10th October is World Mental Health day, the charity YoungMinds is calling on schools across the country to take part in #HelloYellow to show young people they're not along with their mental health. Schools that register for #HelloYellow will receive a free pack, including a mental health assembly plan as well as a range of activities.
Mind Moose have produced an assembly that schools can use. It introduces mental health in the context of being as important to look after as physical health before discussing ways that we can all look after our mental health. It also discusses how children and adults in a school community can help each other to look after mental health.
The PHSE association has a comprehensive DfE funded Guidance on preparing to teach about mental health and emotional well being - as wells being a core guidance document it also includes a range of lesson plans for KS2 and KS3 pupils. It has also produced a mental health teaching checklist as well as ground rules for teaching about mental health and emotional well being to ensure the safety of pupils when discussing this subject.
The Anna Freud National centre for families and children have produced an excellent booklet for supporting mental health and well being in schools - you can download it here: supporting-mental-health-and-wellbeing-in-schools. They have also produced an excellent animated video below to encourage talking about mental health in schools, great for use in assembly and in class:
Adolescent resilience - LGfL have teamed up with Public Health England to provide links to some school-ready resources from a range ofdifferent organisations. These include information on academic research, materials for whole-school approaches as well as lesson series and one-off resources, plus targeted support for specific problems, and signposting. Links do not imply endorsement of one approach over another.Please note that not all resources have been formally evaluated, although many have beendeveloped with schools and experts in the field. This resources are suitable for KS3, KS4 and KS5.
Public Health England have a range of resources to support children in schools, they have a lesson plan and activities based around online stress and FOMO(Fear of missing out).
You can also download a range of calming music for use with either meditation, assemblies or in class from Audio network.
When I worry about things is another excellent resource from BBC Teach it is a collection of animated films that use personal testimony to explore mental health issues from the perspective of children. Alongside each, there is more information about the content of the film, and suggestions of how it could be used in the classroom. These resources are suitable for use with pupils aged 8-13.
Tell us what you are doing for mental health day on either our Twitter or Facebook pages.