💜 School Refusal - A Practical Approach
- Stay calm. If your child sees that you’re worried, stressed or frustrated, it can make your child’s anxiety worse.
- Plan for a calm start to the day by having morning and evening routines. For example, get kits, lunches and school bags ready the night before, get your child to have a shower or bath in the evening, and nurture healthy bed time routines. Practical routines are powerful external structures that sound simple, yet the effect can be very calming.
- Praise your child when they show brave behaviour, like getting ready for school. For example, you could say, ‘I know this is hard for you, but I think it’s great that you’re giving it a go. Well done for being brave’. You're validating that these feelings are hard, and also encouraging them with positive mental representations of success.
- Make your home ‘boring’ during school hours so that you don’t accidentally reward your child for not going to school. This means little or no TV or video games and so on. Support your child with school work if they stay home so that they know learning continues as a priority.
- Get someone else to drop your child at school, if you can. Children sometimes cope better with separation at home rather than at the school gate.
- You can sometimes consider motivators. For example, if your child goes regularly, they could earn bonus technology time, a special outing with a parent, or their favourite meal for dinner. Looking forward to fun family routines and habits can be motivating.
- Show your child that you understand. For example, you could say, ‘I can see you’re worried about going to school. I know it’s hard, but it’s important for you to go. Your teacher and I will help you if you have questions’.
- Use clear, calm statements that let your child know you expect them to go to school. Say ‘when’ rather than ‘if’. For example, you can say, ‘When you’re at school tomorrow ...’ instead of ‘If you make it to school tomorrow...'
- Show that you believe your child can go to school by saying positive and encouraging things. For example, ‘You’re showing how brave you are by going to school, I like that you are bouncing back from some worries, I like that you are using flexible thinking to try new things, etc.’. This will build your child’s self-confidence and internal scripts for cognitive flexibility.
Remember, it takes time to shape habits. We can work together as a team between home and school to support your child.
Warm regards,
Valerie DeGraw
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