All staff have the responsibility of looking after the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people and should be provided with the necessary training to identify and respond to the warning signs of loneliness and depression. Addressing loneliness and depression at an early stage can reduce the harmful impact in later years and lead to better outcomes in the future.

Developed by Anna Bateman, mental health and wellbeing expert who works in an advisory role for the DfE, this course provides you with the knowledge and understanding of how to address loneliness and depression in children and young people, ways in which the signs can be spotted and a range of preventative strategies to help associated distress.

Please note: This course provides AI-generated subtitles in multiple languages including English, Welsh, Arabic, German, Spanish, French, Polish, Ukrainian, Portuguese, Russian, Romanian and Chinese. To select a language, start the video and click the Closed Captioning (CC) button.

When planning and allocating your time, please consider that this training course consists of learning through video, task completion and further reading/research. To successfully understand and achieve the objectives of the course, learners are expected to engage in all aspects of the learning process and complete all relevant activities to ensure they can successfully apply the knowledge and skills they have gained in their own school or setting.

Designed in line with the following policies

Keeping Children Safe in Education

Important note for non-UK learners: Although this course reflects best practice principles and might be useful for learners outside the UK, please note that it is based solely on UK guidance and legislation. Please make sure you also adhere to relevant legislation applicable in your own country.