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Q1. What are TWO things that resonate with me from the sharing?
Q2. How can I make ONE difference in my class or school from the sharing?

Within each group:
1. Nominate a Facilitator, a Scribe and a Spokesperson.
2. Discuss the 2 questions above
3. Share your group discussion. Please indicate you group breakout room's number.

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Maslow hierarchy of needs. Esteem needs to be met. otherwise they will do some things to attract attention.
Need to know the language to communicate with them.
adverse childhood emotions can affect mental well-being

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Mental health among youths is a growing concern due to the exposure of social media and FOMO.

Teachers should try not to dismiss students' responses who are victims of cyber bullying. However, we need to teach preventive measures to help our students.

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1. Reminding students to be present when they FOMO

2  Listen to the students and help them identify the triggers (don't always focus so much on the physical symptoms)

3. Informal conversations with students are more impactful. Knowing their lingo is important for us to understand them better especially when we have generation gap!

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1. Cyber Wellness sharing - It is not realistic to expect adolescents to quit the Internet/ cyber world. We need to be able to enter their world to engage them.

2. Sometimes we may unknowingly be the trigger for their psychosomatic stresses - our lack of awareness/ sensitivity towards students' mental wellness leads to them using physical illness as a front

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1. Stigma in sharing of own mental health/issue
2. Focus on mental well-being vs physical well-being
3. Normalising on mental health/issue.

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1) Awareness in the difference in the technical terms: mental illness, mental health and mental diseases

2) Specific roles of PSLs to support students & peers, important that PSLs are well supported by teachers an schools --> as encouragers, as positive influencers, to be observants in both physical and online spaces. PSLs must be ready to engage peers at a deeper level --> how to start engaging?

3) Suicidal ideations & intentions --> triggered by events (isolated and accumulative). Important for teachers and PSLs to be alert and observant

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1) Mental health concerns are very real in our students - we cannot simply brush them off. Nonetheless, we need to strike a balance as well, and help our students overcome setbacks.

2) Mental health, illness, disease, stress, sickness are all terms that refer to different things and yet sometimes we use them interchangeably.

3) The lingo our students used is very different from us and we need to know somewhat to better understand them.

4) There is not enough conversations about the role of teachers in schools - are we working building the students' resilience / counselling them, etc? The boundaries are not so clear unlike in the healthcare sector.

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1. We are not really addressing actual fears and anxieties as it is not physical and treat it as blatant rebellion 2. Differentiating between mental health and mental awareness

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1. Psychosomatic symptoms when parents brush off of child's comments about emotions, we should be concern when child presents physical symptoms
2. Gaming addiction - is it made worse how it is being portrayed in movies.

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- popular social media apps
- data on recent trends
- what adolescence is NOT ( debunking myths and misconception)

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Q1. What resonate with me?
1. How to interact with the Youth and the importance for educators to adopt a new mindset when handling Cyber & Mental wellness issues

2. Need to acknowledge Mental Illness in school and how to differentiate the "real needs" against the lies.

3. Is it ok to normalise mental illness? Will they take advantage of the situation, run away from their responsibilities and expectations.

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Students spent long hours online and mainly for entertainment which is a concern from a survey conducted. We are also concerned about the entertainment they are interested in, which may not be of healthy content or good for the students. Parents are not fully aware of the online content that the students are viewing. Social media usage is closely related to mental health.

Victims of cyberbullying do not inform the parents. Got to get the friends and peers to find out more about the cyberbullying case. Peer support is important.

Suicidal cases among the youth on the rise is a concern.

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1) Real, authentic sharings about students. How to support students instead of bearing with it in silence.

2) The different terms that students used but we as educators do not understand. As educators, there is a need to know and look out for preventive measures to counter that.

3) The need to address mental distress, otherwise it will lead to mental illness. Students to be taught about the cognitive behaviour skills.

4) The need to connect the thoughts, behaviour and feelings. Students are normalising cyberbullying, in the type of language and content they shared.

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Be positive about mental well-being before it leads to mental illness.
Work together as a team to counter cyber bullying.
Educate students about mental illness
manage expectation about social circle.

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1. Need to understand and be aware of student's lingo and way of communicating is important (based on Joanne's sharing). Just asking them to cut off their source of communication with their peers doesn't solve the problem but guiding them helps.
2. Resonated a lot about Dr Daniel's sharing on how our adolescents have adult brains but lacking in experience thus we label them as "immature" (Health literacy of students or person in general is important for adults/educators to know)

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1) Engage TOUCH (Joanne) to guide our PSLs (focus on relevant and practical skills, difference between mental health, issues and diseases)
2) Need to calibrate expectations of our PSLs.

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1. Knowing that we are on the upstream of the whole continuum of student wellbeing, it motivates us to keep learning and finding different ways to address our students' mental health.
2. Seeing teens as mature thinkers and only lacking in experience will help us to frame our mental model of them. This means we do not talk down to them and sometimes, even can co-construct strategies or coming up with ideas together.

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1. Building rapport & relationship by practising active listening
2. Influencing the students' decision-making process - teaching them not to be silent and should share full story with the trusted adults (ie. teachers/parents)

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Working on reducing stigma
- education on mental literacy
- informal conversations with students

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1. To consciously make the school a safe environment
2. To let them know that it is ok not to be ok.
3. Not down-playing the mental unwell but at the same time to encourage resilience
4. To guide the Peer Buddies to be the encourager/ eyes/ voice of the class

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1) Youth depression is a sensitive issue among youths and it is on the rise. As teachers, we need to be more observant/sensitive to some signs that students might be displaying

2) Importance of creating a safe space - importance of de-stigmatising mental illnesses

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Proposed to carry out mental health station program - to have different stations to raise awareness among the students about the different mental health issues

To inform parents about the cyber wellness issues

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1) Students who are going mental health issues can draw strengths from those who have somewhat overcome them. It can be like showing the video that Dr Daniel Fung showed.

2) Build a positive environment in the school and reduce the stigma of mental illnesses. It could possibly include deepening our students' understanding of mental health-related issues.

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1. Consider doing mindfulness activities at the start of the week.

2. Make school more fun and attractive for all students + find out more about why some students may not find school so interesting

3. Continue to provide more opportunities for students to interact socially at all levels (social awareness & relationship management)

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1. Cyber bullying - There is a need to understand the intention which is more important than a top down interpretation of the student's response. Students may not want to explain to parents.
2. There is a need to understand the implications of using mobile apps. Eg may be giving unnecessary information to app owners.
3. Dependency on mobile devices and apps are growing rapidly.

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How do we make school a place where students yearn to be. To make school a safe place for students to come to seek help when they face troubles or struggles.
Build the trust with students, to be able to tell the difference between when students are being off-task and when they are feeling overwhelmed and support them accordingly.

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Interesting takeaways:
- Development may not necessarily be defined by age - different people may reach different milestones at different age points in life.
- School is a good place to teach general awareness about mental wellness, not necessarily through labels of mental illness but more generic e.g. ways to cope with stress / self-care.
- Mental illness can't be "seen" unlike physical illness. We need to change our perception about mental illness; is just like any illness.
- Should learn to understand and more open-minded, especially when interacting with students. Find out more about underlying reasons / needs, instead of just focusing on the behaviour or issue. E.g. students with cyber / gaming addiction may be using gaming as a escape.
- Need to also work with parents to set realistic expectations - e.g. not possible to get child to totally stop using the mobile device. Going head-on with child may cause them to become defensive instead.
- Early intervention and support is crucial to preventing children reaching the extreme end of the "suicide curve" straightaway.

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1. There is a need to support teachers and parents in understanding the cyber world, the current trends adolescents are going through and the slang they are using.
2. To strengthen and deepen TSR and SSR (through PSLs)

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2 things that resonated with us:
1) The importance for teachers to be intentional in supporting our children on their mental well-being rather than solely just relying on rolled out programmes such as talks/ CCE programmes
2) Our teachers can help the students a great deal by having the skills to perform 'First Aid' upon noticing signs of distress in our children

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There is a need to understand the social media platforms our students are on. We may want to engage the teachers in a conversation so they are aware of all the possibilities.

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1 difference:
- Create more awareness with intentional talks and class sharings (informal and formal platforms) on cyberwellness/ cyberbullying
- To take the above further, roll out Tier 1 programmes of Cyberwellness peer support leaders (empower children, especially those who may also be struggling): this may not be common in Pri School but certainly good to implement.

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Adopt a relational approach with our students, especially with our form classes & teaching classes.
- Do not be too judgmental in our interaction.
- Try to be fully present when they are sharing their experiences with us.
- Introduce preventive measures & encourage help-seeking

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We are hoping that we could also involve the parents about their awareness in mental health. Many a times the school could have done a very systematic or progressive approach for students but it would not be helpful when the direction and thinking differ from parents/stakeholders. Hopefully we could find different opportunities to engage parents to get them to be more aware about sessions like this one.

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Q2. How to make a difference in school?
1. Identify more platforms for conversations with their students

2. Empower the Peer Support Leaders to identify and flag out students who might need additional SE support.

3. Champion Mentors follow their classes from Sec 1 to 4 therefore they are able to build stronger TSR with their students.

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Safe space wall where students can write about the problems that they are facing anonymously to raise awareness

Teacher talk in class - display more empathy

More 1 to 1 conversations with students to check in with them

Train PSLs to be more observant for signs of DISTRESS.

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Educate parents about terms such as cyberbullying  - keeping parents aware about the current terms

Using social media as a way to promote cyber wellness - good use of social media

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Peer aiders to be the ears and eyes on the ground - also supported by the 2nd speaker, that apps cannot really help with mental health as compared to having an actual physical person that our students can talk to or alert teachers about what's going on.

We can appoint mental health ambassadors, apart from our current class monitors, who already have a lot of responsibilities to deal with.
- Mental health ambassadors can play the bridge/link between their classmates and the teachers to bring up issues they have observed that may escape the teachers' notice.
- Mental health ambassadors can also help to educate their classmates on mental health literacy to reduce stigmatism/stereotypes.

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1. Mental Health - have student volunteers(who are passionate) to advocate mental well-being (influence)

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1st : understand what the students are sharing ;

Suspend judgment

Understand their experiences

Negative influence -

checking on terms about cyberbullying - strategy ✌️

2nd: Depressing;

Race based statistics;

Factors that affect racial ideas - societal ideas ;

SES might ;

Academic expectations

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- Working with parents to set realistic expectations
- Teachers interacting with students: Can also identify own vulnerabilities (e.g. going through life challenges, being a victim of bullying, etc).

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perhaps using the strategy suggested by Touch services. "consequential thinking" for students who share they constantly compare themselves to people in social media.

responsible content creation when featuring peers

managing their romantic relationships responsibly online

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Awareness, literacy (recognition, knowledge and attitude) and competency skills before mental illness develops. To start upstream by trying to promote mental health through proper habits such as usage on social media, check in with class, how to cope with stress. Adult monitoring is key.
For example,
Have structures in place to help students to  stay away from addiction from handphones, such as lockers and collection from GO.

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Q1. People are more responsive to physical health related matters than mental health matters because it is easier to identify and handle.
We are more willing to accept physical illness than mental illness because we are more familiar and aware of the associated behaviours and be able to empathise and support the patient.
Essential to establish TSR in order to relate to the students to promote CW.

Q2. Raise awareness about mental illness and self compassion.
To help students to identify more pillars of support besides the Teachers, parents. Can tap on peer supporters to provide additional support. Equip and empower students to do so.

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To provide that avenue for students to express their feelings anonymously. Or weekly journal for teachers to know what the students are going through.

To constantly create a safe environment for students to be comfortable in expressing themselves.

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For both questions:

Peer support can be effective and useful in cyberbullying cases.
- Strengthening Peer Support Structures and Approaches, where the mindset is such that everyone is a peer supporter and not just restricted to their roles in the class committee (peer support ambassador).

Difference between mental health and mental sickness.
- Nuancing in messaging and educating that it is ok not to be ok. Stress is good, having grit is important, but when it becomes distress, recognise it and how to seek help, in a safe school environment