Could one Pandemic help another???
We all know what anxiety feels like! But did you know how anxiety felt when you were a child? If you ask me, we are living in a time when anxiety is the Pandemic that children are fighting. When I started teaching 19 years ago, we did not see anxiety in kids as much as we do today. However, we also did not feel the intense academic rigor of today.
Just 2 years ago in Ohio there was a local school district that mourned the loss of 6 students due suicide in only a 6 month period. Now, there are many factors that play a role in childhood anxiety but I believe that academic rigor plays a role in this as well. Kids are not gaining a love for learning due to the rigor of their day. In the article Burned out in Kindergarten by Elizabeth Mulvahill, she explains just that! Another article called Are Acedemic Demands and Overscheduling Stressing Kids Out? published by Today’s Parent (kids health) explains the same idea!
Education has changed drastically in the last 20 years. Kindergarteners were 1/2 day learners in public schools and their learning was play based. They learned how to hold their pencil, sit on a rug, get in a line, how to treat others, manners, nursery rhymes, letters and sounds, counting and numbers, and let’s not forget the ever famous Letter People (my personal favorite)!!! LEARNING WAS SO MUCH FUN!!!!
Today parents are stressed if their children do not know their letters and know how to read when entering kindergarten. The students are expected to have stamina for 6.5 hours, when developmentally many still require a nap! They begin their year crying for mommy and end the year writing paragraphs and adding and subtracting….phew, that gives me anxiety just writing about this!
How can we reduce anxiety in kids???
LET THEM PLAY! Play games, puzzles, puppets, dress up, go outside, practice mindfulness, slow down your pace, love them…really love them! Teach them to worry more about being a good person and less about their achievements. Show them grace so that they can show others grace. Show yourself grace in front of them!
There are many ways that teachers try to tackle this in their classrooms. Mindfulness and Growth Mindset are two buzz words out there right now! We all need it and should practice it! Click here to get a free resource listing of the top 50 Mindfulness resources for kids from Big Life Journal. This journal is an amazing tool that can be purchased online. My son has one and it has drastically reduced his stress. Becoming aware of what you are capable of and spending time focusing on it can really help during stressful times. I highly recommend this journal!
Another way to slow down is yoga! Check out this link to a youtube video that shows kids ways to focus on mindfulness through yoga! These are fun and hold their attention. Best part…you will like it too!
My point… Could the COVID-19 pandemic play a role in reducing anxiety in kids???
For the first time, we are stuck at home and given the time to slow down. Parents at home ARE NOT TEACHERS and ARE NOT ADMINISTRATORS in most cases. Could this time at home, going on virtual field trips, playing in their backyards, being with family, being able to nap if needed, and being away from the rigor of a day in school reduce their anxiety levels. Maybe slowing down and not feeling the pressure to perform will help this cause. Maybe this different and organic way of learning will help nurture their minds and develop their character!
Even better, maybe this time at home will provide administrators and educational policy makers an opportunity to see that kids will still learn!!! I’m hoping that this will have an impact on our education system! I’m hoping that administrators and educational decision makers will see that there is so much more to learning than test scores! There is so much more to children than how much they are able to retain in a year of school and prove on a test. These kids need to love learning, if we want them to succeed! My hope is that we will all see that if we take the time to slow down, the reduction of anxiety will actually help kids to learn more!