The CUES-Ed story

CUES-Ed an innovative prevention and early intervention programme rooted in evidence-based Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) and designed by our Clinical Psychologists and CBT Therapists as a result of direct feedback gathered over many years from children we have worked with in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust.

Most recently, specific feedback from young adolescents taking part in a CBT research trial highlighted that, whilst they valued the CBT intervention, they had been struggling with their difficulties for a long time and would have liked to learn mental health knowledge and coping skills from a much earlier age.

How we work

CUES-Ed works with whole classes of primary-aged children (7-10 years) to ensure they learn the basics of looking after themselves and their mental health. They are taught to understand when things are not going well and develop life-long skills to help manage any difficulties now and those that might emerge later in adolescence or adulthood.

We believe learning about mental health needs to start from an early age for it to be most effective – and we have found a way of engaging children in a creative and interactive way – with exciting, visually strong and recognisable branding and characters that promote mental health in a positive way.

We recognise the primary school community as the ideal opportunity to offer non-stigmatising universal education about mental health issues, teach children how to look after themselves emotionally and develop a shared language that enables children, teachers and parents to talk about psychological well-being.

Every stage of our development has been shaped by feedback from children and teachers, enabling us to create a programme that is accessible and acceptable for children and meets the key priorities for mental health support in schools.

What our sessions look like

Across 8 sessions, children learn cognitive strategies and simple but effective behavioural techniques through fun hands-on activities that make abstract concepts more concrete and memorable. We promote flexible and adaptive responses to difficulties, including self-regulation as well as support-seeking and recognising when extra help is needed - encouraging children to learn the skills that can help build their resilience from an early age.

The CUES-Ed workbook for children, parent newsletters, weekly home-tasks and digital development reinforce the key concepts at school and home and promote long-term retention of learning.

Our successes

CUES-Ed has worked with over 5,000 children thus far, with service evaluation showing high rates of acceptability and improvements on whole class well-being. Importantly, children identified as more vulnerable (those scoring within a clinical range on self-report measures of wellbeing/distress and emotional and behavioural difficulties) consistently show significant improvement following the CUES-Ed programme. 

This finding that ‘those who need it most, benefit most’ strengthens our overall vision to reduce stigma, raise awareness and improve the mental health resources available to children in the UK, particularly in areas of high disadvantage.

CUES-Ed is also committed to enhancing the flexibility and scope of delivery - ensuring access to the most vulnerable children including population-specific delivery to those with chronic physical illness and those with Autistic Spectrum disorder. 

Learn more about CUES-Ed by vising our site: www.cues-ed.co.uk