As parents and carers you want to do everything you can to help your child succeed and reach their full potential. However, it can be challenging to know when your child needs that extra bit of support and where and how to access this at Knox or externally.
At Knox, the Science of Wellbeing and Psychology Teams are committed to working collaboratively to support wellbeing in young people.
As parents you are the experts on your children – however sometimes it’s hard to know whether the challenge our kids are experiencing is ‘just a phase’ and it can be helpful to have some guiding questions to steer us towards accessing further support.
Ask yourself these questions:
- “Is the [challenge/issue my child is experiencing] causing marked distress and/or interference in any major areas of functioning?”
- i.e. is it causing distress/interference in their social life, academic life or family/home life?
- “Is the behaviour/distress excessive compared to others of a similar age?”
If the answers to either of the above are ‘yes’ – it would be useful to consider relevant support options.
Access to support at internally at Knox has slight variations across the campuses. At Knox Preparatory and Wahroonga Preparatory a helpful starting point is reaching out to your child’s class teacher who can then refer on to the respective Total Fitness/Wellbeing Teams at these campuses. In the Senior School there are several points of contact such as your child’s Team Leader and Assistant Team Leader, Head of Academy, Mentor or Student Welfare Officer for your son’s year group.
In the lead up to school holiday period, it is timely to circulate support options external to Knox. The attached Mental Health Support Options pack contains information pertaining to support options for children, adolescents and even parents. The pack contains information on different websites, apps, and helplines for a range of difficulties. Further there is also information on how to access a psychologist or psychiatrist as well as suite of online interventions for a range of mental health and parenting related challenges.
