Supporting School Wellness Toolkit

The Protecting Youth Mental Health: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory identified that mental health needs in young people continue to rise. Though increases in distress symptoms are common during disasters, most people cope well and do not go on to develop mental health disorders. Resiliency can be learned and developed, especially with home, school, and community supports, which will help people do hard things later in life.

For students, these mental health needs can go unsupported and lead to behaviors that are inconsistent with school expectations. It is important students and staff know that it is okay to ask for help and be ready to respond to those who need additional support. Providing school-based mental health supports and safe learning environments help students improve their overall well-being, allowing them to thrive.

Ohio’s educators and students have shown an incredible amount of resilience despite ongoing changes and concerns. This toolkit provides teachers, administrators, students and families, and communities with support to assist in responding to challenges that effect mental health. Click on the boxes below to find a collection of resources and recommendations, organized by audience type, to address current student and staff wellness challenges.  

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Teachers 

Teachers continue to support students while trying to stay physically, mentally, and emotionally well. The following are practical resources and tools teachers can use to support student behavior through relationship building, self-regulation, and trauma-informed practices. Teachers should also continue to practice self-care and seek additional support when needed.  

Relationship Building

• Create safe and supportive classrooms.
• Learn effective ways to connect and engage with students.
• Make empathetic connections with students.
  • Allow students to share about their personal lives through show and tell, pictures, or stories.

Student Calming and Focusing Strategies

• Establish a calm down corner.
• Use brain breaks to transition between activities.
• Introduce grounding techniques to help students regulate emotions.
• Offer fidgets, flexible seating options, or sensory interventions.

Staff Self-Care

• Regulate yourself to regulate your classroom.
• Recognize the signs of compassion fatigue.
• Take steps toward self-care.
• Monitor your feelings of stress, anger, or sadness and seek support.

Trauma-Informed Practices

• Be aware of common symptoms of trauma and helpful strategies to use in the classroom. 
• Post schedules and create classroom routines to create predictability, structure, and consistency.
• Recognize when students may be experiencing a fight, flight, or freeze response
  • Manage stress in the classroom.
• Become familiar with the strategy of addressing challenging behaviors through regulating, relating, and reasoning.

Classroom Management

• Use de-escalation and emotional regulation strategies when students are experiencing big emotions.
• Practice maintaining a “low and slow” voice volume and pitch.
• Use reflective statements to convey understanding.
  • Example: “You are feeling frustrated with being told to complete the math problems before you have tablet time.”
• Use evidence-based, positive, and proactive practices to respond and support students' social, emotional, and behavioral needs in the classroom. 

Know When to Refer for Services

• Be aware and identify warning signs of a mental health crisis. Refer to counseling or case management services.

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School Administrators

School administrators are facing increased incidents of student behavioral challenges and staffing shortages.

The following are practical resources and tools school administrators can use to implement multi-tiered systems of support to create safe, trauma-informed schools and to develop an environment that promotes staff wellness.

Evidence-Based Programs

• Utilize evidence-based, prevention-focused curriculum, programs and supports.
  • Ohio's Evidence-Based Clearinghouse
  • Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration Evidence-Based Practices Resource Center
  • What Works Clearinghouse.

Strengthen Tiered Supports

• Implement screenings to identify student needs.
  • Identify and provide supports to youth at higher risk for significant stress or trauma.
• Evaluate implementation and fidelity of universal strategies to support student behavior.
• Support positive school climate to increase feelings of safety and belonging among staff and students.
• Review school mental health best practices and implementation
• Leveraging Multi-Tiered Systems of Support Systems to Support the Return to School During and After Crisis

Trauma-Informed Practices and Policies

• Support a sustainable trauma-informed framework in your school.

Professional Development

• Identify flexibilities and opportunities to revise professional development programming to address emerging needs.
• Connect with community partners to provide ongoing professional development on relevant topics like Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports, evidence-based prevention programs, trauma informed practices, and other best practices for safety and school climate.
  • Educational Service Centers
  • State Support Team
  • ADAMH Board
  • Ohio Association of County Behavioral Health Authorities
  • Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports for Administrators

Relationship Building

• Promote parental engagement through resource sharing, newsletters, or workshops about mental health and well-being.
• Increase opportunities for connection between staff during the school day. Allow time for and encourage staff collaboration and cooperation.
• Promote collaboration at staff or team meetings through a shared agenda and opportunities for staff to reflect or share with peers.

Staff Support and Mentorship

• Develop a support group or mentoring program to allow teachers to receive peer-support. Allow groups time for real-time problem solving.
• Become familiar with Secondary Traumatic Stress and develop a response for your building.
• Support schoolwide practices to combat stress.
• Promote wellness events or groups for staff such as: yoga, walking groups, recipe swaps, or a social event for staff engagement.  
• Create a physical staff wellness space in your building.
  • A space with furniture, where students are not permitted.
  • Consider adding relaxation tools or signs.
  • Have a plan for staff coverage or breaks.
• Acknowledge and address grief or trauma experienced by staff.

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District Administrators

Districts administrators are working to provide additional supports to meet the need of schools, educators, and students. The pandemic has created new challenges in meeting the needs of school buildings, school personnel, and students.

The following are practical resources and tools district administrators can use to create new partnerships to increase support services and improve student health and wellness.

Create Partnerships

• Connect with partners to provide additional professional development or support services.
  • Educational Service Centers
  • State Support Team
  • ADAMH Board
  • Ohio Association of County Behavioral Health Authorities
  • Prevention Services for Schools
• Establish school-based health centers or community partnerships with health and mental health providers.

Staff Mental Health Support

• Expand access to Employee Assistance Program or create connections to provide services for school personnel. ​
• Become familiar with Secondary Traumatic Stress and develop a response for your district.
• Identify how PBIS practices can support staff wellness.
• Support school wide practices to combat stress.

Student Mental Health Supports

• Identify funding strategies for schools to expand prevention and mental health services.  ​
  • Ohio Student Wellness and Success Funds
• Become familiar with school mental health best practices and implementation.

Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Health

• Support social and emotional learning strategies in the district.
• Use data to find locations where behavioral needs require additional support.
  • Consider using the Ohio Healthy Youth Environments Survey (OHYES!), a free, voluntary, web-based survey for grades 7 through 12, used to collect student health and wellness information to assess student needs.
• Create strong district-family partnerships to leverage families’ expertise and diversity.

Trauma-Informed Practices and Policies

• Identify policies that can lead to impactful trauma-informed practices.
• Support a sustainable trauma-informed framework in your district.

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Students and Families

Students and families may find these resources and tools helpful as students adjust to changes. Below are ideas for families to support their student's wellness:

Help Manage Intense Feelings and Build Social Skills

• Practice and use calming and focusing strategies like deep breathing, mindful movements, progressive relaxation and positive self-talk.
  • Relaxation techniques for families
  • Relaxation Script for Younger Children
  • Regulation Kit for Families
  • Model Resiliency and Healthy Responses. When adults care for themselves, they model healthy behaviors for children. Children watch and repeat how adults manage stress.
• Normalize confusion, anxieties, or frustration about current events or changes in routines.
• Let Them Play. Just like adults need to talk through difficult topics to process them, children need to play to process the difficult things in their lives. Engage in fun games that increase focus and memory.
• Collaborate with strategies from your child’s school to make a family schedule, choose family expectations and make a plan to teach, remind, reward, and respond to behavior at home.

Stay Connected

• Help build upon positive childhood experiences: encourage your child to talk about feelings or how their day was, offer support during difficult times, facilitate relationships with other trusted adults outside of your family, and discuss and emphasize family traditions.​
• Reach out to friends and family via phone or video chats to stay socially connected. ​
• Maintain communication with your child’s teacher around needs, concerns, and progress. 

Maintain Healthy Habits

• At an age-appropriate level, have conversations about potential consequences associated with inappropriate online behavior. 
  • Create a Family Social Media Plan 
  • Common Sense Media: Technology Support and Strategies for Parents 
  • Social Media and Kids Mental Health
• A nutritious, balanced diet can promote overall wellness. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has provided online resources to encourage healthy nutrition.
• Be sure children are getting enough sleep. Have the same nightly routine and bedtime on both weeknights and weekends to maintain consistency. The Centers for Disease Control has posted recommendations for how much sleep children should get each night. 
• Continue to maintain and attend appointments for well-child visits, immunizations, and oral health care.

Seek Help

• Seek additional supports through school, behavioral health agencies, or other community resources.
  • SAMHSA National Helpline: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)​
  • SAMHSA Online Treatment Locator​
  • Ohio CareLine

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Communities

Community organizations play a critical role in supporting the mental health of children and young people by providing programming and supports and working to create safe, stable, and nurturing environments children and youth need to thrive. Children and young people themselves can also take action to protect, improve, and advocate for their mental health.

While different community organizations may address different community problems, serve various youth populations, and may implement different solutions, all community organizations can use the following recommendations:

Educate the public about the importance of mental health and reduce negative stereotypes, bias, and stigma around mental illness.

• Create open dialogue about mental health and correct misconceptions and biases.
• Partner with trusted messengers such as youth-led programs, faith leaders, and behavioral health professionals to speak to community members about youth mental health needs.
• Address misconceptions in key community stakeholder groups that have outside influence over young people such as educators, faith leaders, and the media.

Implement evidence-based programs that promote healthy development, support youth and their families, increase protective factors, and increase their resilience.

• Youth-led programming, mentoring, and afterschool programs.
• Skills-based parenting and family relationship programs.
• Evidence-based programs designed to prevent substance use/misuse, suicide, violence, and other mental, emotional, and behavior problems.
• Community coalition efforts addressing substance use/misuse, suicide, depression/anxiety, violence, and social determinants of health.

Ensure that programs are rigorously evaluate mental health related outcomes

• Track outcomes around anxiety, depression, and suicide, as well as upstream risk and protective factors such as social connectedness and coping skills.

Address the unique mental health needs of at-risk youth.

• Youth-serving organizations should be intentional about how and to whom program services are offered.
• Actively recruit and engage populations who have historically been prevented form equal access to opportunities and services.
• Engage with youth to understand what unique barriers may prevent them from accessing services.
• Recruit program staff directly from communities being served.
• Build program staff capacity to recognize personal biases and structural challenges in these communities.

Elevate the voices of children, young people, and their families.

• Engage youth in community-based mental health efforts.
• Gather feedback from youth and families involved in programming to understand what is and isn’t working.

Last Modified: 1/16/2025 1:02:09 PM

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