Word of the Month
JANUARY

OPTIMISM: Assured, certain, positive, happy in manner. Looking on the bright side and reaching for your goals
Vs. Negative, defeatist
EspanÕl - optimista

**Please review the following suggestions for content and appropriateness to your child and/or student/s**

Suggested Reading:
Joy
Cocoon
Happiness Hill
The Little Engine that Could
The Cheerful Heart
Acts of the Apostles 24:15
John 3:3

Suggested Film:
Rudy rated PG
Hook rated PG
The Wizard of Oz rated G
The Lion King rated G
Remember the Titans rated PG-13
Forrest Gump rated PG-13
October Sky rated PG
Simon Birch rated PG
Hoosiers rated PG

Songs:
High Hopes
Hakuna Matata 
Somewhere Out There

Family Activity:

• Attempt to spend an entire week during which every comment made to each other as parent and child is positive and affirming.

• Try to avoid accusatory statements aimed at children. Instead of saying “You never...” or “You always...” try saying “I would appreciate it if you would...” or “I hope that you will...”

• Spend more time talking to your children about their hopes and dreams. Let them know that you care, and that you believe that they have the ability to achieve their dreams. Talk to them about things they will need to do to achieve their dreams; skills they will need to acquire, and the education they will need.

• When your children lose at sports they may be upset. Talk to them and help them understand that the important thing is trying their best, and that it says more about them if they keep trying when they are losing than it does if they win without having to try their best.

• Always help your children see the silver lining the dark clouds of life sends their way. When your family is facing tough times explain to them that everyone has bad luck sometimes and that what matters is not giving up, because if you don’t lose hope better times will come. It is important for children to learn this lesson.

Class Activity:

• Review with your students progress they have made and all they have learned in the past school year to help them appreciate how much they have achieved.

• Have your students formulate positive goals for their summer break.

• Ban negative statements from class for this month, or perhaps ban them all together. Make it a class rule that things like, “I can’t” or “it’s too hard” cannot be said. Never let a student call themselves dumb or allow another student to name call.

• Have students list their goals for the next year and how they plan to achieve them.

High School Activity:

• Discuss why students should have an optimistic view of their future and the future of their community.

• Have your students, especially any graduating students, make a list of goals for the next year, 5 years, and 10 years, and have them list a few of the things they have to do to achieve each of them.

• With the year coming to a close, this is a good time to ask students to review your class and suggest ways to make it even better. It could be done verbally, but some students may not feel comfortable making these suggestions in public so they should be given the chance to offer suggestions on paper without giving their name.

Quotes:

Do not anticipate trouble or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.
---Ben Franklin

Bravery is the courage to do anything that comes up and go forward with great expectations.
-Morgan Deaton, 6th grade NMS Student

It takes but one positive thought when given a chance to survive and thrive to overpower an entire army of negative thoughts.
---Robert H. Schuller

When we think positively and imagine what we want, we risk disappointment; when we don't, we ensure it.
---Lana Limpert

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.
---Martin Luther King, Jr.

The optimist already sees the scar over the wound; the pessimist still sees the wound underneath the scar.
---Ernest Schroder

Both optimists and pessimists contribute to our society. The optimist invents the airplane and the pessimist the parachute.
---Gil Stern

I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I though a flower would grow.
---Abraham Lincoln

Optimist: Person who travels on nothing from nowhere to happiness.
---Mark Twain

In the long run, the pessimist may be proved right, but the optimist has a better time on the trip.
---Daniel L. Reardon

Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.
---Colin Powell

A pessimist sees only the dark side of the clouds, and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides, and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all -- he's walking on them.
---Leonard Louis Levinson

Optimism is essential to achievement and it is also the foundation of courage and true progress.
---Lloyd Alexander

Optimism. The doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.
---Ambrose Bierce 

There is a basic law that like attracts like. Negative  thinking definitely attracts negative results. Conversely if a person habitually thinks optimistically and hopefully, his positive thinking sets in motion creative forces -- and success instead of eluding him flows toward him.
---Norman Vincent Peale

A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.
-Winston Churchill

Perform a Random Act of Kindness Each Day