The BBC’s Salford-based Learning department is offering educational videos to help teachers introduce the topic of mental health to primary school children.
The five short films address different ways children might be able to deal with OCD and depression, panic attacks, eating disorders, being bullied and being a bully.
The collection of videos, titled When I Worry About Things, uses personal testimonies from children and powerful animation to portray how such experiences might feel.
The films were created to empower teachers to address these topics in the classroom in a safe way.
The collection is accessible via the BBC Teach website alongside a further 120 new educational clips for pupils of all ages.
BBC Teach is the new central hub for all shortform teacher-facing content, bringing together classroom films, Live Lessons, education campaigns and School Radio.
Mosaic Films was commissioned to animate the mental health series, with children’s voiceovers recorded in a studio with a clinical psychologist.
Andrew Tomlinson, executive producer on BBC Teach, said: “This collection has been created with guidance from clinical psychologists and is designed to support teachers in introducing a potentially challenging subject.
“The idea with this series was to offer a solution by starting the discussion on behalf of the audience, therefore lifting the stigma surrounding them and acting as a tent-pole around which issues and solutions could be discussed easily and openly, whilst enabling young people to recognise mental health issues.”
A further 40 new educational clips are due to be added to the BBC Teach site by the end of the year.
