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Working collaboratively towards creating
positive possible selves
Sarah Fletcher
http://www.TeacherResearch.net
Positive Possible Selves (PPS)
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Overview
What’s the big idea of PPS?
What are the basic techniques?
What use might this be to my pupils?
What use might this be to me?
How do we know it works?
What are the potential benefits
of PPS?
Combating childhood depression
 Nurturing personal responsibility
 Teaching mutual responsibilities
 Modeling easily transferable skills
 Offering support for life long learning
 Realizing creative, imaginative potential
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What are the potential pitfalls of
PPS?
This is no cure all to solve every ill
 Participants have to want to take part
 Some participants find vizualisation hard
 Vizualisation has a “tree huggy” image
 If you are naturally cynical it takes longer!
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It can’t work - it’s cost free, everyone can
try it, it can de-stress teachers and pupils!
Who is using these PPS
techniques?
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Pain clinics
Business executives
Human resources providers
Cancer and chronically sick
Sports coaches and athletes
Students in school and university
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Anyone who wants to alleviate stress!
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My PPS Workbook
My Name
 My Class
 My School
 My Teacher
 My Positive Possible Self
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Step One: Introduction
Who am I now?
 Who do I want to be?
 What are my dreams and targets?
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Step Two: Drawing my PPS
Try drawing a stick figure
 What does your face look like?
 What’s in your thought bubble?
 What are you busy doing?
 Where are your friends?
 How do you feel now?
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Step Three: Drawing a map
Start from you as you are now.
 Draw yourself on a journey to your PPS.
 What happens between now and then?
 How long will your journey take you?
 How will you feel along the way?
 Who will be alongside you?
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Step Four: Overcoming problems
What is that problem on your journey?
 How does it feel when you look at it?
 Who can you discuss problems with?
 How might you get over the problem?
 How do you feel when you do?
 How do others feel now?
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Step Five: What am I good at?
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Step Six: What do I need to work on?
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Step Seven: What can I change in me?
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Who can help me to change for the better?
Step Nine: What am I afraid of?
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How will I overcome my fears?
Who will help me overcome them?
What’s my plan to reach my PPS?
Today
 This week
 This month
 This term
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How will I record what I achieve?
Who will I share my record with?
Potential benefits of PPS
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Possible selves are thought to influence the
motivation process in two ways: on the one
hand providing a clear goal to strive for - and to
avoid if they are negative - and on the other
hand by energising an individual to pursue the
actions necessary for attaining a Positive
Possible Self.
Fletcher, S. (2006) Mentoring Adult Learners: realising possible selves
Potential Pitfalls of PPS
Positive selves may not be ‘possible’
 Timescale for realising PPS is unrealistic
 There is insufficient support available
 Pursuing the PPS becomes sidetracked
 The teacher does not model PPS well
 The pupils experience failure in PPS
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How do I know PPS works?
Overcoming severe physical disablement
in my 30s having been told my teaching
career was at an end. I went on to get my
MA, become a Head of Faculty in a new
school, take on school-based mentoring
for five colleagues, get a qualification in
mentoring, write two books and gain a
lecturer’s post at the University of Bath
(in under ten years from facing retirement)
How can technology enable PPS?
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KEEP toolkit templates are easy to build webpages for students and teachers. They enable
multi-media record keeping.
Do a GOOGLE search - there are many useful
sites on applying PPS in practice.
Draw photos from the web to stimulate
visualisation of PPS (choose with care!)
Use email to keep in touch with pupils as they
form their PPS and keep one another informed
about their progress in attaining their goals.
Where can I find out more?
sjfmentor@yahoo.com
http://www.TeacherResearch.net
Click on Sarah’s Publications
http://www.StudentsResearch.net