Young people and schools


Young people and schools masthead

Shift is committed to working with young people, in partnership with other organisations, to reduce stigmatising attitudes and discriminating behaviour towards people of all ages with mental health problems.

What we are doing


The Health and Education for Life Project

Shift is supporting the work of Health and Education for Life (HELP), a Liverpool based action research project that works in schools to change young people's attitudes and behaviours (or coping strategies) about mental health issues.
Find out more about the HELP project.

School materials

Shift has commissioned HELP and the Samaritans to produce materials for teachers to use in schools across the country that challenge stigmatising and discriminatory attitudes towards mental illness amongst children. These materials are available from Samaritans' website.

Interviews

Shift will also be undertaking a series of interviews with key decision makers and opinion formers in the area of mental health and schools. The findings from this project will form part of Shift’s future plans for reducing stigma and discrimination in schools.

Feeling Good activity sheets

With the support of Shift, mentality have produced 'Feeling Good', a set of activity sheets that encourage children aged 4 to 7 to talk about mental health.

The activity sheets provide parents and their children with a unique resource to help them talk about how they feel and what makes them happy or sad, stressed or secure. The activity sheets were part-funded by Shift.

The sheets include pictures of home and school life designed to show a range of events that happen to young children. Guidance notes help parents use the sheets to help their children explore their emotions and talk about what makes them have different feelings. The activity sheets have been tested with many parents and children before being published.

Download the full activity pack from the Shift Library

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Masthead photo by Jamil Soni Neto from Flickr. Used under a Creative Commons licence.