Mental Health

Mental Health

At Brereton we want all of our children to thrive.  However, we know sometimes they need additional support flourish.  If you have concerns about your child please speak to a member of staff in confidence.

Lead staff members to contact if you have concerns about your child's mental health: 

Mr Cotton - SENCO and ELSA (Emotional Literacy Support Assistant)

Mrs Field - Designated Mental Health Lead

Mrs McLean - Headteacher

Mrs Wood - Deputy Headteacher

Mental Health Helpline - 0300 303 3972

Local NHS Trust, Cheshire and Wirral Partnership (CWP), has launched a new mental health helpline for residents of Cheshire West, Cheshire East and Wirral.

Open 24 hours a day, seven-days a week, it is open to people of all ages including children and young people who need urgent mental health support.

What to do if you need urgent mental health help:

  • Please call 0300 303 3972 and our dedicated local NHS staff will support you to access the help you need;
  • The helpline is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week and is open to people of all ages – including children and young people;
  • The helpline is now the first port of call for mental health help – it is operated by people in your local area who will know how best to support you. If you call NHS111 you may have to wait longer for help and will be re-directed to this local service – so call 0300 303 3972;
  • Please note, A&E and 999 are not the best places to get help for the majority of mental health problems – call 0300 303 3972 to be directed to the best local service to support you;
  • You should still call 999 or go to A&E if you have an immediate, life-threatening emergency requiring mental or physical health assistance;
  • For non-urgent help and general wellbeing advice, the CWP website contains information and links to resources to support people with anxiety, low mood, and worries relating to the current Covid-19 pandemic www.cwp.nhs.uk
  • For children and young people there is also a dedicated website MyMind.org.uk

You can also phone the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) out-of-hours advice line on 01244 397644. 

During this uncertain time, CAMHS Out of Hours and CAMHS duty team remain operational as per their usual working hours. 

Crewe- 01270 253841

Macclesfield- 01625 712 040/712 041 (0-16 years) or 01625 712 054 (16-19 years) 

Winsford- 01606 555240 (0-16 years) or 01244 397555 (16-19 years)

The advice line is open Monday to Friday between 5pm and 10pm and on Saturdays and Sundays between 12pm and 8pm. Tel: 01244 397 644

 

Useful Links 

Her are some useful resources that you could use at home to support your child’s mental health are below:

This leaflet which was created alongside the Talking Mental Health Animation & Toolkit, features an introduction from our Patron, Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cambridge who supported the You're never too young to talk mental health campaign stating the campaign's resources "demonstrate how we can help children express their feelings, respond appropriately, and prevent small problems from snowballing into bigger ones."

 

Young Minds Parents Survival Guide: https://www.youngminds.org.uk/parent/parents-guide-to-looking-after-yourself/

Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families: https://www.annafreud.org/parents/

Young Minds Parents' Guide to Support A-Z gives advice on how to support your child with specific mental health difficulties, and life events which may be negatively affecting their wellbeing. https://www.youngminds.org.uk/parent/parents-a-z-mental-health-guide/

Mentally Healthy Schools Mindfulness Calendar: https://mentallyhealthyschools.org.uk/media/2026/mindfulness-calendar-daily-5-minute-activities.pdf

Parents' Guide to Childhood Anxiety- Knowing the symptoms, how to talk to and support your child with anxiety: https://tutorful.co.uk/guides/the-expert-guide-to-help-your-child-with-anxiety

 

South Cheshire Clasp is a charity in Crewe that aims to support lone parents, whatever their circumstances, based on a strong Christian ethos. They offer friendly support and advice, which is available for the whole family if needed. Some of the services they provide are counselling, parenting courses and one to one help. 

Visyon is a local charity, based in Congleton, that supports the emotional health of children, young people and their families. On their website there is a wealth of information for children and parents. They also hold a 'Parent Empower Hour' which is a session for parents to meet and create support networds for those whose children are experiencing emotional diffculties. This includes sharing stories, advice and knowledge.

Kooth

Kooth is the UK's largest digital mental health provider to the NHS for children and young people aged 10-25, offering digital mental health services and a broad range of therapeutic tools and interventions, including counselling.  

Responses to Traumatic Events

Unfortunately from time to time events in the news, either nationally or locally will have an impact on children. Advice on how to respond to these tragic events is contained below:

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/13865002                   https://www.nspcc.org.uk/what-we-do/news-opinion/supporting-children-worried-about-terrorism/

                                          

What's mental health?

The World Health Organisation defines mental health as a state of wellbeing in which every individual achieves their potential, copes with the normal stresses of life, works productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to their community. Mental health includes our emotional, psychological and social wellbeing. It affects how we think, feel and act.

Like physical health, mental health is something we all have. It can range across a spectrum from healthy to unwell; it can fluctuate on a daily basis and change over time.

Good mental health helps children:

  • learn and explore the world
  • feel, express and manage a range of positive and negative emotions
  • form and maintain good relationships with others
  • cope with, and manage change and uncertainty
  • develop and thrive.

Building strong mental health early in life can help children build their self-esteem, learn to settle themselves and engage positively with their education. This, in turn, can lead to improved academic attainment, enhanced future employment opportunities and positive life choices.

Promoting mental health

There is good evidence that schools can help all children develop essential social and emotional skllls through delivering sessions designed to cultivate these skills, through ensuring broader opportunities are capitalised on to reinforce skills across the curriculum and through whole-school modelling of these skills. Social and emotional skills prevent poor mental health from developing, help all children cope effectively with setbacks and remain healthy. 

Here at Brereton, we hope our currculum allows children to make mistakes in a safe and supportive environment and that we enable every child to succeed and be valued for who they are.  We believe our PSHE and RE lessons allow children to explore their feelings and emotions and look at how to support themselves and others.  Our worship allows children to ask questions and be open and honest about their beliefs. 

Coping skills

Mental health doesn’t mean being happy all the time. Neither does it mean avoiding stress altogether. Coping and adjusting to setbacks are critical life skills for children, but it’s important that they develop positive, rather than negative, coping skills.

  • Negative coping skills are attitudes and behaviours that have often been learned in the absence of positive support and in the face of stressful and often traumatic events and experiences which, over time, may put good mental health at risk.

Example: children at risk of or experiencing maltreatment in the home may have learned to react quickly and in a certain way (flight or fight or freeze) to survive and keep themselves safe. But in a classroom, these reactions may not work well and could get them into trouble, disrupt learning and make them unpopular with teachers and peers. In the longer term, these learned behaviours may also impact on their mental health and wellbeing, sense of belonging, educational achievements, peer relationships and life chances. 

  • Positive coping skills are ways of thinking, attitudes and behaviours that allow children to deal with stress or adversity and which help them flourish. These positive coping skills form an important part of a child’s ability to be resilient in the face of setbacks and challenges. Children who have cultivated robust coping skills can still thrive with support, even when they are mentally unwell.

 

What affects child mental health?

A child’s mental health is influenced by many things over time.

Children have different personalities and they will be exposed to a range of factors in their homes and communities that can trigger worsening mental health (risk factors), or alternatively protect them and help them feel able to cope (protective factors). Ideally, all children should have at least one adult in their life who is monitoring whether they are coping or not.

Identifying children who are struggling

Deteriorating mental health is not always easy to spot and can be overlooked until things reach crisis point. At least two children in every primary school class (based on average class size of 27) are likely to have a diagnosable mental health condition. This rises to three to four students in every class by secondary school age (Green, 2005).1

Around a further six to eight children in each primary school class will be struggling just below this ‘unwell’ threshold (Wyn, J. et al., 2000).2

Body Image:

Bereavement Support:

www.childbereavementuk.org/

www.cruse.org.uk/

www.mariecurie.org.uk/help/support/bereaved-family-friends

www.mind.org.uk/information-support/guides-to-support-and-services/bereavement/#.XN3ItY5Ki00

www.nhs.uk/conditions/stress-anxiety-depression/coping-with-bereavement/

www.lullabytrust.org.uk/bereavement-support/

Files to Download

Brereton C E Primary School

School Lane, Brereton Green, Sandbach, Cheshire, CW11 1RN

Administration Assistant: Mrs S Henderson
or Senco: Richard Cotton

Tel: 01270 918931

Email: admin@breretonprimary.org.uk

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