Children’s mental health and wellbeing week 1st – 5th February
children’s mental health and wellbeing week
Friday 29th January 2021
Dear parent / carer,
During the current lockdown it is more important than ever to be considering our own and our children’s mental health and wellbeing. It can be easy for some of us to share our thoughts and feelings but for others it can be really difficult and bottling things up and trying to deal with them on your own can have a real negative impact on an individuals mental health and wellbeing. This is why, this year especially, we want to put a focus next week on children’s mental health and wellbeing week led by Place2be.
Mental Health is our feelings, our thinking, our emotions and our mood. We all know how to look after our physical health but less so our mental health. Next week we will be encouraging the children to explore the different ways we can express ourselves so that we acknowledge the big feelings we may have and have coping strategies to channel and deal with those feelings.
The whole school will be reading the book Lucy’s Blue Day by Chris Duke. It is a lovely book that let’s the children know that it is ok not to be ok. However in the story the little girl is unable to talk about or explain her feelings and we will explore this and think about things the children can do to understand their feelings and look after their mental health.
If you would like to talk to your child about their mental health but are unsure how to do this then please have a look at the leaflet “You’re never too young to talk mental health: Tips for talking for parents and carers” https://tinyurl.com/y5zohdpu
Whilst everyone is under greater strain and demands, it is easy, as adults, to forget about our own mental health and wellbeing. You may already have your own coping mechanisms but next week whilst we explore children’s mental health, please take the time to also ensure that you are looking after your own. There are lots of ideas on how to start looking after your own mental health on the Anna Freud website https://tinyurl.com/y3cj8l4y
Please don’t put yourselves under any further pressure to do activities or tasks around mental health; you are all doing an amazing job. We just wanted to make you aware how important it is to be talking to your child and helping everyone find their own individual way to express themselves in these difficult times.
As always, if there is anything else that school can support with please let us know.
Stay safe
Mrs Ramsay
PSHE lead
