How Education Professionals can Support Children and Young People with Anxiety

Some anxious children are easy to spot: tearful, reluctant to come in, complaining of stomach aches. Others are the life and soul of the playground and hide it well. Either way, most classes now have a few children who are really struggling.

Two former teachers who spent 20 years as behaviour advisers for a local authority share what they've seen work. You'll learn a four-step emotion coaching script: notice the feeling, normalise it, hold the boundary, then solve the problem together. There are also calming techniques children can use by themselves, like blowing out five finger "candles" one at a time.

The aim is a class where talking about worry is normal. In one Year 5 class, when the teacher admitted she felt anxious, every hand went up with a strategy for her to try.