Dove are aiming to work with young girls / women to promote positive self esteem. They have produced three good clips that could be used to spark debate about body image / eating disorders etc They are called Amy Evolution & Onslaught.
Parental Mental Illness
The Wise Mouse - written by Virginia Ironside and illustrated by Nick Sharratt aims to help 5 to 11 year-olds understand what is happening to a family member who may be experiencing a mental illness.
Young Minds have added this to their site as a downloadable recording of the book. Really good!
Samaritans launched its new ’Doodle’ Campaign on 8th November 2006, aimed at showing young people that Samaritans will support them whatever their problem is - and that it’s better to call sooner, rather than to allow a problem to develop into more of a crisis. The ’doodle’ concept for the winter campaign was selected by young people interviewed in focus groups as the most honest and truthful demonstration of their emotional state.
* Please note as You Tube is unregulated people can post all manner of other videos related to this topic. Please ensure that you only view the Doodle Campaign)
Within the current context, professionals and services may be or feel less accessible. Change is happening around us all the time. In such circumstances, it is important that we have some of our own resources to employ to continue to support those we work with confidently. For these reasons, a set of Values and Guiding Principles for responding to the emotional wellbeing needs of children and young people has been developed to maintain the momentum and diligence with which the Children’s Workforce in Hertfordshire support their charges. We hope you find them helpful.
The Hertfordshire Early Intervention Psychosis Service can be accessed via CAMHS but any teacher or relative can contact the service if they have concerns about an individual for advice. The service works with 14 to 35 year olds. Young people over seventeen and a half can access the service directly. Psychosis refers to thought disturbance, hearing voices, delusions and hallucinations but we can all be more aware of the early warning signs and access support in a timely way.
These downloads include a leaflet about the Herts service as well as a document detailing what you can expect from them. A booklet by Hampshire Partnership NHS Trust provides information about psychosis.
About the Early Intervention Psychosis Service
What Happens Next:
A series of leaflets 'Coping with Crises in Schools' and 'When Someone we Know Dies'
- A guide for school staff - taking care of your school, taking care of yourself
- Handling a traumatic event
- Helping a bereaved child
- The grieving process
When someone we know dies - Understanding your feelings for older children
When someone we know dies - Understanding your feelings for younger children
All leaflets are available to download from the H&S section on critical incidents at:
Step2 is an 0-19 Early Intervention service consisting of a small team of professionals with a wide range of experiences and skills in child mental health emotional wellbeing. The Step2 Team will work with you to improve the mental health and emotional wellbeing outcomes for young people in Hertfordshire.
Young Minds is the national charity committed to improving the mental health of all children and young people. Their website is an excellent source of information for anyone working with children and young people.
Some of the leaflets available to download include:
Hands Off! is a really good leaflet for young people. It explores myths around sexual abuse, is full of information and sensitively deals with the issues around abuse.
Cruse Bereavement care have a section on their website dedicated to schools. You can find info about School Bereavement policy, death of a member of staff, death through suicide and what to do at times of crisis.
The Child Psychotherapy Trust have also developed an excellent leaflet for parents and professionals on the understanding of death through the ages. It looks at what children and young people understand and how grief may affect them.
Depression and how to deal with it by the Charlie Waller Trust is really eye catching and thought provoking. It is particularly targetted at Young Men.
depression_how_to_beat_it.pdf (Acrobat pdf/380kb)
Young Minds have a number of excellent leaflets on depression in children and young people.
Alcohol Concern have a series of excellent web based toolkits for a variety of professionals who are working with families and children where parental alcohol misuse is a problem. They contain resources, advice and websites for help.
Psychosis is a term used to describe conditions which affect the mind, where there has been some loss of contact with reality. When this occurs it is called a psychotic episode.
A Guide for Staff Working With Children and Young People in Hertfordshire
This guidance is intended for use by anyone working with children and young people up to the age of 18 or 25 for those with learning difficulties or disabilities in Hertfordshire. It has been developed via a multi agency working group and aims to offer an informed and systematic approach to addressing the needs of children and young people at risk of self-harm or suicide. It also sets out to ensure that children and young people gain appropriate support, and are assessed and referred appropriately where needed.
A young carer is a person under the age of 18 years who provides care for another person, most commonly a parent or brother or sister, because that person has an illness or disability, mental health problem or problems with addiction to alcohol or drugs.
Caring round the Clock is an excellent leaflet for those children / young people caring for someone with a mental health problem. Gloucstershire Young Carers have developed this fantastic leaflet on what it is like to live with someone with a mental illness.
There is a wealth of literature for Parents and most of the above would be very useful for them too.
The following are a selection of leaflets or sites available for download that are specifically for parents:
Family Life (formerly Parentline Plus)
Family Lives is a national charity providing help and support in all aspects of family life. We're here for you 24 hours a day, seven days a week through our free Parentline. Whatever your family role or situation, we can help.
This excellent leaflet from Young Minds looks at the importance of the relationship between parents and their babies and toddlers and the impact this can have on their mental health
See Me Scotland have two fantastic posters aimed at adolescents that look at eating disorders and self harm. They are very eye catching and popular with young people.
Learning Difficulties and Developmental Disorders and Mental Health Issues New
This guidance has been written to enable schools to:
support pupils with learning disabilities and developmental disorders
who may also have mental health problems
work effectively with families, and all agencies/professionals to ascertain a
best course of action and treatment for the children/young people in their
care and strategies to consider based on real life case studies
Learning Difficulties and Developmental Disorders and Mental Health Issues
The emotional and mental health of children and young people is often a cause of concern for professionals and parents alike.
These tools were created to give guidance to universal services to have a better understanding and clarity about how to manage common issues that families face and who to go to for support.
This publication is only available for download from within a Hertfordshire School.
The emotional and mental health of children and young people is often a cause of
concern for professionals and parents alike.
These tools were created to give guidance to universal services to have a better
understanding and clarity about how to manage common issues that families face
and who to go to for support.
Considerations when preparing to teach mental health
The Feelin' Good Day lesson plan looks at promoting resilience and identifying positive coping strategies. This can be used with Primary or Secondary aged children.
The Samaritans Youth Pack is a good training and reflective resource for teachers and others supporting young people on a range of mental health topics as well as a teaching resource for young people.
NSPCC: Teachers Pack 2001-2
Contains seven lesson plans on topics such as making new friends, peer pressure and school problems.
The Mental Health Foundation have developed two excellent documents full of useful information, case studies and handouts on topics such as positive mental health, resilience factors etc.
These can be downloaded on the following links:
Promoting Mental Health in Schools - An Introduction
Samaritans DEAL
(Developing emotional awareness and learning) programme helps schools develop the skills that young people aged 14 to 16 need to cope with Life’s challenges and develop their emotional health and wellbeing.
It's about resilience: how to feel good when life chucks you lemons. How to be better at thinking positively. How to cope with, and learn to love, failure. By playing SuperMe you'll learn how to be more resilient in real life, and by playing every piece of content you'll score points. Points! Everyone wants those.
Factsheets to enable you to support young people in getting the most out of this exciting resource includes:
Session Plan 11 - Emotional Health and Wellbeing More...
Channel Mogo (ages 11-19)
Hertfordshire's online information site for young people in the county which covers a range of topics related to PSHE & Citizenship.
This inter-active website also offers vidcasts, mp3 downloads, competitions and opportunities for discussion and webchats. It is free to join and provides a safe online community for young people in Hertfordshire.
Act for Change is a unique and interactive educational programme that links historical facts about the Holocaust and other genocides to the social reality and experiences of living in today's society. They have a lot of experience of working in schools helping with RE/PSHE/History/ Citizenship curriculum
A-DASH (Adolescent Drug & Alcohol Service Hertfordshire)
Area covered: Hertfordshire (anyone with a Herts GP) What services are offered? Specialist assessment and treatment service for young people under 18, who have major drug and alcohol related problems and complex. This service will accept self-referrals. A-DASH offers advice, information and consultancy to professionals. Initial telephone enquires to offer advice and information as well giving details of local services to help young people or their parents/carers.
Although based in Bristol the service offers support to girls and women across the country with a particular emphasis on those who self harm. Their website contains a variety of resources for those who self harm and those trying to support them.
The Campaign Against Living Miserably is targeted at young men aged between 15-35. The campaign offers help, information and advice via a phone and web service. It is a very good source of information and support and very user friendly.
CHeCC was established in 2004 to form a network from pre-existing agencies delivering counselling to young people across the county. The aim of CHeCC is: ‘To promote the emotional health and well-being of children and young people in Hertfordshire through the development, provision, promotion and facilitation of a network of professional community counselling services’
Charity for grieving families. The website contains information for families, young people and professionals. They offer training and resources for schools to enable them to support young people and their families through bereavement.
Childline's helpline is available 24hrs a day, 365 days a year for any child or young person who needs to talk. The website contains useful information, links and resources for young people and schools.
This excellent website provides full details of the countywide Connexions service, details of local organisations and some helpful resources for young people aged 13-19.
We provide qualified, quality assured arts therapist and counsellors to work in schools across Hertfordshire with children and young people aged 5-19 years. The counselling service is for any child or young person who is experiencing difficulty, either long or short term. Children and young people are involved in the setting of aims, deciding what they would like from their sessions and are involved in the evaluation process. The counselling service offers one to one counselling, in a confidential setting on school premises, which is voluntarily entered into by the child or young person. The service can respond to request for counselling from schools within two weeks, and will offer both short and long term support.
Help for bereaved people of any age with a special section on information for schools. There is also an excellent website especially for young people who have been bereaved which looks at coping strategies.
Depression in Teenagers Young People's Unit - NHS Lothian
This excellent interactive website is aimed at teenagers. It has a number of activities to help young people with self-help tips, advice on helping friends, and suggestions of where to go for further information, advice and support.
Early Intervention in Psychosis Service Hertfordshire
Hertfordshire's Early Intervention in Psychosis Service works with Anyone between the ages of 14 and 35 years, experiencing a first episode of psychosis.
Our offices are staffed between 9 and 5 Monday to Friday. You may also call or email us if you are a teacher, tutor, counsellor, GP, youth or probation worker, or indeed anyone in contact with someone about whose mental health you are concerned.
sychosis has a range of stages. In the stages where it is just beginning to emerge, it is difficult to positively identify, but common experiences may be things like: Feeling that you are changing in the way you think or feel, possibly accompanied by
suspicions that people intend you some kind of harm or are talking about you or laughing about you,
difficulties concentrating, sleeping or relating to people,
racing thoughts, or a wide range of unconnected thoughts, or difficulty thinking in a logical sequence perhaps,
beginning to believe that strange things may be true, for instance that your thoughts are being read or that your mind is being interfered with,
changes in your mood, either a depressed or elated mood. As the condition develops these experiences may become more obvious to you, or to other people especially to those who know you. Indeed often people having these personal experiences are either not aware of how they are coming across to others, or are very keen to mask them, possibly in fear of allowing them to be acknowledged or known about.
Youth Helpline: 0845 6347650
Helpline hours: Monday-Friday from 4-6.30pm
Family Lives
The website is an excellent source of information on a variety of parenting issues and has downloadable resources, there are a number of excellent leaflets on divorce and separation as well as information on dealing with new families. There are a number of local initiatives in Hertfordshire such as Parenting courses and outreach work.
Helpline: 0808 800 2222
There is also an email helpline
Hertfordshire – Hatfield Office: 01707 270696
Garden Hospice / Tigers
Area covered: North Herts & Stevenage What services are offered? Information, guidance and support for bereaved children/young people; parents/other caregivers, teachers & schools and other professionals i.e. health visitors. One to one support for 5-18 year olds and Group Activities for 6-18 year olds.
Contact details:
Tel:01462 679540 or
Email: familysupportteam@ghhospice.co.uk
Grove House Family Support Service
Area covered: St Albans, Harpenden, Hemel Hempstead & villages What services are offered? Group and one to one counselling available. This is a specialist service for those with cancer, their family and friends and those bereaved by cancer. There are no age restrictions. Mostly referrals from Professionals but self-referrals are accepted.
Mental health information for 6-12 year olds, for 12-18 year olds, and for parents and teachers. Based in Adelaide, Australia. It contains a wealth of interactive exercises and games for young people.
Hertfordshire Anti Bullying Initiative on The Grid
This is the Anti Bullying Initiative site for schools. It gives details of the initiative, contains the Hertfordshire Anti Bullying Toolkit and it also contains valuable guidance for schools in developing anti bullying policies.
Area covered: Hertfordshire – although several local projects. What services are offered? Excellent service offering help, support and information for Young Carers. Trips and activities are regularly organised for those caring for a family member and the team provide education / awareness raising for those working with children and young people. Helpful website.
Area covered: East Herts; area covered by health district serviced by Lister/QE II Hospitals. What services are offered? Telephone & email service. Information, guidance & support are available to bereaved children/young people; parents/other caregivers; teachers/schools; other professionals i.e. health visitors.1-to-1 support for all ages up to 18 years and group activities for 5-18 yrs
Contact details:
Tel:
01707 330686 or
Email: pam.firth@isabelhospice.org.uk
It’s not your fault
NCH Website that offers information and advice for children and young people whose parents are divorcing or separating. There is also information for parents.
This excellent website is designed for children aged 5 to 11. It aims to encourage children to think of themselves as young citizens with a range of rights and responsibilities. It invites children to explore a self-contained world, full of online games and activities.
The Massage in Schools Programme (MISP) is a clothed child to child massage programme aimed at 4 – 12 year olds. This inclusive massage programme is used to encourage learning and develop social and emotional skills within a safe environment. MISP is a recognised anti-bullying strategy and MISA has been a member of the national anti-bullying alliance since 2003.
Quote: From John Stead, NSPCC Education Advisor “The Massage in Schools Programme is a fun, whole-school strategy for promoting respect and reducing bullying”.
An information site for young people with learning disabilities who are going through transition and are from minority communities. It can be translated into a variety of languages.
National Inquiry into Self Harm among Young People
The UK’s first inquiry into self-harm among Young People. Interesting articles and reports on the prevalence of self-harm. Will be of interest to professionals working with young people.
Primary Tai Chi offers flexible Tai Chi and Chi Kung-based resources to Primary School Teachers, enabling them to run their own daily class exercise sessions for 4 - 9 year-olds. These include an instructional DVD, relaxing CD, and live (instructor-led) on-site Teach the Teacher workshops. We have been given a 5-star review by the Times Education Online and have worked with regional PCTs, Healthy Schools representatives, and individual school partnerships.
Area covered: North Herts & Stevenage What services are offered? This is a generic service for ages 10-25 years that specialises in family change. Monday 3.15-5.15pm drop in at Hyde Out. Tuesday 4-6pm at Bowes Lyon House. It is available during the holidays and there are plans to extend the hours. Referrals are accepted from the young person, family or friends and other professionals.
Area covered: Watford What services are offered? Generic counselling is available for 13-25 year olds, family work is also available. Counselling is available by appointment Mon-Fri 9.30am-2pm and a drop in service is available Saturday 10am-12pm.
This website is designed for Survivors of Bereavement by Suicide. They hold a lot of excellent information although you do need to phone to order it rather than being able to download it.
National Helpline: 0870 241 3337 which is
Available 9am - 9pm every day.
St Albans City and District Bereavement Network
Area covered: St Albans City & District What services are offered? Helpline answered personally on weekdays with an answer phone at other times. It is developing specialist work with children and families at times of bereavement. Support for professional workers and resources of literature.
Area covered: North Herts & Stevenage What services are offered? Group and individual counselling is offered for ages 12 to adult. It is a specialist service for people from black & minority ethnic groups. Self-referrals are accepted.
Excellent information & advice website for young people on drugs. They also produce an excellent range of leaflets and packs for use with young people.
Helpline: 0800 77 66 00 for free & confidential drugs advice 24hours a day or email frank@talktofrank.com
Teenage Health Freak
This brilliant website aimed at young people has a wealth of information on issues that may be affecting them i.e. concerns about weight, mood changes, depression etc. It has an A-Z index, quizzes and a virtual surgery.
Opening Hours: The Base itself is open: Tues 7-9:30pm. Ages 11-17. Various activities.
Cost £1. Weds 7-9:30pm. Ages 11-14.
Various activities. Cost £1
You can get in contact with the counselling service by texting your name to 07796522216 or
Email your name to talk2some1@hotmail.co.uk
The Hideout
The first national website to support children and young people living with domestic violence, or those wanting to help a friend. The site informs children and young people and offers sources of help.
Area covered: Mostly North Herts What services are offered? Group and one to one counselling available at this specialist addiction service. The service is available Mon-Fri 9.30-5pm for those aged 13 years and over. Referrals are accepted from the NHS, Friends and Family and young people themselves.
The Place2Be delivers a range of services directly to children, parents and teachers in primary schools. They also offer training for volunteers, staff and adults working with children.
Area covered: Dacorum area – Hemel Hempstead and surrounding villages. What services are offered? Generic one to one counselling for 14-25 years. Counselling is by appointment Mon, Wed & Thurs evenings till 9pm and Drop in counselling and information are available Saturdays 11-1pm. Located with Connexions and the one stop shop.
Excellent website for young people which offers ideas on remembering lost loved ones, ways of dealing with feelings and offers an email service for help and advice. It also has ideas for adults on helping children and young people with their grief.
This site contains excellent downloadable information for children and young people, professionals and parents on topics such as depression, bullying, self-harm and parental mental illness. There is a helpline for Parents (although any professional with a concern about a child’s mental /emotional health can call for advice).
Area covered: St Albans district area What services are offered? Youth Talk provides a generic youth counselling service for 14-25 year olds. Referrals can be made either by the young person themselves or by the GP. There is also a Young Parents support service. The service is open daily by appointment and there is also a weekly drop in service.
This guidance has been written to enable schools to:
