Frame 1099

    2026 PD Wrap Up: Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing

     Mark Collard, experiential trainer, author, and founder of Playmeo, joined us in August 2026 for an interactive session unpacking the latest science and research on why intentionally building play and fun should sit at the heart of any group-based program. Below is a summary of the key takeaways and learnings from the session. 

    Presenter: Mark Collard, Experiential Traininer, Author and CEO of Playmeo

    Last updated: 19/08/2026

    2026 PD Wrap Up: Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing

    At PESA, our learning focus for Term 1, 2026 is simple yet impactful: putting people at the centre of everything we do. Reconnecting staff, students, and families is the foundation of a vibrant, inclusive community, and it begins with the understanding that staff wellbeing is the bedrock of a healthy learning environment.

    We were recently joined by Justin Robinson, Director and Co-Founder of The Wellbeing Distillery, for an online masterclass on ‘Building a Shared Responsibility for Teacher Wellbeing’, where he shared the Wellbeing Quadrant, a practical framework designed to promote wellbeing and proactively prevent ill-being. Below, we have synthesised the key takeaways and curated resources to support your school’s action planning for staff wellbeing. 

    Educators are no strangers to “connect before content”, the practice of building rapport at the start of a lesson before turning to the material itself. In this session, Mark Collard pushed that idea a step further: what happens when connection stops being the opening act and becomes something woven through the whole lesson? The question at the centre of the day was simple: how do we keep students engaged not just at the start of learning, but all the way through it? Mark’s answer was deceptively simple too:  add playfulness.

     

    Play is a powerful tool in education

    Play isn’t a break from learning, it is  how learning happens in the first place. For decades, classrooms have treated play as a reward for finishing the real work: something earned after the lesson, tolerated at the margins of the school day, valued for the joy it brings but rarely for what it builds. Advances in developmental research have upended that assumption. Play now stands out as a primary driver of brain maturation, shaping the sensory pathways, executive function, and emotional regulation that every other academic skill depends on. It is not an optional enrichment activity; it is one of the essential mechanisms through which a young brain grows.

    That reframing changes what a session on play in education is actually about. It isn’t a collection of fun add-ons for teachers to try when time allows, it’s a practice grounded in how children develop, full stop. And nowhere is this clearer than in the classroom relationships play helps build. Educators already know that a class with strong relationships runs more smoothly: students listen better, take more risks, and recover faster from setbacks. Th evidence is clear:  you cannot change how a student thinks or behaves without first changing how they feel, and structured, playful connection is among the fastest, most reliable ways to shift that feeling.

    This is the idea at the centre of what follows: connection IS the content. Relationship-building is not a warm-up act before the “real” learning starts,  it is a legitimate outcome in its own right, one that amplifies every other outcome a teacher is chasing.

     

     

    Two Critical Elements

     Mark framed  the session around two critical elements: 'Connection Before Content', and the idea that 'Environment Dictates Performance'. Neither is new on its own,   most teachers already believe in the value of rapport, and most know that a calm room works better than a chaotic one. What Mark offered was the link between them: connection is what makes people receptive to learning in the first place, and environment is what determines whether a student can access that receptiveness moment to moment. Together, the two elements explain both why connection-first practice works and how to put it into action.


     
    1. Connection before content
    2. Environment dictates performance 

    What it means

     Build intentional connection before and through task-focused learning. 

    A teacher's role is to design the environment in which students operate, rather than to control student outcomes directly. The environment  - how safe, welcomed, and emotionally regulated students feel - enables students to engage and perform. 

    Why it works

    Connection is what makes people receptive to learning. Skip it, and even well-designed learning content lands on a group that isn't ready to engage with it. 

     Emotional state influences behaviour and cognition. Students need to feel safe and regulated before they can engage deeply. 

    Evidence and reasoning

    • Research from the Partnership for 21st Century Learning (P21) found the most successful programs (defined as any setting where someone is responsible for participants' wellbeing), are those that intentionally build healthy, trusting relationships from the outset. Simply being in the same room together isn't enough, deliberate effort is what makes the difference, showing up as greater participation, academic performance, and engagement.

    • An Australian/New Zealand longitudinal study followed 18-year-olds to age 32. The strongest predictor of long-term success wasn't academic score, it was the ability to form and sustain healthy relationships (correlation coefficient 0.62, versus 0.12 for ATAR/academic score).

    This principle draws on the well-established idea that emotional state precedes behaviour and cognition. You cannot reason, problem-solve, or take a curriculum risk from a dysregulated or unsafe emotional state. 

    Ask yourself

     “Have I connected with this student before asking them to engage with the content?” 

     “How is this student feeling right now, and what can I change about the environment?” 

    Put into practice

    Fun, opening greetings and rituals • Ice-breakers • Relationship routines • Knowing students beyond their work 

     Physical space • Group norms • Predictable routines • Co-regulation • Classroom climate 

     

    What the research tells us

     The case for connection-first, playful teaching draws on developmental psychology, decades-long cohort studies, large-scale meta-analysis, and emerging neuroscience,  and the findings converge on the same conclusion: relationships and playfulness aren’t peripheral to learning, they’re foundational to it.

    • Intentional relationship-building outperforms proximity

    Research from the Partnership for 21st Century Learning (P21) found the most successful programs are those that *intentionally* build healthy, trusting relationships from the outset. Simply being in the same room together isn't enough,  deliberate effort is what makes the difference, showing up as greater participation, academic performance, and engagement.

    • Relationships predict adult success better than grades

    An Australian/New Zealand longitudinal study followed 18-year-olds to age 32. The strongest predictor of long-term success wasn't academic score, it was the ability to form and sustain healthy relationships (correlation coefficient 0.62, versus 0.12 for ATAR/academic score).

    • Play and flourishing

    Harvard University's Human Flourishing Program 2026 report reportedly found the top two contributors to adolescent flourishing were laughing with other students and having a sense of playfulness (worth verifying the specific figures directly with Harvard's Human Flourishing Program if citing this elsewhere).

    • Teacher-student relationships move the needle on engagement and achievement

    A large-scale meta-analysis published in School Psychology Review, drawing on 99 studies and roughly 166,000 students from preschool through high school, found that positive teacher-student relationships carry medium-to-large associations with student engagement and small-to-medium associations with academic achievement, with negative relationships showing the inverse pattern. It is  one of the largest evidence bases in education research pointing the same direction as Mark’s framework: relationship quality is not a soft outcome sitting alongside the “real” metrics, it is one of the levers that moves them.

    • Play strengthens executive function directly

    A 2021 study in Frontiers in Psychology tested a play-based executive function program - ten five-minute games such as Simon Says, Red Light/Green Light, block-building, and pretend play - with preschoolers across four sites. Children showed measurable gains in working memory, cognitive flexibility, and inhibition, and educators reported the program was easy to fold into existing routines because it asked for only one short game a day. 

     

    "... the primary role of a teacher is to create an

    evironment in which students can make

    appropriate choices..."

    Mark Collard

     

    Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing

    Mark Collard is an experiential trainer, author and founder of playmeo, the ultimate toolkit of icebreakers, energisers and team-building activities, used by thousands of teachers worldwide. This interatctive session explores tghe latest science and reserach which supports and encourages the intentional development of wellbeing as the central focus of group-based programs. This session presents a series of fun group activities which can easily be integrated into your exitsing curriculum to help your students feel valued, supported included. 

    Presenter: Mark Collard, Experiential Traininer, Author and CEO of Playmeo

    Last updated: 11/08/2026

    Watch webinar
    Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing

     

    Key Takeaways

    1. Connection built into the same room isn't automatic. The research shows a real difference only where relationship-building is intentional; proximity alone doesn't seem to move the needle.

    2. Feeling appears to come before thinking and behaviour.  Across the session, resistance showed up less as unwillingness and more as a signal about how someone was feeling in that moment.

    3. The environment carries a lot of the weight. Much of what shapes whether students step forward, take a risk, or hang back seems to sit in the conditions around them, not just in the individual.

    4. None of it appeared to be subject-specific. The activities demonstrated worked the same way regardless of curriculum area, with the common thread being humans connecting with humans.

    5. Very little of this required preparation.  Every activity demonstrated used minimal materials and only a few minutes, worth noting given how often "no time" is the barrier to trying something new.

    Practical Resources and Readings

    550+ FREE group games and activities

    Icebreakers, energisiers, brain breaks and engaging games requiring no prep. 

    Visit resource

    Lazy Facilitator Toolkit

    Five energisers that can be played with zero prep, anywhere, anytime. 

    Five free energisers

    Free video tutorials

    Dozens of video tutorials for engaging students in many different scenarios and contexts. 

    Video tutorials

    550+ FREE group games and activities

    Icebreakers, energisiers, brain breaks and engaging games requiring no prep. 

    Visit resource

    Lazy Facilitator Toolkit

    Five energisers that can be played with zero prep, anywhere, anytime. 

    Five free energisers

    Free video tutorials

    Dozens of video tutorials for engaging students in many different scenarios and contexts. 

    Video tutorials

     

    References

    Gibb, R. L., Coelho, L. A., Van Rootselaar, N. A., Halliwell, C., MacKinnon, M., Plomp, I., & Gonzalez, C. L. R. (2021). Promoting executive function skills in preschoolers using a play-based program. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, 720225. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.720225

    Harvard Human Flourishing Program. (2026). Report: Adolescent flourishing in schools. https://hfh.fas.harvard.edu/post/report-adolescent-flourishing-in-schools (Figures reportedly cited in this session; recommend confirming directly with the program before further distribution.)

    Olsson, C. A., McGee, R., Nada-Raja, S., & Williams, S. M. (2013). A 32-year longitudinal study of child and adolescent pathways to well-being in adulthood. Journal of Happiness Studies, 14(3), 1069–1083. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-012-9369-8

    Partnership for 21st Century Learning (P21). (n.d.). Research on intentional relationship-building and program outcomes. Source as referenced in this session; the original publication was not independently located for this write-up — recommend confirming the exact citation with the presenter.

    Roorda, D. L., Jak, S., Zee, M., Oort, F. J., & Koomen, H. M. Y. (2017). Affective teacher–student relationships and students' engagement and achievement: A meta-analytic update and test of the mediating role of engagement. School Psychology Review, 46(3), 239–261. https://doi.org/10.17105/SPR-2017-0035.V46-3

     

    Learn more in Mark's books, 'Serious Fun' and 'No Props, No Problem'

    Books available at  https://www.playmeo.com/shop 

     

    Screenshot 2026-08-19 124044

    Related Resources

    Explore more resources >
    2026 PD Wrap Up: Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    Article PD Wrap Up
    2026 PD Wrap Up: Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    Mark Collard, experiential trainer, author, and founder of Playmeo, joined us in August 2026 for an interactive session unpacking the latest science and research on why intentionally building play and fun should sit at the heart of any group-based program. Below is a summary of the key takeaways and learnings from the session. Presenter: Mark Collard, Experiential Traininer, Author and CEO of Playmeo
    Access Resource
    Curiosity Check and the Ask Approach
    Website Display
    Curiosity Check and the Ask Approach
    The Ask Approach is a framework from author Jeff Wetzler built on a simple premise: the insights we need most often already exist in the people around us, we just need to ask well. The five-step approach (curiosity, safety, quality questions, listening, reflection) offers practical tools for surfacing honest feedback and building trust, skills directly transferable to relational practice, staff culture, and leadership in schools and in the classroom. Author/ source: Ask Approach by Jeff Weltzer
    Access Resource
    Communicating with Today's Parents: McCrindle Research and RoundTable
    Research Summary
    Communicating with Today's Parents: McCrindle Research and RoundTable
    What do parents expect from schools when it comes to communication? PESA attended a round table to discuss the results of the research paper: "Communicating with Today's Parents" where 1000 parents were surveyed in February 2026. Author: Research by McCrindle. Article by PESA
    Access Resource
    Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    Webinar/Video 2026 Online PD
    Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    Mark Collard is an experiential trainer, author and founder of playmeo, the ultimate toolkit of icebreakers, energisers and team-building activities, used by thousands of teachers worldwide. This interatctive session explores tghe latest science and reserach which supports and encourages the intentional development of wellbeing as the central focus of group-based programs. This session presents a series of fun group activities which can easily be integrated into your exitsing curriculum to help your students feel valued, supported included. Presenter: Mark Collard, Experiential Traininer, Author and CEO of Playmeo
    Access Resource
    2026 PD Wrap Up: The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    Article PD Wrap Up
    2026 PD Wrap Up: The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    Sue Chandler, Founder of Transformative Schools presents the Relational Practice Bridge, a framework for shifting school culture from control to curiosity. Through three "stories" (the discipline biographies we inherit, the theories of change we adopt, and the patterns our systems reinforce), she explores why relational practice is hard to sustain and how educators can build genuine accountability through understanding rather than consequences. Author/Source: PESA and Sue Chandler, Transformative Schools
    Access Resource
    The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    Webinar/Video 2026 Online PD
    The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    Presented by Sue Chandler, Founder of Transformative Schools. Why Relational Practice Requires a Shift from Control to Curiosity.
    Access Resource
    A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    Webinar/Video Online PD 2026
    A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    Presented by Michelle McKersey: Deputy Head of Secondary (Students), Moreton Bay College. Shifting from rules to relationships and from conflict to connection.
    Access Resource
    2026 PD Wrap Up: A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    Article PD Wrap Up
    2026 PD Wrap Up: A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    Building on our Term 1 focus on creating a strong community from day one, we welcomed Michelle McKersey, Deputy Head of Secondary at Moreton Bay College to explore a whole‑school approach to restorative practice. In this session, Michelle contrasted restorative, relational approaches to behaviour with traditional punitive models and highlighted Collaborative Problem Solving (CPS) as a proactive, preventative strategy within a restorative framework. Author/Source: PESA and Michelle McKersey, Moreton Bay College.
    Access Resource
    Creating a Wellbeing Environment: Positive Leadership Practices
    Article Key Concept
    Creating a Wellbeing Environment: Positive Leadership Practices
    “Authentic leaders are genuine in their intentions and understand the purpose of their leadership is to serve their community not their self-interest.” - Daniel Goleman Author: PESA with contributions from Kerrin Smith.
    Access Resource
    2026 PD Wrap Up: Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    2026 PD Wrap Up: Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    Mark Collard, experiential trainer, author, and founder of Playmeo, joined us in August 2026 for an interactive session unpacking the latest science and research on why intentionally building play and fun should sit at the heart of any group-based program. Below is a summary of the key takeaways and learnings from the session. Presenter: Mark Collard, Experiential Traininer, Author and CEO of Playmeo
    Article PD Wrap Up
    Curiosity Check and the Ask Approach
    Curiosity Check and the Ask Approach
    The Ask Approach is a framework from author Jeff Wetzler built on a simple premise: the insights we need most often already exist in the people around us, we just need to ask well. The five-step approach (curiosity, safety, quality questions, listening, reflection) offers practical tools for surfacing honest feedback and building trust, skills directly transferable to relational practice, staff culture, and leadership in schools and in the classroom. Author/ source: Ask Approach by Jeff Weltzer
    Website Display
    Communicating with Today's Parents: McCrindle Research and RoundTable
    Communicating with Today's Parents: McCrindle Research and RoundTable
    What do parents expect from schools when it comes to communication? PESA attended a round table to discuss the results of the research paper: "Communicating with Today's Parents" where 1000 parents were surveyed in February 2026. Author: Research by McCrindle. Article by PESA
    Research Summary
    Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    Connection IS The Content: A Pathway to Wellbeing
    Mark Collard is an experiential trainer, author and founder of playmeo, the ultimate toolkit of icebreakers, energisers and team-building activities, used by thousands of teachers worldwide. This interatctive session explores tghe latest science and reserach which supports and encourages the intentional development of wellbeing as the central focus of group-based programs. This session presents a series of fun group activities which can easily be integrated into your exitsing curriculum to help your students feel valued, supported included. Presenter: Mark Collard, Experiential Traininer, Author and CEO of Playmeo
    Webinar/Video 2026 Online PD
    2026 PD Wrap Up: The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    2026 PD Wrap Up: The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    Sue Chandler, Founder of Transformative Schools presents the Relational Practice Bridge, a framework for shifting school culture from control to curiosity. Through three "stories" (the discipline biographies we inherit, the theories of change we adopt, and the patterns our systems reinforce), she explores why relational practice is hard to sustain and how educators can build genuine accountability through understanding rather than consequences. Author/Source: PESA and Sue Chandler, Transformative Schools
    Article PD Wrap Up
    The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    The Space Between Knowing and Doing
    Presented by Sue Chandler, Founder of Transformative Schools. Why Relational Practice Requires a Shift from Control to Curiosity.
    Webinar/Video 2026 Online PD
    A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    Presented by Michelle McKersey: Deputy Head of Secondary (Students), Moreton Bay College. Shifting from rules to relationships and from conflict to connection.
    Webinar/Video Online PD 2026
    2026 PD Wrap Up: A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    2026 PD Wrap Up: A Whole School Approach to Restorative Practices
    Building on our Term 1 focus on creating a strong community from day one, we welcomed Michelle McKersey, Deputy Head of Secondary at Moreton Bay College to explore a whole‑school approach to restorative practice. In this session, Michelle contrasted restorative, relational approaches to behaviour with traditional punitive models and highlighted Collaborative Problem Solving (CPS) as a proactive, preventative strategy within a restorative framework. Author/Source: PESA and Michelle McKersey, Moreton Bay College.
    Article PD Wrap Up
    Creating a Wellbeing Environment: Positive Leadership Practices
    Creating a Wellbeing Environment: Positive Leadership Practices
    “Authentic leaders are genuine in their intentions and understand the purpose of their leadership is to serve their community not their self-interest.” - Daniel Goleman Author: PESA with contributions from Kerrin Smith.
    Article Key Concept
    Explore more resources >