Mental Health

Mental Health
Strand 3- Individual and Community Health

Outcome 5.6- A student analyses attitudes, behaviours and consequences related to health issues affecting young people.

Students learn about- Understanding mental health.
- Loss and grief: helpful and unhelpful strategies.
- Reaching out: helping yourself and helping others.

Students learn to- Suggest positive strategies to deal with loss and grief.

Activities- A) Mental health is ‘a state of emotional and psychological well-being in which an individual is able to use his or her cognitive and emotional capabilities, function in society, and meet the ordinary demands of everyday life’ as retrieved from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/mental%20health
B) Watch this short interview and answer the following questions.
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=tpz5tiGYr1s&feature=related
- Do you think the mental health of today’s teenagers is a serious problem? Why/Why not?
- What are some methods/precautions we can take to lower the rate of teenage suicide?
- What are the three different sets of warning signs you can look for to identify poor mental health in a teenager?
C) Write down your own definition of resilience. What are eight things that you think helps people to be resilient. What are some factors that may negatively influence a person’s resilience?

Reason for inclusion- This will help give the students a better perspective on mental health and suicide, how common they are amongst teenagers, how to identify these problems and how to prevent them.