School Community Wellbeing

Emotionally Friendly School (EFS) Award

We are currently in the process of applying to achieve Emotionally Friendly School Status.

The Emotionally Friendly Schools (EFS) programme is a flexible, whole-school approach to improving children’s mental health and wellbeing.

The accreditation focuses on four key areas:

One of the main principles in everything we do at school is to support the wellbeing of children and staff. Ensuring that our children are happy, healthy and achieve emotional wellbeing is paramount to us. This means each child h

as the skills they need to cope with everything that life might throw at them and that they have the ability to thrive and learn. Embedded within our school curriculum is the teaching of key values including: resilience, confidence and positive self-image. We share appropriate coping mechanisms with pupils when things are tough in school and this plays a key part in our PSHE curriculum.

As staff, we are trained to understand emotions, self-control, good relationships and keeping healthy in mind and body. We recognise that our wellbeing can change from day to day and that there are times in everybody’s life when a little extra help or support may be needed. As a result, we have invested heavily in a supportive and nurturing system, the aim of which is to enable all children and staff to flourish whilst at Clarendon Road.

To support the emotional and mental wellbeing of our whole school community, we deliver a wide range of learning opportunities, support programmes and interventions. These range from whole class work to small group programmes to one-to-one sessions and further intensive therapies if needed from our Learning Mentor, who works with children and parents.

We closely work with a number of outside agencies such as CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service), the LSS (Learning Support Service), the Educational Psychology Department, School Nurse Service and Speech and Language Therapists to ensure that each individual receives the best care and support possible. We now have a number of staff who have been trained to deliver therapeutic interventions across all year groups and for staff.