Positive Living Skills for teens: A youth intervention

Abstract

The Positive Living Skills (PLS) program for teens is a personal life enhancement intervention program centered on teaching focusing skills, positive perspectives, and relaxation skills. To date the PLS program has not been introduced to an adolescent population. The purpose of this study was to introduce the PLS program to adolescents (in a classroom context) and to investigate whether the students enjoyed, applied, and found these skills effective in their daily lives. A secondary purpose of this study was to learn from the interactions with the students and teachers and explore the best ways to deliver the program. Two grade 10 health and physical education classes (one boys' and one girls' class) participated in a 10 session PLS intervention over a period of 16 weeks. These sessions included PLS audio CD activities, interactive and person guided PLS activities, logbook exercises, discussions and practice using skills within the physical education context. Teens who participated in the PLS program enjoyed the program skills, applied and planned to continue applying the program skills, and found the program skills effective in daily life. These findings support results from previous PLS research conducted with younger students between the ages of 4-12 years of age (Cox & Orlick, 1996; Gilbert & Orlick, 2002; Taylor & Orlick, 2004). In addition facilitation and program delivery lessons learned are highlighted and discussed.