Mental Health Awareness Week took place this week and the national focus was anxiety. This gives us an opportunity to share a little more about how we as a School support our students on a daily basis.
Over the past few weeks, unsurprisingly the focus has been on the build-up to exams. Exams obviously generate different emotions in our students, from excitement to anxiety and worry, so we have been focusing, through tutors, on different ways to cope with these emotions. Exams can be stressful for everyone, so it is important that we provide help and support in identifying feelings as well as finding ways of overcoming this stress, and that we know when to ask for help.
We also want our students to recognise that feeling stress can be perfectly normal and at times, helpful. Helping them try and practise different healthy coping strategies will carry them in good stead for the stresses of life we all have to deal with at times.
Last week we focused on resilience – what it is and how to build it, and this week we have been looking at anxiety, recognising it is typical to feel anxious at times and looking at the different ways we all cope with it. Students fed back to me, via their tutors, their various techniques – from writing down what’s causing them anxiety to distracting with music or books, to exercise and to smashing things! From this feedback we’ve developed a Woodbridge School students’ mind map of techniques which is available here, and will be displayed around School as well as discussed in tutor groups.
Spending time with the students, listening, observing, supporting and helping them to navigate their way through their emotions, thoughts and feelings is just as important an aspect of School life as academic success. Plus, our students being engaged and proactive has a big impact on the way in which we can help support one another through our ups and downs.
Mrs Brown
Assistant Head Pastoral
