Notice the early signs of mental health issues
Educators play an important role in noticing when a child may be showing signs of emerging mental health issues. This is due to your knowledge of child development and the regular contact and relationships you have established with children or young people in your care.
While it’s not your role to be a mental health professional, you can help identify when a child or young person may require extra assistance. You can also support children, young people and families to seek help.
Noticing the possible signs is the first step in supporting a child or young person who may be experiencing emerging mental health issues. This module is designed to give you the knowledge and tools to identify and record your observations accurately.
Who is this module for?
This module is for educators wanting to understand how to notice the early signs of mental health issues in children and young people and how to record these observations.
It is the first of the three modules in the Early Support domain. The Notice, Inquire and Provide modules are designed to be completed in order as the knowledge in later modules builds on the information in the earlier ones.
The Inquire module elaborates on how educators can use their observations to inquire sensitively about a child or young person’s circumstances.
The Provide module explores how educators can provide support within and beyond the early childhood service or school when children or young people and their families are seeking help.
Be You recommends completing the entire Early Support domain before taking action.
Accreditation
This module contributes to the NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA) and ACT Teacher Quality Institute (TQI) accredited professional development hours, addressing the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers.
In the ACT, completing Notice will contribute one (1) hour of ACT Teacher Quality Institute (TQI) accredited professional learning addressing standard 4.4.2 Maintain Student Safety of the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers.
In NSW, completing the Notice module will contribute one (1) hour of NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA) accredited professional development in the priority area of Student/child Mental health addressing standard descriptor 4.1.2 from the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers towards maintaining Proficient Teacher Accreditation in NSW. Educators can complete modules individually and receive accredited hours.
All registered teachers in every state and territory must ensure they have added their teacher registration number and state/territory to the My Profile page.
Please see FAQs for more details on the Be You Professional Learning upload process and time frames in which participants can expect their learning to be recorded with their relevant organisation.
Learning outcomes
After completing this module, you will be able to:
- appreciate how educators are uniquely positioned to notice early signs of mental health issues in children and young people
- understand the educator's role in noticing early signs of mental health issues in children and young people
- identify the tools you need as an educator to observe and record the early signs of mental health issues in children and young people
- equip yourself with the tools to record your observations of mental health issues within the boundaries of your role.
Using the Notepad
If you’re a PC or Mac user, there’s a notepad feature for you to record notes, actions or discussion points for each topic. If you’re sharing a computer with your team, your notes will be available for everyone to view. If you wish to keep your notes private, please save and delete your notes each time you finish your session. There’s more information in the Notepad user guide on the right.
Using this module
The Be You Professional Learning modules are designed to be used flexibly in the way best suited for you and your learning community.
Consider one section at a time within the modules. At the end of each page, you will be prompted to explore additional resources within Be You that relate to the content. It is suggested that you complete one module at a time and use these prompts to identify future opportunities for learning.
You will be prompted to take breaks throughout; this can aid your learning and retention of the content.
You can further your learning by using the reflection questions provided throughout the module. Use these questions in ways that suit your learning community’s ways of working and broader professional development. There are also resources, such as the Be You Action Plan and Be You Actions Catalogue, that can be used to further facilitate these discussions.