Management Information Sheet

With 1 in 50 people in the UK estimated to have an eating disorder, you will have pupils that are directly or indirectly being affected.

What is an eating disorder?

Eating disorders are serious mental illnesses that involve disordered eating behaviour.

Anyone can develop one. Irrespective of age, gender, ethnicity or background, and young people are at particular risk.

An eating disorder might mean limiting the amount of food eaten, eating very large quantities of food at once, getting rid of food eaten through unhealthy means (e.g. purging, laxative misuse, fasting, or excessive exercise), or a combination of these behaviours. It's important to remember that eating disorders are not all about food itself, but about feelings. The way the person interacts with food may make them feel more able to cope or may make them feel in control.

You can find out more about eating disorders here.

How would we know if a pupil has an eating disorder?

Teachers and staff in schools and settings are well placed to spot the early signs of an eating disorder. You can read about the signs of individual eating disorders here.

There are some signs that may become especially apparent in the school environment, which might include:

• Social isolation
• Avoiding eating around others
• Difficulty concentrating
• Tiredness
• Irritability
• Low confidence and self-esteem
• Anxiety
• Obsessive and/or rigid behaviour
• Perfectionism, including setting unreasonably high personal standards and increased concern about making errors
• Excessive neatness
• Decreasing handwriting size
• Self-harm
• Changes to weight - either gaining or losing weight, or experiencing fluctuating weight

Teachers may notice increased social isolation, and concentration levels will diminish if eating is very restricted. Higher functions such as abstract thought get 'switched off' if insufficient fuel is reaching the brain.

Where can we get training for our staff?

To coincide with National Eating Disorders Awareness Week, we are providing all Norfolk schools with a fully-funded webinar delivered by Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust, Under 18 Eating Disorder Service, supported by Norfolk Schools Early Intervention and Prevention Team. Supporting Pupils with Eating Disorders | Norfolk Services for Schools

Attendance at this workshop will support schools and education settings to:

• Develop understanding of Eating Disorders
• Know what to teach through RSHE, providing an age and stage appropriate preventative curriculum, with resources.
• Be able to identify early warning signs
• Provide early targeted support for pupils and their families
• Know when and how to refer pupils for specialist support

Beat also run training courses for teachers at both primary and secondary school level to help them support pupils with eating disorders.

What should we be teaching in the curriculum?

The statutory Relationships Education, Relationships and Sex Education and Health Education curriculum includes topics related to eating disorders:

By the end of primary, all pupils should know:

• How to recognise and talk about their emotions, including having a varied vocabulary of words to use when talking about their own and others' feelings
• Where and how to seek support (including recognising the triggers for seeking support), including whom in school they should speak to if they are worried about their own or someone else's mental wellbeing or ability to control their emotions (including issues arising online
• It is common for people to experience mental ill health. For many people who do, the problems can be resolved if the right support is made available, especially if accessed early enough.
• What constitutes a healthy diet (including understanding calories and other nutritional content).
• The characteristics of a poor diet and risks associated with unhealthy eating (including, for example, obesity and tooth decay) and other behaviours (e.g. the impact of alcohol on diet or health)
• By the end of secondary, all pupils should know:
• How to talk about their emotions accurately and sensitively, using appropriate vocabulary
• How to recognise the early signs of mental wellbeing concerns.
• The similarities and differences between the online world and the physical world, including: the impact of unhealthy or obsessive comparison with others online (including through setting unrealistic expectations for body image)
• The characteristics and evidence of what constitutes a healthy lifestyle, maintaining a healthy weight, including the links between an inactive lifestyle and ill health, including cancer and cardiovascular ill-health.
• How to maintain healthy eating and the links between a poor diet and health risks, including tooth decay and cancer

Use our newly launched RSHE whole-school approach toolkit and join our primary or secondary RSHE Bootcamps to embed an effective provision of RSHE in your school.

PSHE Association: Teaching about mental health and emotional wellbeing.

Free guidance here
Free lessons here
PSHE Association members can access additional KS1-4 lessons here

Mentally Healthy Schools and Anna Freud: Teaching about healthy coping strategies.

Two free toolkits of resources for children and young people, helping them build healthy coping strategies and learn about unhealthy ones here

Do you need signposting to information, advice, guidance?

Signposting for staff: Get help for myself - Beat (beateatingdisorders.org.uk)
Worried about a pupil - Beat (beateatingdisorders.org.uk)
Worried about a colleague - Beat (beateatingdisorders.org.uk)
Worried about a friend or family member - Beat (beateatingdisorders.org.uk)

Signposting for pupils: Eating problems | Childline
What To Do If You're Experiencing Eating Problems | YoungMinds

Signposting for families: Eating Disorders (justonenorfolk.nhs.uk)
Worried about a friend or family member - Beat (beateatingdisorders.org.uk)