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Sorted for Schools provides Positive Mental Training audio programmes grounded in scientific research.

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These programmes can enhance your mood, alleviate stress, anxiety and depression, and foster resilience and positive emotions.

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We can improve our wellbeing with

The Feeling Good Programme, one of our Sorted for Schools programmes created especially for schools.

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Programme

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Social Media Part 1

Key vocabulary

Look at the words below. What do they mean to you? Discuss them and feed back to the class about what you think they mean. You could try to come up with a definition for each one.

  • Social media
  • Screen time
  • Social media platforms
  • Age restrictions

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Your Best Self

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Write down and/or discuss which of these statements you agree with and which you disagree with.

  • Social media is bad for your mental health.
  • Social media makes our lives better in many ways.
  • Some people are addicted to social media.
  • Social media use and screen time are completely different things.
  • Older people don’t understand how and why young people use social media.
  • Social media is more harmful to girls and women than it is to boys and young men.
  • Social media is damaging the relationship between young people and their parents/carers.

Opinions about social media

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Opinions about social media

A number of studies have been carried out about the impact of social media on people in general and, more specifically, on young people.

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Research into this is still quite new, but some things we know:

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  • Adults worry about the dangers of social media that they don’t want their young people to experience.
  • Young people worry that something they say online now could affect things like applying for jobs in the future.
  • A number of adults and young people think they are using social media more than they should or want to.
  • Social media is often used by young people for things like school work and entertainment, as well as for communicating.

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Think about your own social media use.

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Write down or discuss:

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  1. Which social media platforms do you use?

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  • How often do you use them?

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  • What do you use them for?

Your social media use

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How old does Facebook require its users to be to use their services?

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What about SnapChat?

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Twitter?

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WhatsApp?

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YouTube?

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Instagram?

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TikTok?

Social media platforms - age restrictions

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How old does Facebook require its users to be to use their services? 13

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What about SnapChat? 13

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Twitter? 13

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WhatsApp? 16

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YouTube? No age restriction to watch videos but need to be 13 to have your own YouTube account.

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Instagram? 13

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TikTok? 13

Social media platforms - age restrictions

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Discuss or write down why you think social media platforms have age restrictions.

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Is it…

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  • To protect younger people from inappropriate content?
  • To stop parents/carers/schools from complaining?
  • To give adults a break from young people?
  • To protect young people from being contacted by older people?
  • So they don’t break any laws?
  • Another reason?

Social media platforms - age restrictions

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On average, how many hours per week do you think teenagers spend on social media?

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  1. 13 hours

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  • 20 hours

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  • 27 hours

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Time spent on social media

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The correct answer is...27 hours

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Research shows that on average, teenagers spend more than 27 hours a week on social media.

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  • What do you think about that?
  • How does it compare to the time you spend on social media?

Time spent on social media

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Which of these reasons for using social media are most similar to your own reasons for using it (or most similar to the reasons people you know use it)?

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    • To communicate with friends and family.
    • To find out more about your interests.
    • To pass the time when you’re bored.
    • To get advice about topics that you find hard to talk about with people face to face.
    • To help with school work.
    • Other reasons.

Reasons for using social media

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Rank the following things in order of their importance to maintain good wellbeing and mental health.

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1 = most important; 5 = least important.

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    • Getting enough, good quality sleep.
    • Doing enough exercise.
    • Eating healthily.
    • Getting outside.
    • Face-to-face social interactions with family and friends.

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Discuss your choices.

Looking after your mental health

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Is social media hurting your mental health?

Watch this video.

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Have you or someone you know ever had similar experiences with social media?

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Is social media hurting your mental health?

In this video we learn that when we reflect on what we’ve seen on social media, it can make us compare ourselves to others and feel bad about ourselves.

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But we can learn to switch these feelings off by:

  • exercising
  • reading
  • being in the moment
  • playing
  • relaxing (for example, by carrying out slow, deep breathing)
  • meditating
  • listening to the Feeling Good Teens app.

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Positives

Negatives

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The positives and negatives

Summarise verbally or write down what you think are the positives and negatives of social media.

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Positives

Negatives

Can help stay connected with friends and family

Can get in the way of doing other things that make us feel good

Can build a community

FOMO (Fear of Missing Out)

Can provide help, advice and information

Can lead to problems sleeping

Can reduce loneliness

Cyberbullying

Can help with school work

May replace face-to-face social interactions

Some ideas that you might have included.

The positives and negatives

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Your relationship with social media

Some things that are important for good mental health are:

    • Getting enough, good quality sleep.
    • Doing enough exercise.
    • Eating healthily.
    • Getting outside.
    • Face-to-face social interactions with family and friends.

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Ask yourself: Is your social media use negatively impacting any of these things?

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If the answer is yes, what changes could you make to improve your relationship with social media?

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Do you need to talk to a parent/carer or another trusted adult to get some help or advice?

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Free app for pupils

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If you haven’t given our app for young people a try at home yet, you still can!

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Type ‘Sorted: mental health’ into the search engine in your app store or use the QR code below.

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Free app for adults

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And for adults - Sorted: mental health

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Username: fg9sch

Password: positive

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