Mental Health and Schools

With the Government’s Green paper of Dec 2017 “Transforming Children and Young People’s Mental Health Provision” Schools Mental Health is a key priority.

This module looks at aspects of Young People’s mental health in schools, the relationship with neuroscience, how to recognise common mental health disorders as well as considering what evidence we have to best support young people in the education setting.

Aims of the Module:

1. To explore child and adolescent mental health using key theories (such as attachment, neuropsychological, systemic), and consider them in the context of educational settings.
2. To consider our current knowledge of neuroscience in education and learning.
3. To consider how to recognize common mental health issues and neurodevelopmental difficulties that present in schools.
4. To consider evidence based interventions to address mental health issues that present in the educational setting.
5. To develop a reflective practice as a professional so as to engaged in a process of continuous learning during and beyond the course.

Teaching Methods

There will be a variety of multi-modal face-to face teaching methods, facilitated small group discussions and recommended peer reviewed literature for private study. At the end of the module, as an overview of the central module themes, there will be a reflective learning session in which students will be offered opportunities to present key topics of interest in a formative exercise.

There will be weekly e-forum tutorials using Moodle in which students discuss key questions as a group. The course tutor will act as moderator and discussant.

Dates (2019-20): Selected Wednesday evenings throughout the academic year (Term 1 - 3)

Assessment: 10-15 min presentation at the end of the module to reflect on an aspect of mental health work in schools.