As Mr Barker pointed out in his December blog post, ‘How resilient is your child?’, mental health is top of mind for educators and all those involved in childhood development.
Whilst it is something that is woven into all elements of our pastoral care and indeed our Westbourne Way, we decided to plan a series of focussed activities during Mental Health Awareness Week in May.
Optimism is a fundamental aspect of well-being, so the week started with a bulletin board in the inner hall where pupils, staff and parents posted what makes them happy: ‘my family and friends’, ‘the holidays’, ‘people saying thank you’, were good examples.
The primary goal of the week was to teach children some practical tools to help them thrive with good mental health. We aimed for the children to gain a greater understanding of how mental health needs to be maintained by everybody. The emphasis was on the positive and the proactive.
Children were introduced to the Mental Health Foundation tool kit for building and maintaining a healthy mind:
- Talk to people about your feelings
- Eat well
- Care for others
- Be physically active
- Choose to do things you are good at
- Stay in contact and keep good relations with close friends and family
- Stop and take a break
- Ask for help
- Accept who you are
- Drink sensibly
With the exception of the final one (!), we discussed the guidelines and recognised symbols to remind us of them. Children discussed what these tips meant in our lives.
Pupils in Years 5 to 8 rated themselves on how good they felt they were at each tool. We found that across the age groups (Years 5 to 8) and genders the lowest scores were for:
- Talking to people about our feelings
- Asking for help
- Stopping and taking a break
Through the week we practised stopping and taking a break. Children at Westbourne are delightfully busy, so they need to be reminded to take breaks. Sensory walks encourage adults and children to take a ten-minute time out to explore sound, smell, sight and touch, taking time to notice the things around us that we take for granted. Being in the moment.
Mindfulness walks take place at school weekly in break times.
Year 4 have been experiencing Mindfulness for the past two years on Saturday mornings, and it was a delight to welcome parents and staff on the Saturday of Mental
Health Awareness Week to a practical session of breathing exercises and body scans. Parents were also invited to a talk by Mr. Pitman on ‘Wellbeing, Resilience and Mental Health’. Mr Pitman is the IAPS Pastoral Management Subject Adviser and regularly speaks at conferences about these issues in schools.
As for the difficulty that children have with sharing their feelings, we will be exploring strategies to encourage them to ask for help and talk about their feelings in the future. One child volunteered that she shares a journal with her mother in which she writes to her about her feelings and concerns from time to time. She finds this easier than
talking about her feelings, and it has enabled her to open up about concerns she has that she wouldn’t have shared previously.
We achieved a lot of what we set out to, and we know what we need to do to encourage healthy minds at Westbourne. The broader context of well-being asks us to focus on:
- Being healthy in body and mind
- Keeping perspective
- Developing strong relationships
- Having meaning and purpose
- Concentrating on our strengths
The Westbourne Way was designed with these strands of well-being in mind. It was worked on five years ago in Learning4Life with children and staff, and refined by an
online vote. Well-being is at the very core of the Westbourne Way and mental health is a fundamental part of this. Next term there will be practical workshops for parents and
children as well as information evenings. Keep an eye out for these sessions and engage.
Furthermore, we would encourage parents to consider the Mental Health Foundation toolkit at home, particularly acknowledging that the children reported finding difficulty
talking about their feelings, asking for help and taking a break. Parents may also wish to take the ‘good mental health quiz’ and think through which of the tools they find difficult. Half term is an excellent time to take a break, so we’d love to hear from your children about how they practiced good mental health when they return in June.