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

Psychiatry. Encouraging a healthier community.

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

By the end of this course, you should be able to:

• differentiate between helpful and unhelpful forms of anxiety
• discuss the symptoms, prevalence, and burden of childhood anxiety disorders
• identify problematic childhood anxiety by using questions, behavioural observation and discussion with parents
• develop simple strategies to help anxious children describe their feelings, and cope in the classroom
• develop behavioural and cognitive strategies that can be implemented by teachers in the classroom and playground
• have a framework for thinking about the importance of your 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

Intended audience

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.

Delivery style

Delivered in an elearning 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 facilitator and other participants
• multimedia modules with audio-visual lectures and interactive quizzes
• lecture notes download
• lecture audios download
• Statement 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 elearning 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.

Accreditation

This online course provides 3 hours and 15 minutes of Teacher Professional Development, addressing Proficient Teacher Standard Descriptors 4.1.2 & 4.3.2 from the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers.

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.