COVID-19: Resources for Parents/Carers

In the light of school closures, we wanted to provide a range of advice and resources for parents/carers. 

We are keen to signpost you to resources that start valuable conversations with your children and young people, providing tested tools to maintain wellbeing at a time of concern and anxiety for many families. 

At the end of this document we have included some resources that will allow children to continue learning at home. 

National Advice (Please note this advice will be continually updated as new information emerges): 

Pages for your General Mental Health Information and guidance: 

Mind: Coronavirus and your wellbeing Information from Mind to help you cope if:

  • you’re feeling anxious or worried about coronavirus
  • you’re asked to stay at home or avoid public places, for example if your employer asks you to work from home
  • you have to self-isolate

Mindwell Leeds: Information on Coronavirus

Useful tools and signposting from Mindwell to help you prioritise your wellbeing.

Adjusting to hanging out at home – Gem Turner

Gem is an award winning disabled blogger and consultant who has a lot of experience of staying at home for mandatory rest periods. She gives some advice on things to consider when self-isolating. 

Free online tours of the best art galleries in the world

Google Arts & Culture teamed up with over 500 museums and galleries around the world to bring anyone and everyone virtual tours and online exhibits of some of the most famous museums around the world.

National Trust  

The National Trust are working hard to open as many spaces as they can free of charge, with no parking fees, whilst closing all cafes and gift shops, to ensure people still have access to nature in order to support wellbeing. This will vary from site to site in terms of whether they are spacious enough to allow for social distancing. 

 

 

Information and guidance to support children and young people: 

 

MindMate Website

MindMate is a Leeds website for families, professionals, children and young people around youth mental health. If you’re a young person, MindMate can help you understand the way you’re feeling and find the right advice and support. If you’re a parent, carer or professional, MindMate can help you support a young person you know. We would recommend hovering over the young person’s tab, clicking ‘games’ and then selecting ‘stress pot’, as this is a timely and helpful activity to do with your children. 

Clear Fear App

Clear Fear is an app developed for teenage mental health charity stem4 by Dr Nihara Krause, Consultant Clinical Psychologist, and uses the evidence-based treatment CBT to focus on learning to reduce the physical responses to threat by learning to breathe, relax and be mindful as well as changing thoughts and behaviours and releasing emotions. You can personalise the app if you so wish and you will be able to track your progress and notice change. 

Calm Harm App

Calm Harm is an award-winning app developed for teenage mental health charity stem4 by Dr Nihara Krause, Consultant Clinical Psychologist, using the basic principles of an evidence-based therapy called Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (DBT). Calm Harm provides tasks to help you resist or manage the urge to self-harm. You can make it private by setting a password, and personalise the app if you so wish. You will be able to track your progress and notice change.

Young Minds Take 20 Parent Activities

Talking to your child about how they’re feeling can be hard. By taking 20 minutes with them to do an activity you’ll both enjoy, you’ll create a relaxed space to start that conversation. Here are some ideas of #Take20 activities that you could do in 20 minutes.

Anna Freud Self-Care Strategies

Anna Freud consulted with a wide range of young people to create a portal of self-care strategies to help young people to manage their wellbeing.  Advice to give to young people: It’s up to you to decide what helps.  If it works, keep doing it. If it doesn’t, stop and try something else.  And you can help Anna Freud build an evidence-base for these activities by letting them know what works by clicking on the ‘Did this activity help your mental wellbeing’ button on each page.  This will help them decide which ones to research further. 

Helplines, Online Chats and referrals pathways: 

Kooth: free online counselling platform for children & young people  

Free, safe and anonymous online support for young people aged 10-18 year old with trained counsellors as well as articles written by young people, a supportive online community forum and the function to record online journals. Kooth will still be operating as normal and are able to offer much needed support to young people at such a turbulent time. They are working on some digital materials specific to the current situation that we will send out when we have them. For now, here is a video outlining what the service does. We have a link with an integration and participation worker who is able to offer remote staff training sessions for kooth.com. If this is something you would like more information around, then please let us know.  

  

 

Young Minds Parents Helpline

The Young Minds Parents Helpline is available to offer advice to parents and carers worried about the mental health of a child or young person under 25.  Young Minds will endeavour to reply to emails received within 3 working days.

MindMate Single Point of Access (SPA)  

If you are concerned about the mental health of a young person, MindMate SPA referrals can link your child to the appropriate support. As a parent and carer of children (5-17 years) you can talk directly to the SPA team. Call 0300 555 0324 during office hours. Click on the link above to download a referral form.

Leeds Survivor Led Crisis Service  

Leeds Survivor Led Crisis Service provides emotional support to people in crisis aged 

16+. The team can be contacted on Tel: 0113 260 9328. Young people aged 13-18 living in Leeds can contact their Teen Connect crisis line on 0808 800 1212 or text message 07715 661 559.

BEAT  

The BEAT website has lots of advice and resources around eating disorders including a helpline (0808 801 0677) and a Youthline (0808 801 0711), the link above will take you to their advice around eating disorders and coronavirus.

Healthy eating resources and advice: 

 

Change4life

Fun and family friendly information for eating well and keeping active. Tips, ideas, recipes and games to help keep kids and adults happy and healthy. Parents and pupils can also download the free app and food scanner to find out what’s really in food and drinks.

Food a Fact of Life

Lessons and curriculum resources that parents can use at home to help educate their children about healthy eating, cooking and where food comes from. 

 

NHS Choices Eatwell

Information and advice on food, nutrition and the Eatwell Guide. This website also provides advice on digestive health and recipes ideas. 

British Heart Foundation  

Advice on keeping healthy and eating a balanced diet for heart health.

The Trussle Trust

A nationwide network of food banks that together provide emergency food and support to people locked in poverty, and campaign for change to end the need for food banks in the UK.

 

Physical Activity resources and advice: 

Resources and Advice Specific to children and young people with SEND: 

An app that lets you tick-off 50 fantastic things for you and your child to experience together. This is an excellent resource for young children and can be adapted for SEND children.  

Resources to Support Home Learning: 

We recommend you read through/watch all content prior to showing your child/ren.