This is an imaginative, practical, and well-resourced manual which covers all the major areas of positive psychology and more. It follows six major themes: Positive Self, Positive Body, Positive Emotions, Positive Mindset, Positive Direction and Positive Relationships. It includes a wealth of activities to introduce positive psychology and more general personal development, business, and coaching ideas to young people in an entertaining and engaging way.

Sha-en Yeo is a 2011 MAPP graduate who lives in Singapore. To bring a perspective from another part of the world, I interviewed Sha-en on her work in positive education, where she has been inspired to think of innovative ways of delivering the research in digestible pieces as well as ways to make people experience positive psychology, rather than just learn the textbook definition.

Most experienced teachers have struggled to like a student at some point. Not a big deal? Wrong. Student-teacher relationships are among the most important predictors of engagement and achievement at school. Teachers get little training or support with building supportive relationships with students.

I was very excited to be asked to review Sue Roffey’s latest book. Previously a teacher, Roffey is now an educational psychologist, consultant, and writer. The book’s aim is to go beyond what teaching manuals usually do, which is to provide ways to manage poor pupil behavior so that it doesn’t disrupt other students’ learning. This book also provides the strategies to foster positive pupil behavior.

You may (mistakenly) believe that doing well in school is all about having outstanding academic skills. While skills are important, they may not be the most important abilities that separate excellent students from their less …

Goals for parents can take the shape of child-centered goals (I want my child to sleep through the night) or parent-centered personal goals that do not involve the child (I want to speak Spanish). Perhaps the greatest opportunity for flourishing, as parents, is to ensure that there is a healthy balance between the two.

In their new book, Smart Strengths, positive psychologists and educators John Yeager, Sherri Fisher, and Dave Shearon offer a framework for helping students use their strengths. This book takes fresh research and boils it down into practical, ready-to-apply processes. I know that educators and parents will want to read it and keep it on hand as a valuable resource to return to many times over the years.

As an educator, one of the talks I was most eager to hear at the IPPA World Congress was the presentation titled Geelong Grammar School’s Journey with Positive Education. The Geelong Grammar School is Australia’s largest co-educational boarding school, and as its website now says, it is the world leader in Positive Education.

With a wellspring of research suggesting that children do not increase levels of happiness, why do some people choose to have kids? They choose based on more than a desire to maximize happiness. They choose based on meaning. Despite the decline in happiness, meaningfulness rises among couples choosing to have children.

In the parenting section of any bookstore, you will find a vast array of survival guides with proven tools and strategies for getting through life with kids. But in survival mode, the level of happiness and well-being of parents is endangered. So, how do we as parents move our partnerships from endangered happiness to flourishing?