Quick Links

Quick Links Open/Close

St John and St Francis Church School

Bath and Wells MAT

Mental Health & Wellbeing

If you are worried about your child’s mental health then you are not alone. Many parents and carers have similar worries and stresses. There is good support available from local and national organisations. The sooner you seek help the better for your child and you.

The staff that are directly involved in Mental Health Being at our school are as follows:

  • PSHE/RSE Lead/Senior Mental Health Lead-Emily Wells
  • ELSA trained teaching assistants-Jo Young and Zoe Evans
  • Super Wellness Champion-Teresa Weller 
  • PFSA-Kirsty Hughes 
  • Wellbeing school procedure

Staff

  • Staff Running Group

  • Adult Mental Health First Aiders and Thrive Practitioner

  • Education Support Counselling Line

  • Super Champion Well-being Lead

  • Senior Mental Health Lead

  • Staff information and posters to support with mental health and wellbeing from the Super Wellness portal

  • CPD opportunities linked to mental health and well being 

Children

    • Well being action group (in each section)

    • Wellbeing Ambassadors

  • ELSA

  • Drawing and Talking Therapy

  • Buddy benches

  • Children’s mental health week

  • Wellbeing lunch club

  • SCARF approach

  • Parent Family Support Advisor

  • Emotion Coaching

  • After school club

  • Lego Therapy and Play Therapy

Parents

Mental Health Support Team

The Mental Health Support Team (MHST) is a program delivered by Young Somerset in partnership with CAMHS. It provides early support for children and young people’s mental health in schools. Their work focuses on supporting pupils with anxiety, low mood and emotional regulation difficulties, helping them to build resilience and access support at an early stage. 

 The team are offering specific children at St John and St Francis School with 1:1 and small group sessions, along with advice, guidance and signposting for families. The team also support us to develop a whole school approach to mental health and wellbeing, working closely with the school mental health lead. Training and support from the team, for St John and St Francis School, includes: 

  1. Advice for school staff and school Mental Health Leads 
  2. Parent and carer workshops and guidance sessions. We have already hosted two coffee mornings, this academic year, as run by the Mental Health Support Team.  
  3. We have access to trained Education Mental Health Practitioners, who deliver low intensity cognitive behaviour therapy interventions for children 
  4. The team supports SEND provision within school 
  5. Through the M.H.S Team, St John and St Francis School also has access to an Educational Psychologist, who will provide us with wellbeing training during an upcoming INSET day.  

The Partnerships for Inclusion of Neurodiversity in Schools

The Partnerships for Inclusion of Neurodiversity in Schools (PINS) project is led by the Somerset Parent Carer Forum. St John and St Francis receives training and support from the PINS team in partnership with families and professionals, to improve inclusion for neurodiverse pupils.   

The project focuses on developing approaches that better support children with autism, ADHD and other neurodiverse needs. The support has been designed to improve practice and provide better outcomes for pupils.   

Through the PINS project, staff have been fortunate to access a range of training resources and general support. Pupil voice has played a meaningful role in shaping this provision, ensuring that support reflects their experiences and has a real impact.  

St John and St Francis School also received a very positive PINS review, which recognised our strong commitment to inclusion and effective support for pupils. The review highlighted positive relationships with families, reflective practice by staff, and a whole school approach to understanding and meeting a range of needs. The feedback confirmed that current strategies are having a positive impact and identified this as a good foundation for continued development.  

July 2025

We are proud to confirm that our school has achieved AcSEED mental health & wellbeing accreditation.

Mr Parrington, our SENDCo commented 'it is a solid reflection of the whole school's ethos to comprehensive mental health and wellbeing support for young people with no less than 18 areas of strength identified'.

The AcSEED review team were particularly impressed with:

  1. Use of Voice 21 Oracy as a potential platform for children to communicate their feelings and emotions in an effective way.
  2. SENDCO/wellbeing updates to full governing body meetings.
  3. Well written Wellbeing Policy that is available through the school website as part of the ‘Mental Health and Wellbeing’ section.
  4. Useful pathway document to ensure assessment and implementation of any additional wellbeing support is well structured and involves parents appropriately.
  5. Good wellbeing education programme based on PSHE.
  6. Range of mechanisms used to ensure children are aware of the wellbeing support and services available.
  7. Good range of external organisations utilised to complement the school’s own wellbeing resources.
  8. The Nest.
  9. SDQ’s used to measure the effectiveness of emotional wellbeing support, and subsequently to drive potential improvements.
  10. Range of mental health and wellbeing referral options including CAMHS MH link team.
  11. Orange Button member.
  12. Training and support to year 6 montors and year 2 wellbeing ambassadors.
  13. Forest School Lead and additional PE provision for targeted individuals.
  14. Minds Ahead and other wellbeing training resources for staff.
  15. Staff wellbeing group and wellbeing champion.
  16. Senior Mental Health Lead practitioner training.
  17. Tuning into Kids programme.
  18. Dedicated strand in SDP for ‘Personal Development.
↑