SPCK Assemblies - Five Ways to Wellbeing

Five Ways to Wellbeing

How can we improve our mental health?

by Claire Law

Suitable for Whole School (Sec)

Aims

To consider the Five Ways to Wellbeing model for improved mental health.

Preparation and materials

You will need the PowerPoint slides that accompany this assembly (Five Ways to Wellbeing) and the means to display them.
Further information about the Five Ways to Wellbeing model for improved mental health is available at: https://tinyurl.com/l5wmszy

Assembly

I’d like to set you a challenge: you will have 30 seconds to think for yourself, and then a further 30 seconds to share your ideas with the person next to you. The question is: ‘Can you name five fruits or vegetables that begin with the letter “a”?’

Show Slide 1 and wait for the time to elapse, reminding the students to share their ideas with a partner halfway through.
Thank you, everyone. Let’s see how you did on that. Hands up if you can name three . . . and keep your hand up if you managed to name four. Finally, who managed to name five? Well done on that: it’s not easy to think when you are under pressure.
Now let’s see if you managed to name any of the fruits or vegetables on the slides.

Show Slide 2.

Hands up if one of your five was ‘apple’. That was an easy one!
Show Slide 3.

And hands up if one of your five was ‘apricot’.
Show Slide 4.

Did anyone say ‘avocado’? It’s often eaten in savoury dishes, but it’s actually a fruit, not a vegetable, because its seed is on the inside rather than the outside.
Show Slide 5.

Hands up if you said ‘asparagus’. That’s a vegetable.
Show Slide 6.

And the last one on the slides is another vegetable. This one is a bit more unusual perhaps: it’s an artichoke. Did anyone name that one?
All this talk of fruit and vegetables is a handy reminder that a healthy diet is good for us. In fact, we are encouraged to eat at least five portions of fruit and vegetables a day. Our five-a-day can be fresh, frozen or tinned fruit or vegetables. We’re encouraged to eat a rainbow if we can, consuming fruit and vegetables of different colours: red strawberries, oranges, yellow peppers, green beans, blueberries, indigo plums and purple sprouting broccoli, for example. Eating our five-a-day is good for both our physical and mental health.
However, there is another five-a-day that’s good for us, too.

Show Slide 7.

The Five Ways to Wellbeing are steps that we can take that have been proven to increase our sense of wellbeing.

Wellbeing means much more than simply not feeling ill or fed up. The World Health Organization defines health as ‘a state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing’. When we feel happy, healthy and content, we have positive wellbeing.
The Five Ways to Wellbeing are:

- Connect
- Be active
- Take notice
- Keep learning
- Give

We’ve already done a couple of these today. When we were thinking of fruits and vegetables that began with the letter ‘a’ and discussing our answers with a partner, we were connecting and learning.

Let’s look in detail at the Five Ways to Wellbeing model for improved mental health.
Connect. Good relationships are important for our wellbeing. We connect with others when we eat lunch together, chat with a friend, switch off the TV to talk or play a game with our family and volunteer to help younger students. When we do these things, we experience greater connection with others, which is really good for us.
Be active. Being physically active improves our physical fitness and mental wellbeing by raising our self-esteem and giving us a sense of achievement. Exercise - whether it’s walking, hula-hooping, dancing, football or anything else - causes chemical changes in our brains that can help to change our mood for the better.
Take notice. Paying more attention to things around us can help us to feel calm and peaceful. Noticing our thoughts and feelings, our body and the world around us can help us to enjoy life more and understand ourselves better. Sometimes, this is called mindfulness.
Keep learning. When we adopt an attitude that there is always something to learn, we increase our wellbeing. Learning a new skill or hobby can boost our self-esteem and confidence.
Give. Giving our time, skills or resources to help others is proven to help us, too! Research suggests that acts of giving and kindness can help to improve our mental wellbeing by creating positive feelings and a sense of reward, giving us feelings of purpose and self-worth and helping us to connect with other people.

Time for reflection

Our RE teachers are probably not surprised to hear about the Five Ways to Wellbeing model, but it is relatively new. It was published in a report that was commissioned by the government and included evidence from over 80 scientific trials and papers. However, most of the content of the Five Ways to Wellbeing model draws on ancient wisdom and teaching from world religions.

Show Slide 8.

The Bible reminds us that we don’t exist in isolation: we have neighbours and other people around to connect with. We are encouraged to love our neighbour. In addition, Islam, like many religions, teaches that we can benefit from connection with God through prayer. The Qur’an teaches that God is connected to us and will never forsake us.

Let’s consider how we might find connection with others and with God. What might that mean for us today?