Overview

An interactive book course with Dr Belinda Khong, the author of "Raising Spring Kids", held online over a four-part event series.

Are you:

• concerned about the rising mental health crisis in kids?
• wanting to learn mindfulness skills and become a more mindful person?
• wanting to learn more about yourself as a human being?
• wanting to learn about mindful parenting and raise mindful kids?
• looking for an innovative approach to empower kids to reach their full potential and to manage their problems in this fast-paced age of changing norms and values?
• looking to understand children holistically and improve the ways you communicate with kids and others?

This series is informed by and grounded in Belinda’s book, "Raising Spring Kids: A Psychologist's guide to nurturing Mindful kids". Belinda shows how we can help individuals and families practice being:

• Spiritual, Positive, Resilient, Imaginative, Nimble and Grateful (SPRING)
• Generous, Respectful, Empathetic, Appreciative and Thoughtful (GREAT)

The course showcases an innovative approach for working with young people with practical tips for mindful action — facilitated by the author herself. Belinda examines the Buddha’s important teachings and discusses how to cultivate and practice positive values including the following:

• The Eightfold Path (Fourth Noble Truth)
• Meditation, mindfulness and cultivating a beginner’s mind
• The values of SPRING AND GREAT
• Mindful communication and mindful parenting
• Compassion, empathy, generosity and resilience
• Differentiate between WANTS and NEEDS

About Raising Spring kids: Belinda’s book offers a cutting-edge, strength-based guide book that will help and benefit families, parents, therapists, healthcare professionals, educators and kids themselves. It is a useful resource for adults working or parenting children, and even adults wanting to re-parent themselves. The book integrates wisdom from Eastern and Western psychologies and philosophies and the Buddha’s teachings. The book features clinical vignettes, inspiring narratives, Zen stories, beautiful illustrations, psychological explanations and practical exercises relevant for all ages and cultures. The book offers a practical approach for practitioners who wish to understand and integrate Buddhist wisdom, psychology, therapeutic skills and mindfulness, and shows how you can find and create opportunities to practice right mindfulness in daily life, using the book’s examples and your own stories as a source of inspiration and mindfulness-in-action to help others.

Workshop Schedule
This activity will be held once a week for four (4) weeks on a Friday evening at 6pm – 8pm AEDT.
Topics that will be covered include:

• Cultivating and practising the values of SPRING and GREAT (week 1)
• Learning and applying wisdom from Buddha and animal friends (week 2)
• Tales from therapy: Empowering kids (week 3)
• Guide for nurturing mindful kids & application to contemporary issues (week 4)

Please note: Ticket price includes a hard copy of Belinda's book to be sent to each participant's chosen address (to be coordinated by Belinda herself), and postage fee.

Schedule:

• Friday 10/10/2025; 06:00 PM - 08:00 PM AEDT
• Friday 17/10/2025; 06:00 PM - 08:00 PM AEDT
• Friday 24/10/2025; 06:00 PM - 08:00 PM AEDT
• Friday 31/10/2025; 06:00 PM - 08:00 PM AEDT

Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of this event, participants should be able to:

• Develop the skills of mindful parenting and nurture a SPRING and GREAT kid.
• Use the vignettes, practice exercises, techniques, psychological explanations, and key learnings to help your child build the foundations to cultivate the values of SPRING and GREAT.
• In clinical settings, helping professionals can learn to:
  • use a range of therapeutic approaches, skills, and exercises to help clients explore and manage their psychological and mental health issues,
  • move beyond problem-solving by developing and working with insights,
  • remain grounded and open when encountering challenging clients and situations.
• In everyday non-clinical settings, parents and individuals can learn how to adapt and apply analogous skills and techniques with kids and others.
• Develop a deeper understanding of the Buddha’s teachings and practices:
  • understand Buddhist wisdom and its intersections with psychology and mindful parenting,
  • meditation and mindfulness and how to integrate the exercises and benefits of meditation and mindfulness into daily living,
  • learn to cultivate and practice a beginner’s mind,
  • practise loving kindness, compassion and letting go.
• Be a positive role model and show kids how to embody and practice positive values.
• Use the book vignettes or comparable stories from other wisdom traditions with kids.
• Use the tips, skills and techniques to practice mindful communication with kids and others.
• Provide kids with a set of life skills to help them manage emotional & psychological challenges.

Presenter(s)

About the presenter(s)

Dr. Belinda Siew Luan Khong
LLB (Hons), PhD, FAPA, FCCounP

Dr. Khong is an internationally distinguished Australian psychologist, academic, researcher and mindfulness teacher. She is a fellow of the American Psychological Association, the APS College of Counselling Psychologists, and was an adjunct fellow of Macquarie University, Sydney. She counsels individuals and families on mental health, well-being, mindful parenting, and positive flourishing. She is widely recognized as one of the leading psychologists on the integration of Western and Eastern psychologies and philosophies. Prior to moving into psychology, she practised as a lawyer and was the senior partner of the law firm she founded in Singapore.

She is the recipient of the NSW Seniors Local Achievement Award 2025 for her contributions to children’s literature, writing on positive values and promoting cultural understanding.

Dr. Khong is a member of the editorial board of The Humanistic Psychologist journal. She was the co-guest editor of a Special Double Issue on Revisiting and Re-Envisioning Mindfulness (The Humanistic Psychologist, APA). She writes a monthly column for the Sydney Observer Magazine (https://sydneyobserver.com.au/so-magazine/ under her pen name, “ASK DR PHOENIX,” inspired by her Chinese name, LUAN (meaning Phoenix).

Her books include her Lunar New Year Animal Books series for kids—“AM I A TIGER?” “Water Rabbit Mindful Adventures” and "Dragon & Animal Friends’ Mindful Adventures.” Her fourth book, Raising Spring Kids (2025) is a culmination of more than 25 years of her work and is an essential companion to her animal book trilogy. For more about her work, visit https://www.belindakhong.com/

Ms. Emily Knowles
Co-host, and APS Buddhism and Psychology Interest Group National Convener

Emily is a psychospiritual practitioner – integrating deep psychological work with contemplative traditions (including Buddhism, Yoga and mindfulness).

Emily believes mindfulness – as a chosen attitude, and regular practice – is part of the answer to most questions. She is a Committee Member of the Psychology and Yoga Interest Group, and is currently completing her 200 hour ashtanga yoga teacher training course. She is passionate about helping people, who help people : specialising in support for psychologists, and lawyers.

Emily is a registered psychologist, academic, researcher and subject matter expert in workplace wellbeing. By day, she is an Organisational Psychologist, working in the legal sector. A lawyer-turned psychologist herself, she now practices as a psychologist for lawyers. Emily is leading sector-level change in the lawyer wellbeing movement. She currently holds the role of Wellbeing Manager and the Law Institute of Victoria. Emily is involved in a number of proactive wellbeing initiatives in Victoria, but also nationally and internationally. She is the Co-Chair and Co-Founder for the Australian Chapter of the Mindfulness in Law Society.

Notes

Registration includes postage of a hard-copy of Belinda's book, and access to the recordings for 90 days after the live sessions.

Target Audience

Psychologists; Healthcare professionals; Lawyers; Educators; Parents who wish to take a mindful approach to parenting; and any other professionals who interact with children and wish to learn more about mindfulness skills and techniques.

Duration of Access

This event will be recorded. The recording will be emailed to all registered within 2 weeks post event and available for viewing up to 90 days.

CPD

It is up to attendees to assess and determine how learning from this event aligns with the requirements of their learning plan. The providers accordingly do not make any representation that the event counts towards attendees’ CPD learning requirements. If an attendee determines themselves that the learning they complete aligns to their learning plan, then they can decide to count those hours towards their CPD requirements for the registration cycle.

The information in this presentation has been prepared in good faith and for educational purposes only. Therefore, the information is general in nature and should not be relied upon in the treatment of any condition and you should seek your own independent professional and/or legal advice concerning any specific issue. The APS accepts no responsibility for any errors, omissions or decisions relating to the information. The content should not be reproduced without permission or unless permitted by law.

If you are experiencing registration difficulties please contact APS Events Support.