John M. Yeager - SMART Strengths - Building Character, Resilience and Relationships in Youth

SMART STRENGTHS

A Parent-Teacher-Coach Guide to

Building Character, Resilience, and Relationships in Youth

John M. Yeager, Ed.D, MAPP

Sherri W. Fisher, M.Ed., MAPP

David N. Shearon, JD, MAPP

Cogent Publishing NY

Putnam Valley, New York

You are invited to visit the authors website at www.smartstrengths.com

What if you had a set of tools to help young people grow and develop into resourceful, productive adults?

What would it look like if you were able to build high quality connections at home, school or on the athletic field?

This book will show you how to make it all happen!

An Invitation, A Belief and A Promise

When we change ourselves, we change how people see us and respond to us.

When we change ourselves, we change the world.

Robert Quinn, Building the Bridge As You Walk on It

We believe that young people develop through the positive attention of parents, teachers and athletic coaches, to name a few. We believe that when adult mentors intentionally form strengths-based partnerships on behalf of the young people they serve that this provides a foundation for increased resilience, achievement, and well-being.

We invite you to discover (and rediscover) whats best about yourself and others through a lens that focuses on your strengths, your ability to be resilient, and your capacity to develop the power of high quality relationships.

We promise to provide you with practical research-based information, strategies, and activities that can benefit you and the young people you serve.

Praise for SMART STRENGTHS

SMART Strengths is a wonderful addition to the growing pantheon of works documenting the wisdom of the strengths-based approach in schools and the positive psychology upon which it is based. With both apt and often moving school-based illustrations and also tools to learn how to spot and build a students strengths, the authors reveal that through healthy relationships with the key adults in their lives, students flourish with growth mindsets as opposed to stumbling because of preoccupation with deficiencies. A must read for all the important players (parents, teachers, coaches) in a students life.

PATRICK F. BASSETT, President, National Association of Independent Schools

I am excited about the possibilities SMART Strengths offers to the training of parents and educators. It represents a pathway to understanding dimensions of growth we have neglected for a long time. Strengths-based development is not merely a technical issue, but is at the very heart of the challenge of human development. SMART Strengths is practical in the best sense of that word. I plan on placing it directly into the hands of teachers, future and current school leaders, and above all, parents. I highly recommend this text to anyone interested in personal development, and especially for those who are charged with fostering and facilitating growth in others.

TOM WARD, Director, Principal Leadership Academy of Nashville, Vanderbilt University Peabody College of Education

SMART Strengths will change a long standing belief among coaches, parents, teachers and supervisors that one must identify an individuals weaknesses in an effort to help improve their performance. SMART Strengths provides a plan and roadmap for improving oneself first so we in turn may improve others. Identifying and reinforcing ones talents and strengths is the most effective way to improve the outcomes for children, students, athletes and employees. SMART Strengths can apply to any individual whose responsibility is to help others improve.

TIM FLANNERY, National Federation of High Schools (NFHS) Assistant Director

This is an important book. I learned a lot from the powerful stories and practical methods for building on kids strengths rather than pecking at their weaknesses. It can help any leaderwhether on the playing field, the classroom, the home or the workplacebecome a better developer of young people.

JIM THOMPSON, Founder and Executive Director, Positive Coaching Alliance

Since graduating with the inaugural class of the Master of Applied Positive Psychology (MAPP) program at the University of Pennsylvania in 2006, the authors of SMART Strengths have been at the forefront of the application of positive psychology to education. Among their accomplishments is the transformation of Culver Academies into a strengths-based organization. This is the amazing story of their work, told so that others can follow in their footsteps. A must read for teachers, principals, superintendents, school board members, coaches, parentsanyone who believes that cultivating strengths and resilience is an important part of education.

JAMES O. PAWELSKI, Director of Education and Senior Scholar in the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania; Executive Director of the International Positive Psychology Association

SMART Strengths provides powerful insight on the value and importance of building positive relationships by identifying and nurturing personal strengths. This book should be required reading for teachers and coaches committed to best positioning young people for success in the classroom and on the athletic field. The authors also provide parents with a dynamic and interactive experience that challenges more traditional motivational theory and offers greater perspective on the values and qualities they should demand from the childrens teachers and coaches and themselves.

STEVE STENERSEN, President & CEO, US Lacrosse

John Yeager, Sherri Fisher, and David Shearon are to be commended for writing a truly informative, impressive book. They have skillfully synthesized a large body of research about a strength-based approach for nurturing responsibility, caring, and resilience in our youth. In a clearly written style they offer practical, realistic exercises and strategies that can be applied by educators, parents, coaches, and others who work with children and adolescents. I am certain that this book will serve as an invaluable resource to be read and re-read by any of us who have the privilege of influencing the life of children and adolescents. I recommend it highly.

ROBERT BROOKS, Ph.D. Psychologist on the faculty of Harvard Medical School and co-author, Raising Resilient Children and co-author, The Power of Resilience: Achieving Balance, Confidence and Personal Strength in Your Life

This book will immediately crystallize the importance of parents, teachers and coaches joining forces for the betterment of the young people they serve. SMART Strengths is a must read for adults who want practical strategies to help youth flourish. I highly recommend it!

DAVID J. POLLAY, author, The Law of the Garbage Truck: How to Respond to People Who Dump on You, and How to Stop Dumping on Others. Ocean Ridge, Florida

By coupling years of rigorous research from the field of positive psychology with real-life stories from teachers, coaches and parents; John Yeager, Sherri Fisher and Dave Shearon offer us a practical handbook for building character strengths in ourselves and our youth. SMART Strengths teaches us first and foremost, that in order to become more effective teachers, coaches or parents, before we can develop the character strengths of our children, we must first apply the SMART model to our own lives.

DAN HAESLER, Teacher, Emanuel School, Sydney, Australia

SMART Strengths is an all-important step for bringing the essential truths of positive psychology into schools. Yeager, Fisher, and Shearon outline the conceptual basis for their work and then, more importantly, offer concrete, real life examples of how we can change young peoples lives in significant ways. I hope this work will be followed by many others like it.