Children to be taught ‘worrying and feeling down’ are not mental health issues

New guidance will reportedly teach children that “worrying and feeling down” are not mental health issues as part of new efforts to tackle a growing employment crisis.

According to The Telegraph, new guidance will advise teachers to not encourage pupils to self-diagnose “normal feelings” as problems such as anxiety and depression, following concerns that more young people are calling in sick to work.

The revised relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) guidance comes as 12.5% of 16 to 24-year-olds were not in employment, education or training between January and March this year.

Speaking to The Telegraph, education secretary Bridget Phillipson said: “For too many children today, their understanding of how to manage their mood and regulate their emotions is coming from social media, rather than their parents, teachers or trained professionals.

“Our new RSHE [relationships, sex and health education] curriculum will equip children to develop grit and resilience from the get-go, helping them understand that feeling a little down or anxious for a while is normal and nothing to worry about.”

She added: “With mental health, just like physical health, prevention is better than cure – which is why we are also making sure there is access to mental health support in every school and reducing child poverty with more free school meals, delivering on our Plan for Change to give every child the best start in life.”

The new guidance aims to ensure lessons differentiate between genuine conditions and ordinary feelings, and says pupils should be taught 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”.

It adds that teachers should tell students how “managing those feelings can be helped by seeing them as normal” rather than a symptom of illness. In addition, schools have been instructed to teach students the “characteristics” of common types of mental ill health, including anxiety and depression.

The revised guidance, which was issued last week, says teachers should include “carefully presented factual information about the prevalence and characteristics of more serious mental-health conditions”, but must not be taught in a way that leads to pupils self-diagnosing with conditions.

The change to the guidance comes after Phillipson pledged that young people would be taught the value of “grit” to help them deal with life’s “ups and downs”.