Wellbeing activities: being kind to yourself

Explore our wellbeing activities and exercises for primary and secondary school students, children, and teenagers and help young people be kind to themselves.

Age:: 7-18
Type:: Activities
Subjects:: PSHE
Topics:: Kindness, Home learning resources

Children and young people experience feelings of anxiety, stress, and loneliness. Whether it's caused by what's going on in the world like the Coronavirus pandemic or something they experience personally, it's important that they feel supported and able to manage them.

These activities are designed to teach about anxiety, mental health, happiness, and emotional wellbeing in schools. These resources will help learners to be kind to themselves and look after their wellbeing to build resilience and coping mechanisms.

Adult wellbeing support

These wellbeing activities are suitable for KS2 and KS3 primary and secondary school aged students, 7 to 18. If you're over the age of 19 try our wellbeing activities for adults. Here you can explore ideas and advice to help manage your own wellbeing, cope with difficulties, and build life skills.

> Wellbeing activities for adults

Learning objectives

Our wellbeing ideas for teachers and activities for schools will help learners:

build resilience, empathy, and kindness
reflect on the importance of wellbeing
learn some coping techniques to support with loneliness and anxiety
develop self-awareness and empower themselves to help with their own wellbeing
think about other people’s needs and experiences.

Resource overview

There are different wellbeing activities for primary and secondary learners and two different document downloads – being kind to yourself and web of connections.

1. Wellbeing and feelings: starter activity

Encourage learners to think about wellbeing and what makes them happy, comfortable and healthy. They can record how they’re feeling during the day using different emojis for happy, sad, angry, tired etc. They will also learn some ways to cope through breathing techniques.

2. Circles of control: video activity

Use the video to help learners think about what they can and can’t control. It is important to remember that we cannot solve everything. The ‘I can’ activity helps learners think about all the things they can do.

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3. Web of connections: video activity

Learners think about who they have a connection with and how engaging with them can help improve their wellbeing.

4. Extension wellbeing activities

Reach out and think about other people by helping learners to recognise their feelings. Why is it important to understand other people?

This resource was developed by the British Red Cross in July 2020.

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