he majority of the following are national organisations that provide training around children and young people’s emotional well-being and mental health. As well as these organisations, you should also look at what training is provided locally. For instance, in Leeds, the School Wellbeing team provide a range of training –
This information is relevant to the UK. Please submit any information that would be of help in other countries to [email protected].
UK Training courses MindEd – https://www.minded.org.uk provides free, completely open access, online education, available on tablets, phones or computers – bite sized chunks of ‘e-learning’ – to help adults to support wellbeing and identify, understand and support children and young people with mental health issues. The learning material were written and edited by leading experts from the UK and around the world. Once you sign up to MindEd, a Learning Path, based on the role you choose in your profile, will be recommended to you. There is even a default Learning Path, so that everyone who signs in has somewhere to start.
ADDISS – National Attention Deficit Disorder Information and Advice Service – http://www.addiss.co.uk/ This organisation provides training for schools on ADHD management and information and advice about ADHD. They produced ‘School Report: Perspectives on ADHD’, which illustrates what it is like to be a child with ADHD in the school system – http://www.addiss.co.uk/schoolreport.pdf
Alumina – http://alumina.selfharm.co.uk/ is an online course for young people aged 14-19 years, which was first set-up by selfharm.co.uk – http://selfharm.co.uk/home They provide group and individual courses for young people.
How to Thrive – http://www.howtothrive.org provide training for teachers who want to teach the UK Penn Resilience Programme (PRP). More information about the PRP is in the Promoting Emotional Wellbeing Through the Curriculum section. How to Thrive provide a 5 day programme that provides the skills and knowledge required to teach the PRP curriculum to children and young people. Participants develop their own personal resilience and then apply this insight to teaching the curriculum to young people. The PRP is a licenced model, and only those who have received training through an accredited body such as How to Thrive, can legitimately teach the PRP curriculum.
In our Hands – http://www.inourhands.com/ provide training on a wide range of emotional wellbeing and mental health issues, from promoting positive mental health, to sessions on eating disorders, and self-harm. They aim to ensure that their advice, guidance and any support provided is completely practical and relevantto the school environment by working with school staff whenever developing new materials. They also provide workshops for both young people, and parents. The In our Hands website includes some free resources, which can be delivered to young people, teachers and parents. Mental Health First Aid England – http://mhfaengland.org/first-aid-courses/first-aid-youth/ is an educational course which teaches people how to identify, understand and help a person who may be developing mental health problems. They have a specific Mental Health First Aid course that focuses on young people’s mental health. Mindfulness in Schools Project – http://mindfulnessinschools.org/have developed a range of courses called .b, which stands for ‘Stop, Breathe and Be’ which can be used with a range of different age groups. National Association of Independent and Non-Maintained Special Schools’ (NASS) Making Sense of Mental
Health E-Learning Resource – http://www.nasschools.org.uk/NASS is a membership organisation working with and for special schools in the voluntary and private sectors within the UK. ‘Making Sense of Mental Health’ is an e-learning resource for staff working in schools with children and young people who have complex SEN. The e-learning training aims to increase staff knowledge about mental health and how this relates to children with disabilities – http://www.nasschools.org.uk/making_sense_of_mental_health.aspx Place2Be – http://www.place2be.org.uk/ As well as providing counselling services for children and support for teachers and parents, Place2Be provide continuous professional development training sessions that address themes related to children’s emotional wellbeing in schools, such as safeguarding, attachment, understanding risks and resilience etc. The sessions help reduce teacher and staff stress by providing practical approaches that help them deliver effective support. They also provide a range of professional qualifications around counselling in schools. YoungMinds – http://www.youngminds.org.ukprovide a range of support to schools, including training. They provide a varied training calendar – http://www.youngminds.org.uk/training_services/training_calendar, but schools can also commission bespoke training packages – http://www.youngminds.org.uk/training_services/training_and_consultancy . Organisations who Work with School to Provide Emotional Wellbeing Support Academic Resilience – http://www.youngminds.org.uk/training_services/academic_resilienceis a free resource to help schools support pupils’ academic resilience, devised by Lisa Williams and Prof Angie Hart, and adopted by YoungMinds. The AcSeed Initiative – http://www.acseed.org/ encourages all UK schools to achieve and maintain an acceptable threshold of support, and to align on best practices that provide a common language and understanding between schools, parents, young people, and associated organisations and charities. AcSEED Initiative was founded by young people with direct personal experience of mental illness at a young age, and is entirely dedicated to supporting the emotional wellbeing and mental health of young people in schools Achievement for All (AfA) – http://www.afa3as.org.uk/ The AfA programme delivers a whole school improvement framework that raises the aspirations, access and achievement of vulnerable and disadvantaged pupils, including those with special educational needs and disabilities, EAL, looked-after children and children on free school meals. The programme has 4 elements: Leadership, Teaching and Learning, Parental Engagement, and Wider Outcomes. You can read about how this programme has been used in both primary and secondary schools – http://www.afa3as.org.uk/achievement-for-all/achievement-for-all-3as/case-studies
BeatBullying – http://www.beatbullying.org/provide mentor training for up to 30 students in schools and youth organisations across the UK. It helps keep young people aged 11-17 develop strategies which keep themselves and other young people safe, both on and offline – http://www.beatbullying.org/gb/information-for-adults/teachers-professionals/ Boing Boing – Resilience Therapy and the Resilience Framework – http://www.boingboing.org.uk/ Boing Boing has developed a number of useful products to help develop resilience. They have produced an evidence based Resilience Framework which is for parents, practitioners and young people to use. They can use this to help them think about how they can build resilience in children and young people. Their website contains lots of useful information and there is a useful video which explains resilience therapy – http://www.boingboing.org.uk/index.php/resilience-in-practice Childline School Service – http://www.nspcc.org.uk/help-and-advice/for-schools/schools-service/our-schools-service_wda73313.htmlAs well as Childline’s free helpline for children and young people – 0800 1111, they also have a service that uses specially trained volunteers to talk to primary school children about abuse. The aim is to give them the skills to protect themselves and know where to go for help. Family Links – https://www.familylinks.org.uk/Family Links offer a range of Transforming Learning workshops for schools and trainee teachers to create a school community in which children aspire, flourish and achieve. They also offer training in a parallel programme for parents, providing a consistent positive approach at home and at school. You can read about how they have helped schools by following this link – https://www.familylinks.org.uk/schools/evaluation-and-case-studies/case-studies and their resources for schools can be found at –https://www.familylinks.org.uk/shop/Schools-shop Humanutopia –http://www.humanutopia.com/are a social enterprise group who work with schools and run a range of inspirational workshops and courses for students that focus on personal, social development and employability skills. These workshops can help to build confidence, leadership skills, peer mentoring skills and help students overcome barriers to engaging in their own education. The Nurture Group Network –http://www.nurturegroups.org/promotes the development of nurture groups (these are small groups of children, who need short-focused support to help address issues connected to social, emotional and behavioural difficulties) and to ensure the continuing quality of their delivery through accredited training programmes, research on effective practice, relevant publications and information exchange. Mentoring and Befriending Foundation – http://www.mandbf.org/provides services which aim to increase the effectiveness and quality of mentoring and befriending as methods of enabling individuals to transform their lives and/or reach their full potential. They have produced guidance and quality standards to help schools implement peer mentoring support for students. Place2Be –http://www.place2be.org.uk/ provides one-to-one counselling, and group work with children and young people. Go to their website or see their case study for more information – http://www.cypmhc.org.uk/resources/place2be/ YoungMinds in Schools –http://www.youngminds.org.uk/training_services/young_minds_in_schoolsThe YoungMinds in Schools programme was funded by the Department for Education and piloted a programme of consultancy and training to 4 cluster schools in England. This section of the YoungMinds website provides a very useful library of resources that would be very useful for schools. The school in the programme implemented a range of projects and interventions to help improve emotional wellbeing and includes Zumba, mindfulness, counselling, and therapeutic story writing. More information about this programme and how they have worked with schools can be found by following this link – http://www.youngminds.org.uk/training_services/young_minds_in_schools/about_youngminds_in_schools Therapeutic Story Writing from YoungMinds. This intervention helps to support students’ emotional wellbeing, but it also improves their writing skills. – http://vimeo.com/40733400 Measuring Mental Health and Emotional Health and Wellbeing You can buy in the services of an organisation to help you measure emotional wellbeing. The School Health and Education Unit (SHEU) have been conducting surveys relevant to schools for many years and would help you get feedback from students, parents and schools. You can buy off the shelf surveys, but they will also customise it to meet your needs. Many of these surveys have been commissioned by public health departments, and local authorities. So there may be opportunities in your area to buy in to an area wide survey. http://sheu.org.uk/surveys/pupil-surveys.htm
There are also a few international surveys of children’s wellbeing that may be useful and tare included here for information.
Health Behaviour in School Aged Children (HBSC) – http://www.hbsc.org/ This cross-national study aims to gain insight into young people’s well-being, health behaviours and their social context. It is a research collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional Office for Europe and is conducted every four years in 43 countries, including England, Scotland and Wales, and regions across Europe and North America. You can download reports which provide data about wellbeing at a national level, but data about individual schools or local areas is not easily accessible.
