Lesson video

Welcome to the eighth and last lesson in this unit on mental wellbeing, where we will be looking at how we can maintain positive mental health into adulthood.

I'm Mrs. Harris, and in this lesson, we're going to be exploring helpful strategies for positive mental health and looking at what support is available should we have moments where we need some extra help.

For this lesson, you will need an exercise book or paper and a pen.

This is what our lesson is going to look like today.

You should have already competed the intro quiz.

I'm now going to recap our previous lesson.

We looked at social anxiety disorder, its causes and symptoms, and what support is available.

In this lesson, we are going to explore what strategies we can use to maintain positive mental health.

Once we have learned this, we are going to investigate what support is available to enable us to maintain positive mental health.

And at the end of the lesson, there will then be an exit quiz for you to reflect on what we've learnt.

Here are our keywords for today's lesson.

Communication is the exchanging of information by speaking or writing.

It is really important in terms of our mental health, and we should try to chat with a friend on a regular basis, whether that be on the phone, by text, email, or in person.

Connection is when a person is linked to another person or network.

When we are thinking about maintaining positive mental health into adulthood, we will see why it is important to connect with others and try and build up these connections.

We've met this key term before, and wellbeing is the state of being comfortable and happy.

In fact, we talked about it in lesson two of this unit, but it's worth mentioning again in this lesson, as it's important to look after this as we become adults.

So where do you want to be in five years time? Draw a stick person like you can see here, and annotate it with your response to that question.

You might consider whether you'll be in employment or education.

You might consider where you might be living, what you might be doing.

I would also like you to consider your mental health.

How will you be living in order to maintain as positive mental health as you can? thinK about what we have learned in the lessons in this unit.

Add on the advice you've been given.

We will revisit your initial thoughts later in this lesson.

You may wish to pause the video as you carry out this first activity.

In this section of the lesson, we are going to look at strategies for maintaining positive mental health.

You are going to gather information today in this lesson that is going to enable you to produce a quick guide to maintaining positive mental health into adulthood.

It can be presented in any way you like, and I'd like to imagine it might be something you could display in an area that you use a lot, like this study area seen in the picture on the left.

It could even be something that you attach to a door in your house for everyone to benefit from.

You will add to your notes as we move through our learning and then finally produce a piece of work that is meaningful to you.

That means you could use any medium to do this.

You could do it by hand, using paints, colours, textiles, or even produce it on the computer.

You will also see that I'm guiding you through an activity that can be used throughout your life to help you take time out and reflect on your mental health.

Let's move on now to start our information collection.

So this is your task.

Prepare how you will collect your notes.

You could use a mind map, bullet points, Post-it Notes, or another method of your choosing.

Your categories are the importance of communication and connection, what is a stress container, treatment and support, and probably at this point you want to pause the video to complete this task in terms of organising how you're going to collect your notes, and then resume when you are finished.

Why is communication so important? I'm going to talk through this information on the slide, and then you're probably going to want to pause the video and add this information to your notes.

It's important that we communicate with people in our lives.

Your social network, and here we're not talking about social media, more about your friends, classmates, family, or people you work with, can be people who ultimately support you.

We have looked in a previous lesson at everyday stressors, so you know you will be facing challenging times in the future.

Talking to a friend, colleague, partner, or parent on a regular basis maintains that relationship and nurtures it so that you can call on them when you need their support and also support them too.

Supporting others gives you a sense of purpose and self-worth which is really helpful in maintaining positive mental health.

You can talk to someone either in person or on the phone.

Send them a text or type them an email.

Communication in any way \you are comfortable with is important.

You can share your worries with a trusted person.

We've talked many times in previous lessons in this unit about the importance of sharing your concerns and that this is often the first step in reaching out for help.

Share your happy moments too.

People always love to hear good news stories, and you can create that ripple effect that brightens up someone else's day.

Knowing that you have a regular communication slot with someone encourages you to tackle issues and not ignore them, which is positive for our mental health, but also great for our well-being.

Let's recap for a moment.

People won't want to listen to my worries all the time.

Is this true or false? Did you get it right? Well done if you agreed with me.

It's false.

Keeping in touch with someone helps to develop a support relationship where you are happy to support each other.

There will be times when you want to share your worries but also times when they want to.

There will also be times of joy to even things out.

These are all ways we can connect with other people.

Making links with people is the way to generate more communication and widen our support network, but also enable us to support others.

A lot of these suggestions have come from the NHS website, and they also suggest that connection is important because for your wellbeing and in turn your mental health, they can help you to build a sense of belonging and self-worth and also give you an opportunity to share positive experiences.

Your task is to pick three.

You can pick more ways of connecting that appeal to you from this list and add them to your notes, along with an explanation of why they would help you to maintain positivity in your life.

You may wish to pause the video as you carry out this activity.

Let's recap for a moment.

Which is an example of a good way to connect to people? Which of these options is the correct answer to the question on this slide? Think about what we talked about in terms of the best way to connect with people in terms of frequency and also by a method that would help to build up and nurture our relationship with someone.

Have a think.

Did you agree with me? Well done.

All the options are ways of connecting with people, but option three is the best example of how to strengthen a connection with someone and to be able to trust and support them as part of your support network.

Can you remember what we said some of our everyday stressors might be in adulthood? Pause the video, see what you can remember, and make a list.

These are all examples of stressors anyone could face every day and throughout their adult life.

Did you remember some of these for the activity on the previous slide? All or most of these will happen to most people at some point in their life and are totally normal challenges.

It may be difficult to imagine yourself going through some of these in the future at your current age, but there may be also some of you who've already faced some of these challenges already in your personal life.

We know that we are going to face some of these, so what strategies could we use to try and maintain positive mental health at the same time? Let's find out.

How can everyday stressors fill up our stress container? Think about some of those from our previous slide.

If we think of our stress as being water in this container, there is always an amount of stress in our container.

It could be hardly full at all, with maybe just running five minutes later leaving the house.

Later on that day, you could find out that someone you know has a major illness, so your container fills a little more.

Stress gets added to your container maybe daily, weekly, or monthly.

These are just some of the stressors that could fill up our stress container.

Draw a picture of this container, and add some more stressors that could go into it.

You may wish to pause the video while you do this activity.

How can we empty some of the stress out of our container? There are wellbeing activities we can take part in that would take some of the stress out of the container, making the stress in there more easy to manage and helping to maintain positive mental health.

Some examples of these are getting enough rest and relaxation.

We have spoken about taking breaks, especially when we were talking about exam stress and anxiety, and also getting enough sleep.

Making connections with people and communicating helps to remove some stress out of our container.

It is important to share our worries with other people.

Do something you enjoy doing.

You will release endorphins, which are feel-good hormones.

Focus on something else, and hopefully relax while you are doing it.

Planning what you need to do and when you can get it done is another way to reduce the stress in the container.

Now is the time for you to add some ideas onto your drawing of the container of how you would empty some of the stresses out of yours.

You may wish to pause the video while you are doing this.

This is your task.

How can you maintain positive mental health into adulthood? As we said at the beginning of the lesson, you are now going to produce your personalised guide about how to keep positive mental health for display at home.

Remember to include ideas and tips you've collected in this lesson.

Present it in any way you like.

Pause the video to complete this task, and then resume when you are finished.

In this section of the lesson, we are going to look at what support is available for us in maintaining our positive mental health.

What support is available for maintaining positive mental health? As always, the advice to share your worries with someone, whether that be a friend, parent, or other trusted adulthood, should always be your first port of call.

You can then seek other support if necessary, but it is always less daunting with someone on your side supporting you.

You can also speak to many of the help lines available to you from UK charities that we mentioned in a previous lesson, for example, YoungMinds, Samaritans.

Speak to your GP.

As we have said before, the stigma that used to be surrounding mental health is slowly being broken down.

GPs know so much more about what support they can offer you and, if needs be, can refer you to treatments that may be suited to your needs.

They will have heard it all before and will listen without judgement.

Your GP or another person with authority may make a referral to the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service, or CAMHS.

CAMHS support covers depression, problems with food, self-harm, abuse, violence, or anger, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and anxiety, amongst many other difficulties.

There are local NHS CAMHS services around the UK, with teams made up of nurses, therapists, psychologists, child and adolescent psychiatrists who are medical doctors specialising in mental health, support workers, and social workers.

Talking therapy, such as counselling, can sometimes support someone.

And again, your GP would be able to refer and recommend you for this treatment if it was suitable.

If you want to take medication for your mental health, discuss this with your GP.

They will discuss this option with you, but may also offer alternative treatments.

You should have at this point produced your piece of work with tips and ideas about keeping positive mental health into adulthood.

Why don't you take a little time to jot down some of the information and maybe write these support strategies on the back of the piece of work so that you know where to seek help and support if you need to.

That brings us to the end of our lesson on maintaining positive mental health into adulthood and also our unit on mental wellbeing.

Before you go and complete your exit quiz, I'd like to thank you for engaging with the tasks and ask you to reflect on the last eight lessons.

What have you enjoyed learning about the most in this unit on mental wellbeing? I hope you've acquired some useful information to carry forward with you and use in your live and into adulthood.

You can share the work you've produced on your top tips for keeping positive mental health into adulthood on Twitter using the hashtags mentioned here.