The new academic year is just around the corner, a time where children’s anxiety can build ahead of the shift in routine, increased pace of life and pressure they feel at school, both academically and socially.
A certain amount of back-to-school nerves is normal and to be expected, but excessive anxiety around it isn’t.
In a survey of over 1000 children and young people conducted earlier this year by the youth mental health charity stem4, more than a quarter (28pc) of 12-to-18-year-olds said they have avoided going to school or college so as not to feel anxious. When they are in education, more than eight in ten say they avoid certain situations so as not to feel anxious. Reasons that they cite include:
- unhealthy friendships (28pc)
- contact with bullies (26pc)
- academic pressures due to lost work in the pandemic (19pc)
- contact with teachers they don’t get on with (17pc)
- and a negative and hostile school culture (13pc)
The pressures young people face can differ widely depending on their age.
Over the school holidays younger children potentially don’t communicate with their peers for six weeks, which can heighten their apprehension about seeing schoolmates again, whereas for teenagers that communication hasn’t stopped, it’s just moved online.
Either way, the prospect of returning to those face-to-face situations can cause excessive anxiety in that lead up to the first day back.
Kate Frost, service manager at Norfolk and Waveney Mind’s REST hub in Norwich, shares her experience balancing her children’s technological connectivity over the school holidays.
“There isn’t any off-switch from being connected to everything all the time, meaning there’s no time over the holiday to just stop. And sometimes a little thing that happened during their last term turns into arguments online. Back-to-school means coming face-to-face with that person or group of people again, which can be scary.
“As a parent it’s really hard to navigate that, when for them to not have access would be like saying ‘You can’t speak to anybody for six weeks’, which doesn’t seem fair.”
In addition, children in the upper years of secondary school face exam and assessment pressure as soon as they return from the school holidays.
Knowing everything their children are facing, the start of the new school year becomes an anxious time for parents too. A survey from NHS England in 2023 showed about one in five children and young people aged eight to 25 years had a probable mental disorder, which can create a whole other set of complexities that parents have to navigate.
Kate explains, “It can feel really difficult to be in that space as a parent and can feel really isolating. If you have a child with some form of mental health issue, I think it’s about building that relationship with the school, the pastoral support team and the teacher.”
While every child is different and will express anxiety differently, Kate has shared some markers parents can look out for and some of the ways she tries to manage her children’s anxiety.
“When things get very quiet or very loud, or you feel there’s something secretive or hidden going on, that can be a sign. You know your kids. Anything that’s out of their normal range of quirkiness is a sign to look out for. Another is when that sense of fun and joy starts to go. And sleepless nights can often indicate high anxiety over previous conversations and ruminating on something.
“The back-to-school anxiety starts for us around the three-week mark in the summer holidays. We get to the halfway point and my seven-year-old is already asking, ‘How long until the school holidays end?’ We manage it by:
- Going through what we’re doing the rest of the holiday so they’ve got those markers to count down.
- Making sure that they’re prepared. For my youngest it’s: do you have your bag and drinks bottle? For my middle and my eldest it’s: do you need to talk to me about anything before you go back? Do you know what you’re doing on the first day?
- Breaking things down. Our life is essentially six-week blocks of time, we don’t look further than that. And if we can’t get to six weeks, we’ll get to the end of the day.
- Validating them, acknowledging that it is really hard and asking what they need. Are they venting, looking for problem-solving, or wanting advice? Nine times out of 10 they just want to tell you.
- Gently starting to remind them towards the end of the holidays that things are going to shift, and being communicative about it.
- Checking in once they have settled in. I don’t ever ask, how was your day? Because I won’t get anything from that. So, I ask things like, who did you sit next to today at lunchtime?
What was the kindest thing somebody did for you today? It gets slightly trickier when they’re older, because they’re not quite so keen to give you that information.
But, if I know they’ve got a particularly tricky situation – lessons/friendships, I’ll ask about this while we are focussing on something else or when side by side to reduce the pressure to answer.”
For general resources and information about NWM’s other services, visit norfolkandwaveneymind.org.uk or call 0300 330 5488. For urgent mental health support, call NHS 111 option 2.
Details of the stem4 survey: https://stem4.org.uk/children-and-young-people-more-worried-than-ever-about-going-to-school-feb-24-press-release/
Details of the NHS England survey: https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/mental-health-of-children-and-young-people-in-england/2023-wave-4-follow-up
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