Mental Health Someone posted this on Facebook

[nuttynutskin]

What do you guys think? Should mental health education be a priority for public schools?

 

[nuttynutskin]

When I was in school we did...it was health class...back inthe 90’s

I don't remember anyone teaching anything about MENTAL health tho...

 

[Mycophile]

I certainly think at the very least it should be an elective, if not an actual mandatory class, yeah, I think it would be great.

I was never taught anything about it in school either.

There's a whole lot of things I think should be taught in school that aren't and a whole lot more emphasis on things we don't need so much of.

I've never needed math that is more complex than basic arithmetic but had to take advanced Algebra and hated every second of it lol, and though I managed to find an interesting loop hole that allowed me to get out of taking physics and chemistry, they were mandatory for everyone else, and are just not necessary unless you are going into a field like science, medicine, pharmacology/psychiatry, etc, nor have biology or earth science helped me in life.

They tell you "well, you need to learn this or that because you MIGHT need it later in life", but I mean, there's LOTS of other things you might need later in life that they don't teach in highschool, though I'm too tired to feel like rattling off the long list of ideas I've had about this in the future.

I really think that I learned MOST of what has been necessary for me in life before I was ever even in highschool, with the exception of English because I now have a job that is based around language, but that's only cause I chose to go down that path and continue with that in college and grad school.

I think we should start treating highschool as much more like college with a whole lot more electives and a lot less of what we are being taught now as mandatory because really a lot of it isn't. We should let higschoolers make more open choices about what they want to learn than making them wait till college for that IMO.

 

[ThoseCleverKids]

My last couple years of secondary school (late 90's, age 15-16), they started to introduce a little bit of mental health and sex education. It was pretty fumbling and confused - I felt terrible for the teachers trying to deliver it, and I don't think the students really got much out of it. I'm afraid I don't know how that's progressed here in New Zealand since then, although I hear that sex education starts much earlier now, around age 12 I think. Whether mental health issues are covered, I have no idea.

I definitely agree, wholeheartedly, that some basic mental health education should be included. I think it would make sense for it to be a mandatory class for people starting secondary school, even if only for a term, maybe leading on to more in-depth electives later on. It certainly would have helped me, I think. I've suffered from avoidant personality disorder since, I think, well before that time, but I suspect it would have been less severe, led to less depression, self harm and substance abuse, and that I would have understood it and sought treatment much earlier, if I'd had some education about mental health issues back then.

 

[Cateturry3turrycan]

Surprisingly i think this is a great idea.

 

[hydroazuanacaine]

could call it “psychology.”

 

[swilow]

I totally agree, and I think techniques that can help with difficult mental states should be taught too, like meditation and some of the ideas behind CBT. But if its delivered in the way most school curriculum is, I'd be a bit worried...