Teaching What Matters: Activating Happiness, Kindness, and Altruism

The desire to be happy and live a good life has been a constant throughout history. In these incredibly important adolescent years, creating opportunities and encouraging teenagers to open their hearts to the world, to others, and to themselves is the most worthy and important endeavor adults can provide to them. Teaching What Matters arrives at the right time. Rates of anxiety, depression, and chronic stress for teenagers and young adults are on the rise. Social-emotional learning along with ‘teaching to the whole child’ has seen increased interest from parents, educators, principals, businesses, the general public and even government agencies. Teaching What Matters is written by a life-long teacher for any practitioner interested in fostering social and emotional skills into an existing curriculum or classroom. This book distills Banno’s transformative and widely-popular high school course into a guidebook that empowers teenagers to explore the science of happiness and altruism. Teaching What Matters is infused with practical lessons, learning objectives, overarching reflection and discussion questions, summations of emerging research in positive psychology and other academic disciplines, assessments, and teaching strategies. Teaching What Matters will provide the agency for teenagers to enhance happiness and kindness in their lives and in the lives of others.