Recently I wrote about using the phrase “How is your PERMAH Today?” as a strategy that engages several of the PERMAH pillars and some of the character strengths. I also included the question of asking oneself the same question in the post. In giving this strategy more thought, I came up with what I am calling a How Is My PERMAH Today? worksheet. It uses the chart from the PERMAH Pivot plan.

I am doing some professional learning with new staff, so I plan to have them first do the How Is My PERMAH worksheet, followed by writing their personal wellness plan.

Once my school moves forward with a wellness program and the language of Positive Psychology becomes a part of the language of learning, the opportunity will arise to teach the protocol of asking “how is your PERMAH Today?” along with some form of an age-appropriate “how is my PERMAH today?” worksheet for students.

Another way to look at this “how is my PERMAH” daily check-in is to think of having a wellness dashboard. Like that of a car, the dashboard has gauges that measure the performance of specific vehicle functions. In the case of a wellness dashboard, I think we can use the PERMAH construct with some representation of performance level and which character strengths are in play or could be in play for the day. If this idea becomes an app, I could see additional features, including physically “dialing up” individual pillars, each with its own color. It would also be helpful to have a menu of activities/strategies for each pillar to choose ways to further engage within each PERMAH pillar.

The character strength of the social intelligence page of my Wellness@ES site has a few intermediary strategies that can move students along to be ready to use the PERMAH question with others and themselves>>>

Active/Attentive Listening – One way to help our students make emotional and social connections with each other is to help them learn how to listen with attention. Design a listening protocol based on the tenets of attentive listening that fits the age of your students. Use this article and this one as a starting place with your design work to teach and embed active listening into the culture of your classroom. Look to integrate active listening into your Turn and Talk activities.

Active Constructive Responding (ACR) – Design strategies to teach the four ways we can respond to good news.

Personal Profile – Students use active listening skills to interview a partner to complete a personal profile organizer. The goal is for the interviewer to start with a few starter questions to then engage their own questions to learn about their partner’s interests, skills, talents, and goals. This activity needs to be scaffolded by grade level. The intent is to practice active listening and to help the students grow their social awareness. Students can, of course, complete the personal profile organizer for themselves to go the extra step to gather insights from family and friends for what they might not see in themselves.

 

Photo by Antoine Beauvillain on Unsplash