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A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life - Charles Darwin

SOONVolume 40 - October 2010IR Home

St. Luke's

Seriously Optimistic Online NewsletterSeriously Optimistic Online Newsletter

In this volume...

• Workshops

• Reprinting

• Baby Strengths

• Specials

To contribute to SOON email us at: soon@innovativeresources.org

After 20 years of presenting and more than 700 ‘seriously optimistic’ workshops, Innovative Resources’ creative director Russell Deal is again planning another full year of hands-on Tools workshops in 2011.

The initial program will not be advertised until January next year, but is likely to again feature workshops in most states, and New Zealand.

Interested organisations are invited to notify us early to book a professional development workshop. Our workshops range from three hours to three days, according to need. All are experiential and interactive. All use a range of conversation-building materials from Innovative Resources and other publishers, as based on the principles

of St Luke’s strengths-based practice, and all contain lashings of humour, poetry, and

both of Russell’s jokes!

Earlier this year, we ran two Literary Therapist three-day workshops in Castlemaine, Central Victoria. Both were fully subscribed with a waiting list and were very enthusiastically received by participants. We are facilitating another Literary Therapist workshop at Buda in Castlemaine on April 4, 5 and 6 next year, with another to follow in September.

Check our website at www.innovativeresources.org for new postings of workshops and to secure a great professional

development event for your network, organisation, school or football team, contact Nola, Innovative Resources’ Training Coordinator on (03) 5442 0500 or email Nola at nola@innovativeresources.org

WORKSHOPS

St. Luke’s

Tools'The2011

All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better - Ralph Waldo Emerson

THE REPRINT SCHEDULE

The reprint schedule is again newsworthy because we have agonised over the success of the current Shadows’ box and our preference is for the latest polypropylene boxes.

Everyone loved the finish of the original cardboard box created by Tim Lane for the Shadows’ cards and there was genuine concern that we would not be able to reproduce this look with the plastic boxes.

Well, we proved the critics all wrong and the matte finish of the box has worked a treat, so much so in fact that you would be hard-pressed to tell them apart without picking them up and feeling the product.

The new boxes have a larger black strip across the bottom to cover the locking tabs but otherwise there is no discernible difference.

Anyway if you’ve been pondering the Shadows cards, they are now available in the new stronger box that doesn’t allow them to fall out when you’re passing the box around.

Also on the reprint horizon is the Note To Self series. After just 12 months, the initial print run has been exhausted and the reprint is due in any day now.

Congratulations to author Gena McLean on the success of this card series which we published in November last year.

Other resources in the schedule over the next month or so are the Growing Well cards and worksheets and the Everyday Goddess cards built around Katharina Rapp’s beautiful artwork.

The Sometimes Magic cards, the Can Do Dinosaurs and the new edition of The Bears are all on the schedule for reprint.

Finally, Our Scrapbook of Strengths is with the graphic artist as we transfer the design onto a similar polypropylene box, as we did for the Shadows cards.

All the art of living lies is a fine mingling of letting go and holding on - Henry Ellis

THE REPRINT SCHEDULE

I can get attention

I can have big feelings

I can give great cuddles

I am good at exploring

I can ask for help

OFF TO THE PRINTER

© Jan Player & St Luke’s Innovative Resources 2010

Author Jan Player’s new card set Baby Strengths – Understanding Baby Behaviours, Nurturing Healthy Bonds is due for release later this year. Jan is a Family Support Worker with Anglicare South Australia and has created a wonderful resource designed to help build healthy attachment between babies and primary carers.

The card set was introduced a couple of newsletters ago and now with the cards at the printer and the booklet through the editing process it is timely to promote them to our subscribers.

Here’s a reminder: Baby Strengths will be a set of 25 delightfully-illustrated cards for:

• recognising baby strengths• understanding baby cues• nurturing connections with baby • building solid foundations for baby development.

Baby Strengths can be used to build dynamic conversations with:• mothers, fathers, grandparents• childcare and family workers • parenting educators, health professionals...and anyone who cares for babies and parents.

Any idiot can face a crisis - it’s day to day living that wears you out - Anton Chekhov

Acting from the heart

Thousands of Australians from all walks of life have been moved to

act in support of asylum seekers and refugees

NOW $15.00

Concert for East Timor

Melbourne Concert Hall. Australian World Music Compilation CD. Artists celebrating Australia’s

cultural diversity. NOW $10.00

Voyage of the poppykettle

Set in ancient Peru, there is a village of miniature

people who lead a peaceful life sailing and

fishing. NOW $24.95

Biography and Autobiography

By one of today’s leading biographers, features excerpts from Michael

Holroyd’s lectures, essays, and reviews.

NOW $15.41

DON'T FORGET OUR SPECIALS BUTTONYes, at the top right of our web page we have a little button marked Specials' with some value

packs, backlist stock and end of run items like:

TRAINING CALENDARAs mentioned on the front page our training program is always evolving.

With our second Literary Therapist workshop (creative writing for personal growth, healing and social change) about to get underway next week we are busy developing our training calendar for next year.

We are planning to do the Travelling Tools workshops, get in a Team Building day or two, and maybe even talk the famous Karen Masman into doing her Soulful Melancholy workshop again.

Anyway, what we really want to do is finalise planning and get a calendar of events up on our website. This will put it all out there and make it easier for everyone to plan around us.

Keep an eye on the website, when it’s in place we’ll get it in an email to you.

There’s also a bit of a reshuffle taking place at St Luke’s that has restricted our training ability so we might even be running a Strength Training workshop or two.

We’ll keep you updated.

Just for explanation, that’s our very own Russell Deal in full voice during the inaugural Literary

Therapist workshop at Buda House in Castlemaine, last month.

Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact - William James

Talking Pictures … and Ways of Seeing is a unique resource for inviting young people to talk about their experiences, values and identity. Each of the 27 full-colour cards paints a picture of a social situation they or their friends may have confronted. For some young people, these may be everyday situations they simply breeze through, and for others, they may be quite challenging. For everyone they can evoke questions and possibly even dilemmas that are well worth pondering.

Created from original water colour paintings by Carolyn Marrone, this resource is built around the idea that life can be viewed through different lenses. Some lenses may be rose-coloured, some may be dark. With each card resembling a television or computer screen, the viewer is invited to put themselves ‘in the picture’, construct the story around each card and interpret the meaning.

The 27 scenes depicted in Talking Pictures do not

appear with any text. They are ‘stills’ or snapshots of ambiguous and interpretable situations that require each of us to create the story and the meaning. What this story will consist of depends on the particular lens that we have chosen, as well as how the scene connects to our own experience.

• What is happening in this scene?

• Does it remind you of something from your own experience?

• What has led to this situation?

• What will happen next?

• What are those in the picture feeling?

• What might they be saying?

The ‘storying’ that can be built around Talking Pictures can be rich and diverse. Some stories might be intensely personal with a lot of emotional content embedded. These sorts of stories might be safely told in the context of counselling or therapy. Other stories might be pure fiction, or at least at arm’s length from the real life experience of the storyteller. These stories might take the form of creative writing activities either inside or outside the classroom. Somewhere in the middle might be written or verbal stories that are memoirs or autobiographical accounts of scenes from our lives.

This is an original, powerful and revealing conversation-building tool for all young people … and their parents!

Available early 2011.Expected price $44.50

PICTURESTalking

a n d Wa y s o f S e e i n g

© St Luke’s Innovative Resources 2010

COMING SOON from IR