This week is Children’s Mental Health Week. A week that is focused on raising awareness and breaking the stigma that surrounds children’s mental health issues.
Currently, one in ten children have a mental health illness, which equates to three children in every classroom. Statistics also show that 75% of mental health illnesses start before the age of 18. This means there is a significant need for intervention as early as possible to help those suffering.
In modern society, children are subject to pressure from a number of different sources. This could be pressure from schools to perform well in exams/SATs, from parents to perform well at a sport or extracurricular activity, or even their peers through the rapid growth of social media.
While recent work from a number of mental health charities has helped to raise awareness of issues, there is still lots more work to be done to help ensure that children are given the best possible support.
YogaBugs are on a mission to improve children’s mental health across the country. Through our work in Schools and local community classes, we take children on story adventures combining Yoga and mindfulness practices.
Our classes also incorporate breathing, visualization and relaxation techniques. These techniques help children to ‘calm their mind’, reducing their stress and anxiety levels.
The theme of this year’s Children’s Mental Health Week is ‘Being Ourselves’. We believe that all children should be encouraged to be themselves and this is echoed throughout all of our classes.
It is vitally important that parents understand how to talk to their children about mental health, whilst also doing all they can to help create a positive mindset for their child. YogaBugs have created a number of Mindfulness sheets to help parents develop their children’s mental health and are accessible via our social media pages.
Children’s Mental Health Week is an excellent idea to help generate awareness, however we must ensure that awareness is continued to be generated beyond this week, therefore encouraging more children to break the stigma around mental health and not be afraid to talk about their feelings.
