While teaching, reinforcing and sustaining optimistic thinking in children may seem an abstract and potentially difficult task, the benefits of such practices will extend to all aspects of those children’s lives. Studies have shown that children who learn to think and act optimistically are more likely to succeed as adults and avoid depression. Martin Seligman, a professor and leading psychologist from the University of Pennsylvania, found that preparing children to constructively challenge pessimistic thoughts helped raise self-esteem. These practices ultimately improve academic performance while encouraging greater self-reliance and self-confidence.
 
How can teachers engender such practices and habits in their students? Seligman’s book The Optimistic Child: A Proven Program to Safeguard Children Against Depression and Build Lifelong Resistance provides concrete ways to build optimism within children.  He does this by teaching children how to envision their troubles realistically, be aware of their internal feelings and thoughts about difficult situations and create positive, active solutions to those problems.  By providing concrete examples of this theory in practice, Seligman enables educators to incorporate such practices in their own classroom work.
 
Because service-learning projects often push students to approach and examine their abilities, strengths and weaknesses, reinforcing optimistic thinking while conducting service-learning projects is an easy way to teach optimism. Encourage your students to think creatively about problems they come up against that may seem confusing or impossible to solve. Create scenarios that your students can use to think through possible solutions. Encourage your students to examine all possibilities, even seemingly silly ideas. These silly ideas can generate feasible solutions that would not have been thought of without such limitless brainstorming. By learning how to productively and creatively cope with these obstacles, children will be better prepared for responsible adulthood.
 
These brainstorming sessions should be conducted with one rule in mind: that no idea, no matter how silly or unlikely, will be dismissed, laughed at or put down. By establishing some trust among students, they are more likely to use their creativity fully in problem solving. This, in turn, produces a sense of leadership and acceptance, while helping kids solve difficult problems in a positive and thoughtful manner.
 
As helpful as optimism is, however, don’t shrug off pessimism immediately as a worthless trait. Recent studies have also shown that constructive pessimism is important to a realistic development of the self and self-worth. Books such as Optimism and Pessimism: Implications for Theory, Research, and Practice, edited by Edward C. Chang, take a balanced look to the cup-is-half-full/cup-is-half-empty approaches.  These studies state that while optimism is healthy, a well-balanced and harnessed pessimism can also be helpful in conducting full lives.  You may find that some of your students seems to be more naturally pessimistic.  Teaching these students to use their pessimism in a productive manner, such as a means to troubleshoot and continue on a realistic, positive track, can aid both the student and the overall project in reaching its final goals.
 
Most importantly, it is essential to respect the differences in your students’ approaches to problems and to life, while also helping them find new ways to better solve conflicts and issues that may arise during service-learning projects. 
 
Check out these books for further information on optimism and pessimism:
 
Seligman, Martin, et al. The Optimistic Child: A Proven Program to Safeguard Children Against Depression and Build Lifelong Resistance . Harper Collins, 1996.
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=1-0060977094-4
 
Chang, Edward C. ed. Optimism and Pessimism: Implications for Theory, Research, and Practice. American Psychological Association, 2000.
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=62-1557986916-0