Inspirational Futures puts mental health and well-being of families first
Inspirational Futures has created a free downloadable well-being diary to help families look after their mental health and wellbeing during lockdown.
See this page in: Cymraeg
Inspirational Futures is a social enterprise that was founded by three teachers who could see, first-hand, how children’s mental health and wellbeing was having a huge impact on their lives.
With a strong focus on wellbeing and mindfulness, they set up Inspirational Futures to enhance the mental health provision in schools and empower pupils with wellbeing techniques and strategies that prepare them for the wider world.
As well as resources for pupils, they typically provide workshops and training to teachers and parents with the primary aim of promoting how, as a society, we are not only responsible for our own wellbeing but the wellbeing of others around us.
Their work has never been more important while most children are now off school, and parents are balancing home-schooling with working from home. The disruption to our usual routines is likely to have a huge impact on our mental health, particularly for young children who are unable to see their friends and extended family members or fully understand the severity of the pandemic.
Recently, the Welsh Government announced extra funding for mental health provision in schools in Wales. This funding will be used to extend mental health and emotional support services to children younger than Year Six and support the mental health and wellbeing of the school workforce. But, right now, there is very little support for families and children while we are all spending more time at home.
As well as pushing forward their plans to provide wellbeing workshops in schools that will best support children when they return, Inspirational Futures created a free downloadable family well-being diary filled with ideas and tips to support families and promote mindfulness and wellbeing during this particular time.
Please share this resource with colleagues and friends. It’s free!!
A Well-being diary full of activities for children 💛
https://t.co/WlVIXsmGDS pic.twitter.com/WdUpAeDZoW— Inspirational Futures (@IFWales) May 19, 2020
The diary was created in just over a week from conception to being shared across social media, and the feedback they have received so far has been incredible, with many families sharing images of the activities they have completed together. It has already been accessed by over 1,000 families, some of them from as far away as the USA and Australia.
The well-being diary is completely FREE to download as a PDF from their website and provides lots of hints, tips and family activities to complete as well as a ‘reflection section.’
😲Our family diary has now been accessed by over 1000 families! Some from as far away as the USA! 🌎
We’ve received some lovely feedback & are so proud that it’s making a difference & helping people through this tricky time 💛
It’s available for free here https://t.co/6VN9GgX3WP pic.twitter.com/jecVKr6Lm6— Inspirational Futures (@IFWales) May 16, 2020
Kate Spear, co-founder of Inspirational Futures said:
“The creation of the well-being diary required us to quickly adapt to the changing situation, all whilst the three of us home schooled our own children!
Plans are in place to provide the workshops in schools and within the community as soon as we can safely do so but in the meantime we are assessing the feasibility of providing the workshops virtually in order to support those who will benefit from them. We have also just had the diary translated into welsh and will be making it available bilingual soon.”
💛 We love this sketch-note explaining ‘supportive alternatives’ by @ImpactWales
💛This sort of shift in language could make all the difference to the way children and young people view the current situation moving forward. pic.twitter.com/k1sFOkXTW6
— Inspirational Futures (@IFWales) May 21, 2020
Moving from the world of teaching into running a business has been quite a learning curve, with and without a pandemic. As a social enterprise, we need to access grants in order to provide our workshops and produce the resources to support pupils. Negotiating that new territory was challenging but having the support of Joanne at Social Business Wales enabled us to connect with someone with good business knowledge who could point us in the right direction.
Inspirational Futures has received business consultancy support and advice from Social Business Wales, funded by the European Regional Development Fund and delivered by the Wales Co-operative Centre.
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