Mental health is really important to us at Team Education both for our team and for all of the staff and teachers we work with and support. The 3rd of February is Time to Talk Day,  a day to encourage those around us to start conversations about mental health. We have spoken to some of our teachers to come up with five ways you can get involved with your class:

Start a conversation.

Starting the conversation is always the first step. Have your students start thinking about mental health, what it means to them and how they maintain good mental health. The Time to Talk website has a PowerPoint you can use if you are holding an assembly or for a quick presentation before lessons begin. By introducing Time to Talk day in the morning you can have your students be mindful during the rest of the day’s teaching!

Make posters.

We can all remember the excitement of making a poster in school. Chanel this enthusiasm and have the students make flyers and posters about self-care and self-care tips. You could even have a competition and put the winning poster up around the school to spread the self-care message!

Share stories.

The best way to encourage making time to talk is by listening to others mental health stories. There are endless blogs available on the Time to Talk and Time to Change websites that you can share with your class to help destigmatize and normalise conversations around mental health.

Practise affirmations.

Practising affirmations can be one of the easiest ways of improving self-confidence, get your students to make a list of things they love about themselves. You can even have examples to help those who may be struggling to start. 

Encourage your students to listen.

Have your students get into partners and ask questions about one another. For example, what made you happy today? Who are you grateful for? What are some of your favourite things? After their conversations tell them to pair up with somebody else and share the answers their last partner gave them. This will encourage them to actively listen and show how sharing these types of feelings can be rewarding and fun.

We hope these 5 activities will help create conversations about mental health in your schools and will bring attention to such an important day, especially after the past two years.

Don’t forget we’re here for you too, if you’re a teacher looking for a better work-life balance get in touch with us.