multi-media element
• Pupil Book (Reflective Journal) – containing 2 pupil activities per lesson, self-assessment and homework activity
• Parent/Guardian/Carer Information Guide – (in the centre of each Pupil Book) to encourage parents to support their child

Click on the programme ‘Framework’ image to see what’s covered at each of the three class levels.

To download this Scope and Sequence chart (for primary schools) as a pdf please click HERE or for the Scope and Sequence chart of all four well-being programmes for primary and secondary (all ages), please click HERE.

Click the image above to browse the 24-page ‘Well-Being School Programmes – Catalogue’ (for all ages) or click HERE to download a pdf of same.

Fiona Forman is an author, speaker, facilitator and trainer in the area of well-being and Positive Psychology. Click HERE to find out more about Fiona.

Click HERE or on the image above to access the FREE Meditation (Body Scan)

Click HERE or on the image above to access the Digital Companion Pages