Social, emotional and mental health (SEMH) team
The Social Emotional and Mental Health Team (SEMH) is skilled and experienced specialist teachers and practitioners, who provide support to schools and colleges in meeting the needs of children and young people experiencing SEMH related challenges.
The team offer a fully traded service, meaning that schools and colleges are able to purchase support following referral.
What do we do?
At our core, is the commitment to supporting children and young people who are experiencing problems at school, due to SEMH difficulties, to access learning, improve their relationships within school and beyond, whilst developing emotional literacy and a sense of positive well being.
Children and young people are supported in many different ways, depending upon their need, individually or as part of a small group. The team meet with staff, parents, carers and other professionals involved in supporting your child or young person to assist in developing plans and coordinated approaches.
We also offer a range of support for staff within schools and colleges, which includes advice, consultation and training.
How do we do it?
With parental permission, schools refer individual pupils to the SEMH team.
Once a child or young person is accepted onto the SEMH team caseload, the link teacher will contact the school to arrange a visit to start the assessment process. The clear identification of needs will take place, in collaboration with the school, which will result individualised recommendations in the form of strategies that school will be able to put into place.
The assessment process will give insight into the child or young person’s experience of SEMH difficulties, as well as the way that they are impacted. Individualised recommendations may also take the form of direct work from a member of the team, on a one to one or small group basis. This work may include: anger management sessions, understanding and coping with anxiety and low self esteem, developing emotional language and understanding what happens in our bodies when we feel overwhelmed, work based upon Cognitive Behavoural approaches.
For further information the team can be contacted at semh@leicester.gov.uk