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The new year signals a return to school for many kids and beginning school for others. It can be a time of angst for younger children.
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“Until the change becomes familiar and predictable we can struggle and feel anxious,” says parenting author, Maggie Dent. “For our youngest children it’s helpful to have practised parents going and coming back – even playing hide and seek around the house can help build this. Being honest and telling them you are leaving and will be coming back is better than doing the ‘disappear’ trick as they need to be able to trust you.”
Maggie says it’s useful to explain to kids that new things, places and people can also make adults feel a little unsettled. She has the following advice for parents whose children may be anxious about starting school:
- As they leave home always place a kiss from one parent in the right hand and the other parent in the left … it is also magic and stays there all day.
- Practise imagining you sending them rainbows of love from your heart at recess and lunch and ask them to send one to you when they miss you.
- Put a really small stuffed toy – maybe smelling of your perfume, dad’s after-shave or with a lipstick kiss – in the bottom of the backpack so they don’t feel so separate and alone.
- Teach them how to take three big breaths and breathe out the butterflies hiding in their tummy or gently rub their tummy telling the butterflies they are safe.