Black Rock Primary School is committed to the ongoing improvement of student wellbeing. Through our teaching of social and emotional skills to our students through our Friendly Schools Program and The Resilience Project, we support students in recognising and managing emotions, caring for others, making responsible decisions, establishing and maintaining positive relationships and dealing with challenging situations effectively.Research shows that mental health and wellbeing is very important for children’s learning and development. Children who are mentally healthy learn better, benefit from life experiences and have stronger relationships with their families, friends and school staff.
As part of our commitment to this, our school is implementing the KidsMatter Primary framework. This is an Australian mental health and wellbeing initiative that aims to improve the mental health of primary school age children. KidsMatter Primary helps schools to support children’s mental health and wellbeing by bringing together the important people in a child’s life: their family, their school and the wider school community.
KidsMatter Primary is divided into four components as a way of making the task of improving student mental health and wellbeing manageable. Each of the four KidsMatter components has specific, evidence-based target areas and goals. These are:
We will be including information addressing a range of wellbeing issues in our Newsletter so look out for those!
For more information on KidsMatter, please visit their website:http://www.kidsmatter.edu.au/primary/resources-schools
This is an evidence based program that explicitly teaches the social and emotional skills that provide the foundation for children’s learning and for citizenship. It fosters personal and social capability, which is identified in the Victorian Curriculum, as an important capability for 21st-century learners. The chart below describes the five types of social and emotional learning skills that our teachers teach to their students. Students with well-developed skills in these areas find it easier to manage themselves, relate to others, develop resilience and a sense of self-worth, resolve conflict, engage in teamwork and feel positive about themselves and the world around them. For more information about this program, please visit the following website:http://friendlyschools.com.au/fsp/
