Teachers – Some of Your Students Are Depressed – Do You Know What to Do? | By Ruth Wells
This is a rough time for many families. That is why this issue will focus on ideas for helping children who are sad and depressed. Since depression often worsens around holiday time, it is always a good idea to be especially vigilant during November and December. Be sure to carefully watch over any children and teens who show signs of sadness, isolation, withdrawal, distress, or other marked changes in behavior. If you are not a counselor, be sure to seek help if you have any safety concerns about a child or teen; these strategies are not a substitute for that.
Yesterday Once More
When children and youth spend a lot of the present being very upset about problems from the past, ask them to “bloom where you’re planted.”
Power Walk
Vigorous exercise can have almost a magical effect on depressed children and teens. Studies have consistently shown that exercise is one of the top three things that can help a child or youth stay ahead of depression. Don’t forget that if you are not a clinician, be sure to immediately seek mental health guidance if you have any safety concerns about a depressed child. It is always better to play it safe as the severity of a youngster’s depression is often not readily apparent.
Power Talk
Talk is the other intervention that studies have shown to be potentially quite useful to help depressed children and adolescents moderate the amount of sadness they are experiencing. We recommend that you combine this intervention with the preceding method– exercise. For example, you and the student can walk rapidly around your site while the child gets to talk about any issues that may be of concern. You can “Power Talk while you Power Walk”. Children who “talk it out”, are far less likely to “act it out”. They are also less likely to “act it in”– to hurt themselves with behaviors such as self-harm, self-endangering, substance abuse or other similar self-destructive actions. Depression can be both acted out and acted in. We tend to think of depression as just being acted in, but it can be either.
For Right Now
For children who are sad about things from the past or future, ask them “What’s wrong with this moment?” If they say that nothing is wrong right now, then ask them “Why would you waste the present worrying about what’s done…or what may never happen?” Assist students to avoid squandering the present moment for a problematic past or potentially problematic future.
Depression Solves What?
For children and adolescents who are often mired in depression, ask them to tell you exactly what depression solves. Assist the students to understand that depression solves nothing, and can make things worse when the child neglects responsibilities or shirks work due to sadness.
Cancel Stinkin’ Thinking
Now that you have your students realizing that depression never solves anything, teach them to notice and stop depressing thoughts by thinking “Cancel” whenever they notice negative thinking. You can call the negative thinking “stinkin’ thinking.” If students protest that they will never be able to turn off all the negative thoughts, reassure them that just noticing the negative thinking is a huge first step. “Sell” the idea of reducing negative thinking by emphasizing that students will be probably more comfortable and experience less pain by simply reducing the amount of negative thoughts.
Take Action
Train depressed students to take an action rather than just wallow in sadness. This intervention is the perfect follow-up to the two approaches shown immediately above.
Depression Time
For students who really hesitate to take steps to stop their negative thoughts, suggest to these youngsters that they simply try to reduce the number of minutes spent on negativity. Next, point out that there will always be plenty of time to be depressed later, that students aren’t giving up anything, they can always choose to be sad again later. Alternatively, have students determine how many minutes per day they spend dwelling on sad thoughts, then have them reduce the time by a percentage that is acceptable to them.
Get much more information, books, ebooks, posters, podcasts, free worksheets and more, all on this topic at http://www.youthchg.com. Ruth’s other sites include http://www.coolprintableworksheets.com. Author Ruth Herman Wells M.S. is the director of Youth Change Workshops and Books. Sign up for her free Problem-Kid
Problem-Solver classroom management blog at the site and see hundreds more of her innovative, problem-stopping methods. Ruth is the author of dozens of books and provides inservice workshops, keynotes and teacher professional development training throughout North America.
For re-print permission for this article, contact the author by email (dwells@youthchg.com.) or youth professionals (teachers, counselors, principals, juvenile court workers, etc.) can call 503-982-4220 with questions. Working with difficult youth doesn’t have to be so difficult. Youth Change can help.
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