What strategies are effective in promoting positive mental health in young children?
Why have I chosen this?
As adults, there are very few of us who are strangers to mental illness. We live in a society where we face daily pressures, whether it's work, family, money, appearance...the list goes on. For many of us, we have the emotional vocabulary to explain how we are feeling and ask for help if we need it. But what about children? When a child is emotionally distressed, they are rarely able to explain how they are feeling and why. Unfortunately the pressures that children and young people face are increasing every year. 1 in 4 primary school aged children have suffered from stress and anxiety and, finally, it is becoming a key priority of the education sector to support these children. But what about helping our youngest children to become more fluent in speaking about emotions and helping them to express their feelings in a helpful way.
I started thinking about the children that I have taught in the past; many years ago, I taught a 6 year old child who seemed angry all of the time. He was frustrated at school when he didn't understand, and felt neglected at home. He would express himself through violence, both st the classroom and at himself. It was devastating to watch such a young child harming himself as a way to release the rage he was feeling. I worked hard st spending time talking to him and assisting him in explaining what thoughts were getting in the way. We worked together to 'problem solve' and this (sometimes) helped.
He is not the only child I have taught with similar problems though. There have been others who get so bad that they resort to temper tantrums and violence. We need to help these little children!
Some schools have brought in a Mental Health policies, but the key message seems to be that we should not just be tackling this problem as a REACTION to problems, but we need to be encouraging POSITIVE mental health right from the start. This links very closely to the importance of wellbeing here at School 21.
I am going to be looking at approaches taken at other schools, as well as other ideas I have developed, and see whether they make a difference to the children I teach.
I started thinking about the children that I have taught in the past; many years ago, I taught a 6 year old child who seemed angry all of the time. He was frustrated at school when he didn't understand, and felt neglected at home. He would express himself through violence, both st the classroom and at himself. It was devastating to watch such a young child harming himself as a way to release the rage he was feeling. I worked hard st spending time talking to him and assisting him in explaining what thoughts were getting in the way. We worked together to 'problem solve' and this (sometimes) helped.
He is not the only child I have taught with similar problems though. There have been others who get so bad that they resort to temper tantrums and violence. We need to help these little children!
Some schools have brought in a Mental Health policies, but the key message seems to be that we should not just be tackling this problem as a REACTION to problems, but we need to be encouraging POSITIVE mental health right from the start. This links very closely to the importance of wellbeing here at School 21.
I am going to be looking at approaches taken at other schools, as well as other ideas I have developed, and see whether they make a difference to the children I teach.
Methodology
- Equiping children with emotional vocabulary
- Daily time to talk about how we are feeling and what an effective reaction may be.
- 1:1 time with some children who are emotionally vulnerable (including happiness surveys to find out what makes them happy or unhappy etc.)
- Daily time to talk about how we are feeling and what an effective reaction may be.
- 1:1 time with some children who are emotionally vulnerable (including happiness surveys to find out what makes them happy or unhappy etc.)
How will I measure the effectiveness?
-Aiming for 95% of my class achieving ELG in Managing Feelings and Behaviour at the end of the year.
-'Happiness surveys' - collecting qualitive data from the children to see whether their feelings change towards certain activities or situations after they are able to express themselves.
- Photographic recording and observations of the language used when children are discussing how they feel.
-'Happiness surveys' - collecting qualitive data from the children to see whether their feelings change towards certain activities or situations after they are able to express themselves.
- Photographic recording and observations of the language used when children are discussing how they feel.