Managing Anxiety Disorders at School: An Online Course for School Teachers

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This online course on anxiety management is specifically designed for primary and secondary school teachers and other school staff to improve their skills in identifying problematic anxiety, increase their understanding of the presentation of anxiety disorders at school and to introduce tested strategies used by other teachers to calm anxious children.

Health professionals who are interested in childhood anxiety disorders are also welcome to complete this course, as are parents of children who are prone to anxiety.

Outcomes

Upon successful completion of this course, participants should be able to:

1. Differentiate between helpful and unhelpful forms of anxiety.
2. Discuss the symptoms, prevalence, and burden of childhood anxiety disorders.
3. Identify problematic childhood anxiety by using questions, behavioural observation and discussion with parents.
4. Develop simple strategies to help anxious children describe their feelings, and cope in the classroom.
5. Develop behavioural and cognitive strategies that can be implemented by teachers in the classroom and playground.
6. Have a framework for thinking about the importance of their own self-care.

Content

This course covers the following topics:

• Foundations of anxiety and Its disorders in children
• Functions and symptoms of anxiety module
• Anxious presentations
• What are children afraid of
• When fear becomes a problem
• Types of anxiety disorders in children
• What causes an anxiety disorder
• Anxious presentations at school
• Different strategies for different students
• Starting the school day
• Transitions
• Tools for managing anxiety
• Events, thoughts and emotions
• Planning
• Limit setting and security
• Rewards.

Delivery Style

This course will be delivered in an e-learning system with the following components:

• Social chat forum where you can introduce yourself to the class
• Q & A forum where you can ask questions and get feedback from the tutor and other participants
• Multimedia modules with audio-visual lectures and interactive quizzes
• Lecture notes download
• Lecture audios download
• Certificate of Completion download.

You will have 90 days to complete the course at your own pace. It takes approximately 3.5 hours to complete it. Within the enrolment period, access to the e-learning system is available anytime and anywhere in the world as long as you have a reliable and high speed Internet connection.

The lecture audios were recorded in a professional studio and are of high quality. You can download them to your mobile devices and continue to listen to the course while travelling.

CPD Accreditation

• The University of Sydney – Sydney School of Education and Social Work is endorsed to provide NESA Registered Professional Development for teachers accredited at Proficient Teacher and Highly Accomplished Teacher.
• Completing this online course will contribute 3 hours and 15 minutes of NESA registered PD addressing 4.1.2 & 4.3.2 from the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers towards maintaining Proficient Teacher Accreditation in NSW.

Technical Support and Course Advice

Details of your student login and how to access this online course at MHE will be sent by a separate email from the Discipline of Psychiatry at the University of Sydney. Please keep an eye on an email from admin@mhe.edu.au and check your spam/junk mails. If there is an outstanding amount owing on this enrolment, login details will not be sent until payment has been received. For technical support and specific advice about this course, please contact the course coordinator Richard He here.

Acknowledgement

We acknowledge Associate Professor Anthony Harris, Melissa Hulme, Belinda Allen, Luke Hanley and Rebecca Bowman for their contributions to the development of this online course.