Children's Mental Health Awareness for Churches
Children are facing growing pressures on their mental health, and churches are uniquely placed to offer safe, compassionate support. This course equips churches to better understand children’s mental health, recognise when a child may be struggling, and respond with confidence, care, and appropriate boundaries, while knowing when and how to signpost for further help.
This course will help churches to:
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Understand common children’s mental health difficulties
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Recognise early signs of emotional distress
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Respond with compassion, confidence, and clear boundaries
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Support children and families appropriately
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Know when and how to signpost to additional support
Children's Mental Health awareness for Churches is a self-paced online course designed to equip church leaders, children’s workers, teachers, volunteers, and parents with the knowledge and confidence to recognise, respond to, and support children’s mental health needs within a Christian context.
Across a series of practical, easy-to-follow modules, you will learn how to spot early signs of emotional distress, anxiety, or depression in children, how to have sensitive, age-appropriate conversations, and how to create safe, inclusive church environments where every child feels seen, valued, and heard. You’ll explore the impact of trauma, relationships, bullying, and additional needs on children’s wellbeing, and discover simple, faith-informed strategies to build resilience, hope, and connection.
The course combines clear teaching, reflection exercises, and downloadable resources that you can use straight away in your church setting. Whether you’re new to the topic or already have some experience, this program will give you practical tools and a confident framework for action, so that your church can become a place of genuine emotional and spiritual support for children and their families.
Children's Mental Health Awareness for Churches covers the following areas:
- What is Mental Health? And how do we understand it as Christians?
- Misunderstandings and myths around mental health.
- Building confidence and resilience in our children.
- Talking about emotions in helpful ways.
- Child attachment and trauma.
- Common mental illnesses: Anxiety, panic attacks and separation anxiety, OCD, Tics and Tourette's syndrome, depression and grief.
- How to support families who foster or adopt.
- How additional needs such as Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia and Developmental disabilities can impact mental health.
- How to support the mental health of children of parents working overseas.
- How to support Young Carers.
- How to help children who are being bullied.
Online
Learn at your own pace from anywhere, with flexible sections so that you can tailor your support to the children you are supporting.
Group support
Connect with others, Share ideas, ask questions and encourage each other as you progress through the course.
Additional resources
Access lesson plans and resources to print out, to help you teach children how to look after their own mental health.
We are donating 20% from the cost of this course to The Raft - a local charity that supports care experienced children and the adults in their lives.
This course can be purchased separately or as part of our more in-depth Church Champion course.