Recognising wellbeing across education – supporting good practice and enrichment
For psychological wellbeing every child, teacher, parent and caregiver needs access to environments that enrich their physical and mental health, including physical activity. We need to support and recognise the connection between physical activity, wellbeing and mental health for all children, young people and their teachers.
Impact highlights
Advocating staff wellbeing can lead to positive outcomes:
- A Staff Wellbeing Charter allows schools to monitor and commit to Staff Wellbeing.
- Many schools set up designated staff wellbeing leads.
- A wellbeing culture is driven by school senior leadership teams.
Pupil-centred approaches adopted by schools to support physical health and literacy, mental health and the development of life skills including:
- Educating pupils on the importance of physical activity, good sleep, hygiene and maintaining a balanced diet.
- Using sports and mobility to support mental and physical health.
- Offering a range of sports and extra curricula activities where physical activity was accessible for pupils’ individual needs.
- Recognising the benefits of outdoor learning.
This project with the Youth Sport Trust has shed a spotlight on evidence and examples of how schools can support children’s physical and mental health as a foundation for life.
From a network of 1,000 ‘Well Schools’ across England, 10 case studies took part to share good practice for physical and mental wellbeing and school provision. National bodies such as Sport England and charities such as the Youth Sport Trust are at the forefront of recognising the value of access and engagement to physical activity and the outdoors for children’s health and wellbeing, but are concerned that significant challenges remain.
Wellbeing was recognised as whole-school nested within schools and the community. Pupil wellbeing was directly supported by teachers’ own wellbeing to support a culture of wellbeing and into homes via the messages schools communicate to families and their communities.
Case study schools reported their pupils were happier and healthier, which had a positive impact on pupils’ engagement with learning. Emphasis on physical health and literacy were the leading focus across all school types to support pupil health and wellbeing.
This research was completed at the end of COVID-19 pandemic as schools and their communities began to realise the potential implications. The role of physical activity, school sports and play opportunities was a regarded as key and direct linked to wellbeing. Evidence suggested wellbeing was higher for pupils who engaged in more days of physical activity a week. School provision of facilities that offered a range of timetabled extra-curricular activities involving physical activity was a crucial for equipping pupils with skills necessary for confidence and success. Teachers in this network, were more often protected from professional burnout and reported greater job satisfaction and staff retention.
How we’re making a difference
This Youth Sport Trust project presents evidence and examples of how schools can support children’s physical and mental health as a foundation for life, which is accessible on the Wel School platform for other schools to use and be inspired by. Here case studies of practical and feasible ways to supports wellbeing at range of school types, locations and context are presented.
Awareness of what is good practice and achievable in schools promotes equity and enables every child, teacher, parent and family to have access to environments that support and fuel their wellbeing and mental health.
National bodies such as Sport England and charities such as the Youth Sport Trustare at the forefront of recognising the value of access and engagement to physical activity and the outdoors for children’s health
and wellbeing, but are concerned that significant challenges remain.
- Reports are shared within a Linktree for ease access.
- UoM project page
Ongoing impact
Case Study schools reported positive experiences of becoming a Well School and managing being a Well School. This included:
- Positive experiences when reflecting on school level support systems and Well Schools engagement.
- Emphasis given to making time for Well Schools as well as provision of training that relates to Well Schools. Schools report mostly positive accounts of the support and engagement across their school regarding Well Schools.
- Engagement with online resources revealed the most mixed responses from schools, with some schools engaging with online resources and others reporting reduced engagement with such resources.
The impact of Well Schools was being monitored in most schools, this includes the use of wellbeing surveys across staff and pupils.