Facts4Life Training
Training and Support
Facts4Life offers training and support to Early Years, Primary and Secondary settings.
We offer complementary online welcome meetings to all settings that are new to Facts4Life. This is a chance to run through our digital training and resources and to support you as you introduce Facts4Life into your setting.
A subscription to Facts4Life is fully funded for Gloucestershire settings with a small charge for other UK settings. To find out more about Facts4Life before subscribing, please get in touch (here) and we can set up a meeting or provide more information.
Facts4Life Key Themes
Running through all of our training and resources are the three key messages of Facts4Life:
- Riding the Ups and Downs (of Health)
Our state of health is constantly changing due to the challenges we meet and how we respond to them. It is a normal part of life to be ill from time to time. However, we believe that for most of us it is in our power to minimise the ‘downs’ (when we are less well) and maximise the ups (when we are more well). - Keeping Balanced
Daily challenges can knock us ‘off-balance.’ A variety of processes in our bodies help us to respond to these challenges and return to equilibrium. By and large we are very successful at managing this – most of the time, most of us get better from most illnesses without help. - Smoothing the Path
With a better understanding of the symptoms of an illness and how it’s treated, we come naturally to thinking about actions that can be taken to maximise our health, which might include healthy eating, physical exercise, rest and sleep. This more exploratory learning is a very different route to telling individuals what they should or shouldn’t be doing.
Training Courses
Early Years Foundation Stage training (digital) – introduces practitioners to the key ideas of our approach and the delivery of the Early Years materials. Our Facts4Life Early Years Pack includes a collection of activity cards that can be used in a ‘pick up and go’ style by key workers in settings. These cards cover a range of themes that link closely with the Early Learning Goals and complement the new changes to the Ofsted framework. They are ideal too in supporting work on school readiness. The pack also includes a copy of our picture book ‘This is Fin and Bear’, a double-sided activity poster and a collection of children’s songs.
Primary Resource training (digital) – introduces teachers to the key ideas of the approach and the delivery of the materials. We invite a teacher from Reception/Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 from each school to attend to support the sharing of learning back in school. At the training you will receive free copies of the Facts4Life resource and access to a wide range of online modules, including support for mental health and relationships education. The resources cover Reception through to Year 6 and form units of work that can be taught as a stand-alone topic or adapted to suit the needs of your pupils and your curriculum.
Primary Mental Health Resource training (digital) – gives teachers the confidence to explore issues of mental health with children, provide a language for discussion and develop strategies for support. The classroom materials are structured around 3 central questions: what is mental health?, when might I need help? and how can I better support myself? They are designed to be reassuring for students, recognising that we all experience the ‘ups and downs’ of health, but that there are some choices we can make to ‘smooth our path’ and build our resilience. This includes self-help as well as peer support.
Family Support Worker/Community Family Worker Resources training – introduces support workers to the key ideas of our approach and the delivery of our Healthy Families resources, as well as materials for Parents/Carers and Families. You will be given a login to access our online materials at the training session.
Pastoral Teams Resources training – our Primary and Secondary Pastoral Mental Health and Wellbeing Training is designed for SENDCOs, Pastoral Support Workers and Teaching Assistants who are working on a one to one basis or with small groups. It provides an introduction to the key ideas of Facts4Life and gives access to resources that can be used in this support role.