Wellbeing in School

Support Programmes in the Curriculum

The PATHS^® Programme for Schools (UK Version) provides teachers and educators with a systematic developmental procedure for enhancing social competence and understanding in children. It addresses the following goals:

• Increased self-control, i.e., the ability to stop and think before acting when upset or confronted with a conflict situation. Lessons in this area also teach identification of problem situations through recognition of “upset” feelings.
• Attributional processes that lead to an appropriate sense of self-responsibility.
• Increased understanding and use of the vocabulary of logical reasoning and problem-solving, e.g., “if…then” and “why…because.”
• Increased understanding and use of the vocabulary of emotions and emotional states; e.g., excited, disappointed, confused, guilty, etc. Increased use of verbal mediation.
• Increased ability to recognise and interpret similarities and differences in the feelings, reactions and points of view of self and others.
• Increased understanding of how one’s behaviour affects others.
• Increased knowledge of, and skill in, the steps of social problem-solving: stopping and thinking; identifying problems and feelings; setting goals; generating alternative solutions; anticipating and evaluating consequences; planning, executing and evaluating a course of action; trying again if the first solution fails.
• Increased ability to apply social problem-solving skills to prevent and/or resolve problems and conflicts in social interactions.

Through the PATH’s programme children also have the opportunity to become the class VIP, which is drawn out of a box each day so that all the children get a chance to have a turn. Children get to wear a VIP badge and have a compliments list to take home at the end of the day. These compliments are from their friends and teachers but more importantly they get to compliment themselves.

Fun FRIENDS is a social group for children aged 4-7years. The group activities where children learn new skills are crucial to the success of the Fun FRIENDS program. We are very fortune to have our community health visitors come in and deliver these sessions, on request, to small groups of children who need them. These evidence-based, play-focused activities equip children with a these foundational resilience skills in a way that can be easily grasped, understood and used in everyday life:

• Helping other people including family, peers, and teachers
• Self-awareness of body clues (e.g. tense means stressed, butterflies means nervous)
• Relaxation techniques for the body and mind during stressful situations
• Engaging and relate to peers and making friends

Curriculum Overview

As a minimum expectation, Wellbeing and Mental Health is taught as part of our PSHE Curriculum.

 Children’s Mental Health Week

This week (4th-10th February) was children’s mental health week and the theme was Healthy: Inside and Out. All classes promoted mental health by ensuring they had a class discussion on the importance of mental health, and completed at least one activity with the whole class. Resources including powerpoints, videos and activities were used throughout the week and the children participated in role-play activities, created posters and had in class debates on the subject on mental health and wellbeing.

KS2 Wellbeing Assembly

This week (4th-8th March), CAMHS came into our school to deliver a series of wellbeing assemblies to our KS2 children. Many things were discussed such as, how physical and mental health need each other, the importance of mental health and talking to others when feelings of worry surface. The children were given a series of activities to do which highlighted the ‘five ways to wellbeing’ and talked about how they can help each other to look after mental health. The children found it very informative and have begun to use these strategies throughout their school day.

Wellbeing CAMHS Coffee Morning

 We would like to thank all the parents who came to our CAMHS coffee morning this week (Thursday 4^th April). The CAMHS staff who delivered the presentation were very complimentary and informed us that it was the best turn out they have had. Parents that attended, commented that they found it very helpful and felt it was a brilliant insight into children’s anxieties and the strategies and support systems that are available. We were very fortunate to welcome the Mayor and Mayoress to our coffee morning; with Madam Mayoress providing us with homemade cakes and Mr Mayor giving us an insight as to why mental health is so important. Parents had the opportunity to talk to Mr Mayor and Madam Mayoress and some of the children had the pleasure of having their photo taken with them. All in all it was an inspiring morning.