Why?
Schools often do not focus enough on the mental health of students.
We know it sounds tough and maybe a bit confronting, but it’s true. Everyone here at LBTS has gone to school and some of us are either in uni or obtained a bachelor’s degree already. Sadly, we all feel like there was absolutely no place at school to talk about these kind of things. And when we tried, teachers would often reply with things such as “we can’t help you, you need to pass all exams”. But it’s not about passing exams, or group projects. It’s about our mental health, something teachers often can’t relate to.
Core Goals
"Stop the Mental Health Stigma"
Help people who are struggling with their mental health
Provide them with advice on how they can get help and what they can do in certain situations.
Increase Awareness of the importance of Mental Health
Make sure people respect each other's feelings and thoughts, and show them what the consequences are if they don't.
Get people to open up about their mental health
Oef... One of the hardest things to do, but very important. Our motto is "It's okay not to be okay".
Get people in touch with each other
We can learn a lot from people who feel completely different, but we can also get courage by knowing other people have the same struggle.
Cool Games
We like to play games such as building your emotions with LEGO bricks or the "If you knew this about me..." game. This helps people getting more comfortable with sharing their struggles.
Regulate Emotions
Learn how to cope with statements such as “You’re lazy”, by not responding with “You don’t understand”. Also show people how to say things more genuinely, and how to control your emotions when you're feeling offended.
Share Feelings
Discuss why it’s difficult to talk about feelings. What holds people back from sharing them? Together, we work on sharing our feelings by practicing, for example, with role plays.
The Importance
Mental Health in general; why it's important, what it is, how it affects our lives etc.
Coping
What to do when you’re dealing with mental issues & what to do when someone in your environment is facing mental health issues.
Discussions/Questions
We go over certain scenarios and let the students have a discussion about certain topics.
Roleplay
The goal is to learn how to share emotions and feelings, and deal with different responses.
Self-Awareness
Increasing self- awareness by writing down strength and weaknesses. We're also going to focus on what you can do when negative thoughts take over.
Improve Drawing Skills
Draw your emotions and explain what you do when experiencing these emotions.