Pupils with SEND: supporting mental health

Learn about whole-school strategies and personalised interventions to support the mental health of pupils with SEND. Find out how to get pupils talking, how to monitor wellbeing and get links to resources from charities and other organisations.

Last reviewed on 9 December 2024See updates
School types: AllSchool phases: AllRef: 33686
Contents
  1. Have a robust mental health policy
  2. Create an inclusive school culture
  3. Make the discussion accessible 
  4. Get pupils used to talking about mental health
  5. Monitor pupils’ mental health and wellbeing
  6. Prevent mental health from becoming a barrier to attendance
  7. Run staff training
  8. Offer targeted support

Please note: in this article we refer to a number of resources for supporting pupil mental health, including from commercial providers. Their inclusion is for your information, and is not a recommendation from The Key.

Have a robust mental health policy

There's no statutory requirement for schools to have a pupil mental health policy, but having one will help you provide consistent support to all pupils, including pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Your policy could lay out:

  • Your whole-school approach to promoting mental wellbeing (see more about this below) 
  • Warning signs to look out for, and what staff should do if they're concerned about a pupil
  • Where pupils can go for support
  • The responsibilities of staff members, such as the inclusion lead or designated safeguarding lead (DSL) 
  • How staff should manage disclosures from pupils 
  • Escalation processes
  • The role of parents and carers

 See examples of mental health policies from other schools: 

Create an inclusive school culture

Tackle social isolation

Provide more opportunities for pupils with SEND to form social connections with their peers  these connections are important for promoting positive mental health. For example, you could: 

  • Switch up the groups during in-class group work, to make sure pupils with SEND get the chance to work with all of their classmates 
  • Ask class teachers from different year groups to run projects together, so pupils get the chance to work together and form friendships beyond their immediate class 
  • Set up an inclusion hub during lunchtime, where pupils can seek support, learn life skills and make friends. See an example of this from The Martin High School Anstey, Leicestershire

Prevent bullying

If you haven't already, consider creating an anti-bullying policy that specifically refers to the bullying of pupils based on their SEND.

See examples of anti-bullying policies from other schools, and get tips on writing your own.

For more advice about how to prevent bullying, see: 

Make sure PE and sports clubs are accessible for all pupils

Emphasise the link between regular exercise and mental wellbeing. If possible, offer a wide variety of clubs to cater for all interests. To make sure pupils with SEND are getting the opportunity to sign up to the clubs they like, you could offer them the chance to sign up first.

Reward non-academic achievements

Praise pupils for their skills and achievements in areas that may often be overlooked in a busy school environment, such as welcoming new pupils to the school, or sharing their out of school achievements through a presentation. You could reward them by:

  • Using your school's merit system
  • Giving them a certificate in assembly
  • Stopping them in the corridor to congratulate them for a personal achievement

Make sure that rewards occur across the whole school community.

Make the discussion accessible 

Consider the level of engagement each pupil can have with the topic of mental heath, and if communication frameworks could be used to improve understanding, such as;

  • Adapting interventions such as the zones of regulation to talk about topics like bullying, depression and anxiety
  • Social stories to address topics such as burnout, or illustrate case studies around mental health
  • Visual timetables, for self-referral in times of crisis 

This advice was given by Charlie Raufi, SEND expert and senior education specialist at Diverse Young Minds.

Get pupils used to talking about mental health

Show pupils that you care about how they're feeling by promoting good mental health in school throughout the year. Actively find opportunities to talk about mental health by incorporating it into:

  • Personal, social, health and economic education (PSHE) lessons 
  • Assemblies 
  • Tutor time or circle time

Encourage pupils to talk about their feelings – if pupils feel that school staff take mental health seriously, they're more likely to speak up if they have concerns. You can reduce barriers to pupils sharing their concerns by using apps such as tootoot, pupils can report their concerns discreetly and confidentially.

Mental health charity Anna Freud has created a free mental health toolkit for primary schools, which includes a lesson plan and an assembly plan. 

Read about how to build a positive mental health culture in our other article.

Monitor pupils’ mental health and wellbeing

To do this: 

  • Carry out a whole-school mental health survey every year – you could run it during your school's mental health week, if you have one. This will help you identify pupils who need more targeted support and interventions, or if there are groups of pupils who consistently show signs of increased challenges or poor mental health
  • Find out what pupils think about the way your school provides mental health support, by running pupil focus groups with pupils from different year groups. Or, if you have a school council, it could hold discussions in class 
  • Show pupils you're listening to them by acting on any concerns they have
  • See our list of tools for monitoring pupils' mental health and wellbeing, both at an individual and whole-school level

Prevent mental health from becoming a barrier to attendance

Absence rates are higher for those with SEND than those without.

If you have a pupil with SEND who is struggling with attendance, consider whether their mental health may be a contributing factor.

When discussing attendance with the pupil’s parents/carers, check in with them to see how the pupil's mental health is.

Decide with parents/carers and relevant healthcare professionals how best to tackle the pupil's specific barriers to attendance and agree a support package to help them to attend fully, e.g. putting in place or updating an existing individual healthcare plan.

Learn more about working with parents/carers to identify barriers to attendance.

Pupils with an education health and care (EHC) plan

If the pupil struggling with attendance has an EHC plan, you should consider communicating with the local authority (LA) at an early stage.

You’ll probably be able to agree to a package of support that is consistent with the provision set out in the EHC plan. However, the level of support needed may mean that the LA needs to review and amend the EHC plan.

This is based on the DfE’s guidance on mental health issues affecting attendance (page 15 of the 'summary of responsibilities' document).

Run staff training

Train your staff to be on the lookout for signs of poor mental health – although only professionals should attempt to make a diagnosis, staff are well placed to observe pupils day to day and identify those who may be experiencing a mental health problem. 

Remember, if staff are concerned about a pupil’s mental health and it's also a safeguarding concern, they must take immediate action. They must follow your child protection policy, and speak to the DSL or deputy DSL. This is set out in paragraph 45 of Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) 2024.

If you're a Whole School member, or have Leaders+ with The Key Safeguarding, use our ready-to-deliver sessions on pupil mental health

Training for senior mental health leads

Learn more about about your school’s options for training a senior mental health lead, including courses suitable for different levels of experience.

Offer targeted support

Once you've identified pupils who need support, carry out targeted interventions to help them.

In-school interventions might include: 

  • Interventions to teach emotional skills, e.g. social stories and the zones of regulation to give pupils the words to recognise what they’re feeling and express it 
  • Emotional literacy interventions, e.g. Lego Therapy 
  • Carrying out personalised support for pupils experiencing mental distress – this might be a 1-to-1 intervention with a teaching assistant trained in mental health, or longer-term interventions like nurture group
  • In-school counselling – Place2Be offers a range of services, which can include in-school support 

Refer pupils to external agencies

If a pupil's mental health problem is serious, or does not improve after targeted in-school intervention, refer them to external agencies. Speak to the pupil's parents/carers, who should make an appointment with the GP. The school or the GP can make a referral to the child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS).

Pupils should also be made aware of different organisations which may be able to help in their specific scenario, such as;

Details could be made available by putting up posters on noticeboards, having leaflets in open areas and/or using the school newsletter and school website. 

Sources

Gulshan Kayembe is an independent consultant who has experience of inspecting schools. As a consultant, she provides mentoring for senior leaders and has worked as an external adviser on headteachers’ performance management.

Article updates

17 September 2024

The DfE updated Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) on 1 September 2024.

We’ve updated page and/or paragraph numbers in this article, where relevant, to reflect the updated guidance. There were no other changes to the guidance that affected this article. 

10 March 2023

We've made updates to this article to reflect the 2023 guidance for schools on mental health issues affecting pupil attendance.

31 May 2022

We've made minor updates to this article to reflect the 2022 version of Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE).

What did you think?

Rate this

Why did you give this rating?

Your feedback helps us to ensure our content is helpful to all members.

Our researchers read every comment.

Can't find what you need? Try searching, or ask us a question.

The Key has taken great care in publishing this article. However, some of the article's content and information may come from or link to third party sources whose quality, relevance, accuracy, completeness, currency and reliability we do not guarantee. Accordingly, we will not be held liable for any use of or reliance placed on this article's content or the links or downloads it provides. This article may contain information sourced from public sector bodies and licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.