What are effective ways to support students with mental health issues?

1. Assess all students 3 times per year to monitor emotional self-regulation and any changes that occur over time. This allows us to see who is in need of support.

Supporting students with mental health issues involves promoting a positive school culture, integrating mental health education, and training staff to recognize signs of distress. Establish counseling programs, encourage open communication, and involve parents in the process. Implement peer support initiatives, offer flexible learning options, and collaborate with mental health professionals. Create calming spaces, integrate stress-reduction activities, and have a crisis response plan. Regularly monitor students' well-being and follow up with appropriate interventions. This comprehensive approach fosters a supportive environment for students, enhancing their overall well-being and academic success!

Mental issues are best spotted through inconsistencies. Providing a routine and consistent expectations allow students to feel comfortable in their class, to not have an ambiguous teacher. These ground rules allow you to see "out of the ordinary" behaviour sooner. We can sometimes underestimate the power of observation as well as be approachable and reliable for our students.

To enhance communication with students, teachers, and educators can employ various strategies that demonstrate care and understanding. Expressing concern and offering assistance, actively listening, validating emotions, and acknowledging difficulties create an empathetic environment. It's essential to refrain from providing unsolicited advice, encourage seeking professional help when necessary, respect privacy, and consistently follow up. Real-time examples, such as expressing genuine concern or validating emotions, exemplify these approaches. Employing these techniques enables educators to support students with mental health challenges in a respectful and helpful manner.

Once a level of need is identified, the first step is to provide support. This may not be actually communicating with the young person that you have identified a need, rather just coming alongside them to support. Perhaps prolonging conversations or suggesting they develop a talent or aptitude. This may prevent an issue becoming a problem.

Students need to feel like an educator cares about them from a human perspective before they can trust them with their feelings.

Every person wants to feel worthwhile and that they matter. Likewise everyone wants to be fully connected with others to feel valued and loved. In some ways this is wellbeing and good mental health. People need to be affirmed and loved.

Role model a healthy lifestyle and allow the young person to make good decisions in this area. Allow time for reflection, discussion and evaluation to promote positive changes. Connect them with like minded individuals who will support them.

Modeling the wellbeing is also a plus. Allowing the students to see that mental wellbeing is a process and ongoing journey. Creating space for parents to learn, understand and address their own mental health is crucial is supporting the students.

Modeling wellness also means modeling the healthy and safe ways you respond when your own mental health is taking a dip. Students need to see adults when they struggle too, so that they understand that mental health requires ongoing care and attention. If children only see us model when we are at our best, they may inadvertently walk away believing that mental health challenges disappear when you’re a certain age or might not develop adequate skills for when things are really tough. Increased resilience comes from seeing the good and the hard.

Consider the power of relationships! Safe, warm and nurturing relationships play a key role in supporting children's mental health. A child's experience with attachment figures in their early years serves as the foundation for their social and emotional development for the rest of their life. Secure attachments can create a sense of safety and trust for children, providing a secure base from which they can explore the world. When attachment figures (school staff) consistently respond to a child's needs with warmth, sensitivity and responsiveness, the child can learn that their emotions matter, fostering a secure attachment. As Dr Karen Treisman says: ”Relationships are the most powerful mental health intervention known to mankind".

I am of the opinion that recognizing the signs of mental health struggles, communicating with care and empathy, providing accommodations, promoting overall well-being, and collaborating with professionals and support systems are effective ways to support students with mental health issues.

There was a post on social media that was popularized. The focus of the content spoke of how a teacher would have her students write down students they wanted to sit next to as she would prepare to rearrange seating. It offered students voice and choice in their learning environment and also gave her the opportunity to ensure each student was given a sense of belonging. This small act offers great impact on student mental health. What’s an important take away from this example is, when we zoom out a little further into the classroom environment, this practice can be a component of an inclusive, agentic centered learning environment or an isolated incident. It makes a world of difference to the mental health of our students.

Consider the teachers themselves. We worry about the students and their mental health, but nothing is done to help the teachers with theirs. Instead, more and more gets piled on them and they end up imploding and burning out

Assess every young person regularly to pick up changes in emotional self-regulation. Prioritise those in need of support Write a simple plan for each person that supports them in recognising their self-worth and value and that others are there for them. Improve their self disclosure and willingness to expand and improve themselves. Keep tracking them over time.