A Psychological Flexibility Wellbeing Curriculum
About 5 years ago, Duncan (Gillard) came to me with an idea. He said that we needed to create a Psychological Flexibility Wellbeing Curriculum.
At the time, and mainly because I love the man, I said ‘I’m in’ without fully understanding his vision. If I would have understood his vision, then I may well have run for the hills given the huge amount of work that has followed that moment. I’m joking, of course, but be under no illusions about the enormity of what Duncan wanted:
Firstly, he wanted to design a one-hour lesson per week, with associated PowerPoint files and resources, to be delivered by schoolteachers over a 7-year period (from aged 4 to aged 11).
Secondly, he wanted each and every lesson to have the same broad aim: to improve the Psychological Flexibility of our children.
You see, Duncan and I (and many of the other people working for Connect) have spent years learning an approach to human suffering called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (or ACT). Now don’t be scared off by the word ‘therapy’ there because ACT is for everyone. It takes the position that suffering is a normal part of human existence, and that by trying to avoid difficult things (unwanted thoughts and feelings) we can make our lives worse in the long-term.
It therefore aims to increase, you’ve got it, Psychological Flexibility – being able to move in the direction of what’s important while taking our unwanted thoughts and feelings along for the ride. For example, a psychologically flexible child would be able to have the thought “If I go over to that child and ask to play, they’ll say no and then I’ll feel awful” and still approach the child because the development of friendship is important to them.
Personally, and professionally, Psychological Flexibility, has made a huge difference to our lives. It has helped us to reach for the stars even when our minds have told us that what we wanted was impossible. In fact, Connect is an example of us using our Psychological Flexibility power to achieve something remarkable.
When you see Connect, I think you’ll initially be impressed by the size of it. It’s a heck of a resource. But its true strength lies in the fact that children are trained to develop a key skill that’s reliably linked to better mental health. DNA-V is a child friendly, developmentally sensitive, Psychological Flexibility model, and we believe that children trained in this skill will go on to flourish in the game of life.
Dr Nic Hooper is a Senior Lecturer of Psychology at the University of the West of England (UWE). He has authored a number of empirical articles and books, including The Unbreakable Student (2021), as well as presenting his research at conferences and universities over 50 times all over the world. Between 2015 and 2017 he sat on the board of directors for the Association for Contextual Behavioural Science, which is the 8000-member organisation that oversees a lot of ACT related work. Nic is Communications Director at Connect PSHE.