Mental Wellbeing (Secondary)

Curriculum content:

1. How to talk about their emotions accurately and sensitively, using appropriate
vocabulary.
2. The benefits and importance of physical activity, sleep, time outdoors, community
participation and volunteering or acts of kindness for mental wellbeing and happiness.
3. That happiness is linked to being connected to others. Pupils should be supported to
understand what makes them feel happy and what makes them feel unhappy, while
recognising that loneliness can be for most people an inevitable part of life at times
and is not something of which to be ashamed.
4. That worrying and feeling down are normal, can affect everyone at different times and
are not in themselves a sign of a mental health condition, and that managing those
feelings can be helped by seeing them as normal.
5. Characteristics of common types of mental ill health (e.g. anxiety and depression),
including carefully-presented factual information about the prevalence and
characteristics of more serious mental health conditions. This should not be discussed
in a way that encourages normal feelings to be labelled as mental health conditions.
6. How to critically evaluate which activities will contribute to their overall wellbeing.
7. Understanding how to overcome anxiety or other barriers to participating in fun,
enjoyable or rewarding activities – that it’s possible to overcome those barriers using
coping strategies, and that finding the courage to participate in activities which initially
feel challenging may decrease anxiety over time rather than increasing it.
8. That gambling can lead to serious mental health harms, including anxiety, depression,
and suicide, and that some gambling products are more likely to cause these harms
than others.
9. That the co-occurrence of alcohol/drug use and poor mental health is common and
that the relationship is bi-directional: mental health problems can increase the risk of
alcohol/drug use, and alcohol/drug use can trigger mental health problems or
exacerbate existing ones. That stopping smoking can improve people’s mental health
and decrease anxiety.