16th Annual Children’s Mental Health Poster Contest

Theme: "I Feel Good..." Deadline: Friday, March 5, 2010. 4:30 pm.

Awards for top winners will be presented at 10 AM on Saturday, April 24th at Queen Ka'aumanu Center stage.

Students are to depict what they do to make themselves feel good, whether it be spending time with a special person, going to a special place or doing a fun activity.

Goal:
To have children think about ways to keep mentally healthy and make a poster illustrating things children do that help them feel good about themselves.
Concepts and Terms to introduce and discuss:
Develop activities appropriate to your class’s age level to cover curriculum areas. E.g. writing individual responses, or teacher writes what children dictate on the board; classifying and sorting responses (either as a group, in small groups or individually), practicing listening and speaking skills, experimenting with different
formats and media(if allowed)for the posters.

Mental health is “having the skills to cope with daily problems.” We all feel stress and we all have problems to deal with.

Define stress. What kind of things make you feel bad?

Keeping bad secrets.
Putting off chores.
Not telling the truth.
Bullying.
Taking things that don’t belong to you

We can deal with stress and problems in a variety of ways—what things do you do that help you feel better about yourself or about things that happen? What do I do when I have to deal with a problem? Is it the best way? Is there something better that I can do? Ideas and Suggestions:
1. Ask children what they like to do when they have spare time. Explain that they are “brainstorming”; all answers are accepted. Write them down on a big piece of paper (language). You can count all the responses when the session is done (math). Categorize—let children suggest categories (math, inquiry,language). Color code categories (organization). If inappropriate responses come up, you may want to suggest a category such as “Use for another time.”
2. Help children say or describe what they enjoy doing. Expose them to various hobbies and interests so that they develop the attitude of being a life-long learner, and it is hoped that they will not want drugs or gangs because their lives will be full of their interests, hobbies and friends.
3. Leave the paper up while children work on their posters, so that if a child seems “stuck”, you can direct their attention to all the ideas that were brought up.

POSTER CONTEST RULES
1. 12” X 18” paper. Any media. Open to K—5 students.
2. Students should complete the theme. “I Feel Good…”
to describe their posters. E.g.—I Feel Good Singing!
3. Print name, grade, school and name of teacher on the
front upper left corner.
4. Attach a typed roster of participants using your name,
grade and school as the heading.


2010 MHA Poster Contest Winners

Congratulations!
2010 Mental Health Association Wellness Poster Contest Winners
An awards ceremony will be held at Center Court stage in Queen Ka’ahumanu Shopping Center on Saturday, April 24th at 9:50 AM. Students will report to grade area signs. Please be prompt.
The winning posters will be on display the week before the Awards presentation at Maui Sporting Goods.