Introduction to stress management

This week we'll be getting started on Stress management by having a look at the question "What is stress?"

Weekly tasks

1. If you haven't already, familiarise yourself with the Course page.
   Note that there are a range of resources at the bottom of the page which may be of use to you in the course of your studies. Stress management resources (Wikieducator) contains a set of resources which have mostly been developed specifically for this course.
   
   
2. Download and review the course assessment. Don't worry about getting started on this yet, I'm not anticipating that you will get going with it for another month or so.
   
   
3. Elluminate - Monday 1-3pm.
   Introduction to Stress management
   This presentation will contain some fundamental ideas & models which you will need to have a good grasp of if you want to really understand the rest of the course. Interpretation of your clients' state of stress using these models is also a required part of the course assessment.
   
   I strongly recommend that in the time between this lecture and the next, you study this material to clarify your understanding.
   
   

Looking forward

1. In the next practical block you will be introduced to your first relaxation technique - breath retraining. We'll quickly run through some theory behind the use of breathing in stress management, will practice assessment of breathing patterns and breath retraining.
   
   
2. Two weeks later we'll get into looking at the chronic effects of stress, causes of stress, and assessment for stress.