We’re supporting our sister charity Place2Be’s Children’s Mental Health Week 2022, with the theme of Growing Together.  

Here at Tutor Trust, we’re always thinking about how best to serve the young people who need our support – and that includes making sure we’re all aware of the challenges that they may be facing, and what we can do to help.

This year’s Growing Together theme encourages both children and adults to consider how they have grown, and how they can help others to grow.

Place2Be’s Royal Patron, HRH the Duchess of Cambridge, helped launch their first ever Children’s Mental Health Week in 2015 and has supported the campaign since, encouraging more people to get involved and spread the word each year. In that time, Place2Be have been providing resources and raising awareness for the mental wellbeing of young people all over the country.

This week, we’ll be focusing on the Five Ways to Wellbeing:

• Connect with people
• Keep learning
• Give to others
• Be mindful
• Be active

We’ll be sharing top tips on staying well and asking for your top tips too, so follow us and take part in the discussion on Instagram - @TheTutorTrust, and follow us on Twitter - @TheTutorTrust, @TutorTrustLeeds, @TutorTrustLPL and @TutorTrustBford.

As part of our week-long celebration of mental health and young people’s wellbeing, we’ll also be hosting a specialist Continuing Professional Development (CPD) session this Thursday, 10 February for our tutors and colleagues. We’re so excited to be joined by Lorna Colter from Place2Be, who will be leading the session and opening up a discussion around young people’s mental health more widely. This CPD will also explore how our tutors can make tuition sessions more accommodating for young people with mental health issues, and give them practical strategies, resources, and activities to use in their lessons. Tutors can sign up through our Thinqi platform here.

Children’s Mental Health Week is a fantastic opportunity to learn, share ideas, and most importantly listen to how young people are currently feeling about the world around them. It’s also a chance to take stock of our own mental health, and make sure that we’re in the best position possible to help provide the support that young people need. If you’d like to learn more about Children’s Mental Health Week, or find more tools to help you navigate talking about these big topics with children and young people, visit Place2Be for resources, information and more.

Mental health and wellbeing are important to us at Tutor Trust year-round, and we’re always working on ways to make our staff, tutors, and the young people we work with feel included and represented in the conversation about their mental health. Some steps we’ve already taken include having some members of our staff become mental health first aiders, to better support our team on a one-to-one basis. Our online Thinqi library has resources for our tutors to help with anxiety and stress, including meditation guides and strategies for working through negative thoughts. This Children’s Mental Health week, we’ll be thinking of even more ways we can support our staff, tutors and pupils with their mental health as we continue with our mission of transforming lives through tutoring!