Mental Health Week Ideas

As I stare at the time and date located at the bottom of laptop screen I am asking myself did that week really just finish?

Week 2 is done and dusted and we are now in Week 3 – like how is that even possible!

Did I blink? Fall asleep?

No but SERIOUSLY!

Which then leads to that fact that I am having one of those moments (or lots of those moments lately!) where you go in that blind panic!

There is still so much to do… What have I even taught my kids this year? …I have taught them nothing ….my kids know nothing… I am the worst teacher.

PANIC PANIC PANIC!

So from one panicked teacher to the next just breathe!

You are a good teacher!

You kids DO KNOW things!

You have taught your class MORE than you will realise!

You have that amazing ability to hit multiple skills in one lesson so you can get through that content!

And lastly

As a teacher you were built to roll with the punches – so do what you do best and TEACH ON!

(…. My wayward song) - sorry couldn’t resist the Supernatural reference! ;)

On the theme of panic and stress I thought I would share with you what we did at school for Mental Health Week!

I am a HUGE advocate of trying to ensure our students’ emotional and social needs are at the forefront of our minds as educators.

Too often these days I hear stories of children breaking down for fear of performance in tests or are too nervous to say the wrong answer in class.

Healthy minds are open to learning and growing.

In order to learn we need to be ready to fail!

So this year we decided to host a Mental Health week at our school to encourage positive conversations about how people were feeling and also encourage students to take time out to do things they love!

It was a GREAT week!

Each day we had a daily focus and a little YouTube video to watch to inspire or promote conversation.

At lunchtime we put out drawing paper, musical instruments, printed slogans for the students to decorate and had a giant banner for students to decorate before it was hung up.

We created a positive jar where students wrote down a positive message or thought and put it in the jar. If someone was having a down day they could pull out a sweet thought and hopefully it may just brighten their day!

As if HP was ever NOT going to make an appearance haha

We also had some fun themed days!

On the Wednesday, everyone was invited to dress up in colours or clothes that made them happy!

The teachers had ordered wigs and all came dressed up as characters from Inside Out. I chose Sadness because I knew it was going to be SO MUCH fun pretending to be Sad – my students thought it was HILARIOUS!!

One day we had the school band rock out and some fellow teachers jam on the guitar – leaving the rest of us to show off our awesome dance moves!

But let’s be honest you really don’t have to ask me to dance twice! ;) or really even ask I’ll just be doing it already!

Finally on the Friday we partnered up with our buddy class and watched the Inside Out movie with popcorn on beanbags! So nice for the students to just stop and enjoy each other’s company!

You can see a brief outline below:

If you are able to hold a Mental Health Week at your own school I highly recommend it!

If you do I would love to hear what you do!