Teachers’ Resource Guide for Virtual Classroom
TeenMentalHealth.org and TakingIt Global partnered to develop a set of mental health online resources available to teachers free of charge.
The combination of mental health education and technology in the classroom places teachers on the cutting edge by engaging students in a vital topic to help maintain their health through a medium that will engage their interest. This in turn helps students challenge assumptions around mental health and mental illness, combat stigma, manage stress, and be aware of warning signs that may indicate a mental health problem for themselves or their peers. It will also help students in their development of 21st century communication and computer literacy skills.
The thematic classroom is designed to act as a supplement to the Mental Health and High School Curriculum. This high school curriculum focuses on training teachers to be comfortable with their own knowledge of mental health, then empowers the teachers to share this knowledge with their students through a multiple module program. The program uses a variety of interactive sessions that help to promote dialogue among students, as well as with their teachers.
If teachers are looking to enhance these materials, provide homework assignments, or would like to do stand-alone activities regarding a specific area of interest, the Mental Health Thematic Classroom contains a set of four modules with a total of twenty comprehensive activities that can be tailored to suit the particular needs of each individual classroom, and connects to two fun and educational online games. It also includes additional resources in the files and bookmarks section of the classroom for both teachers and students to explore in order to extend the learning even further.
The technology involved in the classroom set-up is designed to be quick and straightforward for teachers. In order to further support the development of your customizable classroom, virtual office hours, frequently asked questions, and a demo classroom are provided, in addition to an informative teacher’s guide which can be downloaded here.
