It’s World Mental Health Awareness Day! Scouts can play an important role in supporting mental health and wellbeing. You don’t need to be an expert to make a difference – we have support available to help you look after your wellbeing, spot signs of difficulties in others, and start conversations with both adults and young people.
As Scouts, we’re always striving to leave the world a little better than we found it. Over the last one hundred years, the issues we’ve tackled have evolved and changed, but our young people’s drive to make a positive impact remains constant. Participating in our A Million Hands programme is one way Scouts can take action and achieve their Community Impact Staged Activity Badge.
It provides ready-made activities and programme ideas centred on six national themes, chosen by our young people themselves. One of these is better mental health for all. In 2020, we understood that lockdown was an especially tough time and created 10,000 Wellbeing Champions: children, young people, and adults who committed to help tear down the taboo around mental health and do what they can to boost people’s wellbeing.
To help my mental health, I make time to focus on the things that matter to me. I make time for my family: We talk, we laugh, we make memories. I make time for my friends: I listen to them, we share experiences. I make time to turn off the laptops!
Mental health refers to the way we think, feel and act. Everybody has mental health, the same way everybody has physical health, and we need to look after it.
If you go through a period of poor mental health, you might find that the ways you’re frequently thinking, feeling or reacting can become difficult, or even impossible, to cope with.
Lots of things can impact mental wellbeing for young people and adults such as a challenging time at work or at school.
1 in 4 adults and 1 in 10 young people experience a mental health problem (Mind, 2020).
If you are concerned about an adult volunteer or young person’s wellbeing, try to stay calm and have a conversation with them. Where appropriate you might have a conversation with the young person’s parent or carer.
If a young person is at immediate risk of significant harm follow the advice and guidance on the Yellow Card and inform their parents or carers.
Volunteering does wonders for my mental health, it gives me a sense of purpose, connects me to amazing people with shared values and gives me the opportunity to give back to my community
Some people find it difficult to talk about mental health and wellbeing. Being open and gently encouraging conversation helps mental health to become an everyday topic that people are more comfortable to talk about.
Just like our physical health, there are things we can all do to improve our mental health. The five ways to wellbeing have been researched thoroughly, and there is evidence to show that they can improve our ability to feel good and function well.
When I’m feeling overwhelmed by life and what’s going on around me, I either get outside into the fresh air or I speak to a friend and share what’s on my mind. Both are key for my mental health and wellbeing.
Here are some suggestions on suitable mindfulness activities for younger scouts to try to explore what mindfulness and well being are.
1. Describing emotions
Sit in a circle with the young people and ask them to describe different emotions. How does it feel when they are angry, happy or worried? You could prompt them by suggesting that they visualise their emotions as colours, or types of weather.
2. Listening circle
Take a trip to a local park or nature reserve. Sit down in a circle and ask the children to try to be quiet and listen out for different sounds. Instead of calling out, ask them to put their hands up when they want to share the sound that they can hear.
3. Looking at clouds
Keep an eye on the weather for this activity, as ideally you need partial cloud cover and a good breeze. Get the scouts to lie down outside and look up at the clouds (taking care not to look directly at the sun). Ask them to look out for shapes and notice how the clouds change as they move along.
4. Bubble balloon game
Blow up some balloons and play the don’t-touch-the-floor game, but focusing on very slow gentle movements. Pretend that the balloons are bubbles that might pop, so you can only tap them delicately and carefully.
5. Texture bag
Put a selection of objects with different shapes and textures into a canvas bag. Get the young people to take turns putting their hands in, feeling one of the objects and describing it to the others (without looking at it) in as much detail as possible.
6. Guided relaxation/visualisation
Get the scouts to lie down on the floor, possibly on a comfortable mats. Take them through a guided relaxation exercise (eg focusing on all of their muscles in turn) or guided visualisation story (eg imagining they are lying on a beach). There are plenty of these available to download online.
7. Yoga
Do some research and try some easy yoga with the scouts – there are lots of fun moves for preschoolers to practise, for example animal poses. If you’re not confident enough to lead this yourself you could always ask a local instructor (preferably one who is experienced in working with children) if they could come and help.
8. Mindful breathing
There are several ways of practising mindful breathing with young children. It works best when combined with some kind of action, for example counting off on one hand as you breathe in and the other hand as you breathe out, or putting your hand on your tummy to feel it moving in and out.
Samaritans: Samaritans offer a free service any time 24/7. If you need someone to talk to, they listen. They won’t judge or tell you what to do.
Phone: 116 123
Website: samaritans.org
NHS 111: For urgent medical advice out of hours you can contact NHS 111. They can help if you have an urgent problem and don’t know what to do.
Phone: 111
Website: 111.nhs.uk
MIND: Mind Infoline is open 9am to 6pm, Monday to Friday. We’re closed outside of those hours
Call: 0300 123 3393
Website: mind.org.uk
