Mental Health Awareness Week: Evolve

There is no shortage of evidence to the fact that physical activity can have a hugely positive impact on the mental health and wellbeing of adults and children.

Improved mood and a decreased chance of depression and anxiety are just two of the mental benefits that being physically active can bring to Londoners.

Throughout the past 12 months, with the covid-19 pandemic, multiple lockdowns and serious disruption to their schooling, the mental health of young people has been particularly affected.

In January, charity Young Minds found that 67% of young people believed that the pandemic will have a long-term negative effect on their mental health.

So, for Mental Health Awareness Week, London Sport are looking at community physical activity and sport organisations that focus on supporting mental wellbeing as well as physical health.

Evolve

Over the past two years Evolve has been working in 12 primary schools in Southwark and Lambeth in partnership with Guy's and St Thomas's Foundation on urban health.

Evolve’s Project HE:RO (Health Engagement: Real Outcomes) focuses on getting children to the ‘start line’ in learning and life.

Their programme has a specific focus on improving the moderate to vigorous physical activity levels in children by 10 minutes per day. To do this Project HE:RO focuses on the holistic wellbeing of the child and combines physical, emotional and cognitive interventions for children.

The programme is delivered by Health Mentors who work full-time in schools. Examples of individual interventions include before-school physical activity sessions and 1-to-1 mentoring workshops.

What They Do

During the recent lockdown, many of Evolve’s interventions had to be adapted to ensure they could still reach the children who were not in school.

One Health Mentor did this by setting up and live streaming Joe Wicks-style home workouts for the whole school community including teachers and parents.

The levels of pupil engagement were extremely high as they had previously built strong relationships with Evolve’s Health Mentor.

These sessions showed the importance of maintaining a healthy routine and had a knock-on effect on individual pupils by increasing self-esteem and resilience.

Evolve have increased the intensity levels within their before-school clubs to make them fun and engaging which helps children lose weight, in turn boosting their self-esteem.

Health Mentors also use a combined approach of physical activity and mentoring to unpick the reasons for why a child may behave badly and provide support on how to change their behaviour.

Success Stories

Elizabeth Raji, Health Mentor

"The children have gained a new understanding on the importance of their physical and mental health and this has had a knock-on effect in all other areas of their lives." 

James Robinson, Headteacher Camelot

"Our children are more active, more engaged and overall, in a better position to get the most from their learning."