Letting kids recover instead of making them try and ‘catch up’

Letting kids recover instead of making them try and ‘catch up’

As Australia’s second year since COVID-19 arrived draws to a close, there’s a very different feeling within the community to this time last year. Last year we had little idea we’d have another year of such pandemic-interrupted lives. Children and young people, particularly in Victoria and NSW, have missed a lot of school.

While it’s tempting to try and catch children and young people up on everything they’ve missed, we need to help them recover first and foremost.

We don’t understand the full extent of the mental health and developmental impact the pandemic has had on children and young people. It’s obvious that it’s taken a significant toll in the short-term, but the medium and long-term impacts are to be seen.

There are some things we do know that can help.

1. Children and young people thrive on routines and rhythms

Routines feel safe, predictable and regulating. COVID-19 has disrupted our routines dramatically and dysregulated most of us to some extent. Children, young people and their families are generally exhausted from the stress of constantly re-adapting to new ways of doing things such as online schooling or going to school when their friends and regular teacher aren’t there. School holidays can be a time when all routine goes out the window, but there’s good reason to try and keep, or introduce, if necessary, some of those rhythms and routines.

Advice:

• Try to rebuild some of those rhythms now and keep them going through the summer holidays. The transition back to school next year will be easier if you can.
• Start off small if need be. Regular bed and wake-up times are a great place to start, even if they are later than they would be during school term.
• Aim to build a regular and predictable rhythm to their day during the school holidays, such as a walk together at roughly the same time each day.
• You don’t need to fill the day with activities but try to regularly do some things together with them like preparing and eating dinner.
• Where and when you need to break those rhythms, tell children and young people what’s happening and why. Let them ask questions and make them feel involved.

2. They might be a bit behind developmental milestones, but that’s to be expected

Some children will be behind in some of their developmental milestones. Some will have regressed socially. Some might be much clingier, and others will have forgotten how to share or take turns. Young people might feel more socially awkward or out of place. They’ve missed out on so many of their social interactions, time spent with other adults outside the house, their classmates and playing with friends. They can finally see all these people in person again, but it may seem foreign, awkward or uncomfortable to lots of them. Some children and young people are embracing the return to normalcy, but others are really struggling.

Advice:

• Go slowly. Just because you can see lots of people again doesn’t mean you have to.
• Make play dates shorter. Briefer and more casual social activities are easier to tolerate.
• Smaller groups will be easier for kids that are socially anxious.
• Offer to pick-up young people early if they aren’t feeling comfortable somewhere.
• Encourage children and young people to share how they are feeling (if they want to) by checking in with them regularly and casually. Listen and empathise with them without judgment or needing to jump to solutions if they’re struggling.
• Don’t underestimate the healing benefits of just doing things together with children and young people. Just watching a movie on TV or walking the dog together is a meaningful way of connecting.
• While children can slip behind developmentally in some circumstances or when they feel disconnected, they can also leap ahead when they feel engaged again.
  

3. Academic learning may have suffered

Some children and young people have enjoyed doing school online from home. But many have struggled, and their parents and carers may be worried they have lost learning. Some kids will also be worried about all the school they’ve missed.

Advice:

• Reassure your child that their schools, teachers and other educators will get them back on track.
• Affirm to yourself and your children that they will have learnt different, but no less valuable, things during the pandemic.
• Don’t push children to spend all holidays studying to ‘catch up’. It’s counterproductive. They’re exhausted too and need a holiday so they can start fresh next year.
• Remember that a child or young person who is stressed will struggle to activate their prefrontal cortex (‘thinking brain’) – meaning that trying to force a child to learn new skills when they’re too tired or distressed won’t work.
• If you do decide to do some structured learning over the holidays, do it in short and fun bursts. Just 10 mins every couple of days is great.
• Do the learning with them. It will enhance the connection and relationship between you. Yelling at them to go and study in their room alone is very unlikely to achieve anything positive.
• If you don’t understand what they are learning, ask them to explain it to you, because that will also help them learn.

4. Pausing school… again

Most children and young people have been back in the classroom for all of Term 4 and have been experiencing something resembling a more ‘normal’ routine. But with the school year nearly over, this is about to change again. We can see this as another disruption to schooling, but we can also see it as a chance to reset and start afresh. It’s been a long and hard last two years for all of us.

Lots of schools are trying to catch up on things like excursions, sports days, camps, book weeks, celebration events, swimming lessons etc., before the year ends. These events, even when they are enjoyable, are exhausting for children.

Advice:

• Recognise how tired and stressed children and young people are.
• They’re likely returning to things they couldn’t do, such as play dates or hanging out with mates, after-school sport and extra-curricular activities. While they might be wanting to do all these things, they may also find them overwhelming.
• Be kind, patient and expect them to have to get used to it again.
• Transitions and changes are hard. Explain what’s going to happen, how long you’re staying somewhere and give kids the choice to opt-out. You may need to adjust your plans to accommodate their ability to tolerate situations as they readjust.
• Surprises can be scary or hard for lots of children, so give them a heads up that you’ll be leaving the playground/go to bed/be ready to leave the house in 10 minutes, then again in 5 minutes, so they can prepare for the change.
• Accept that in lots of families there will be more frayed tempers, tantrums, meltdowns and tears than you might normally expect. Try and remove yourself temporarily if you feel you’re not able to remain calm.
• Make sure everyone gets enough downtime and sleep.

5. Be kind to yourself

The last couple of years have been a rollercoaster. Look after yourself and practice self-care. Ask for help where you need it and take time out on your own when you can. If you’re not coping, then you’re not going to be able to help the children and young people in your life recover either.

Advice:

• Take time for yourself if, and when, you can.
• Play with kids and pets and be a bit silly.
• Do things you enjoy – go for a swim at the pool, read a trashy novel, write down a couple of things that went well every day, spend time on a hobby you enjoy, have a long bath or go see a movie. If you don’t have someone to look after your children and can’t afford babysitting, approach a friend and offer to look after their kids and then they can look after yours so you can both take some time out from parenting.
• If you feel like you’re not coping, reach out and ask for help from your doctor or someone you can trust.
• BeyondBlue (1300 224 636) and Lifeline (13 11 14) are available 24 hours a day to provide crisis support if you need it.

While every family’s experience has been and continues to be different, the best thing we can all do is try to maintain healthy emotional connections with the children and young people in our lives. Without strong relationships with the adults caring for them, children and young people can feel like they don’t have anyone who really cares about them. And that’s much worse for a child’s development than missing a few terms of school.

Connection, caring and compassion is what we all need right now as we process the collective trauma of the past two years and prepare for what will hopefully be a more stable, routine and positive year in 2022.

*The names of the children and the families we work with have been changed, and models are used in our photographs to protect their identities.

Berry Street’s Take Two program is a therapeutic service helping to address the mental health impacts on children of the trauma they have experienced from abuse, neglect or adverse experiences. At Take Two we see who the child is, not just the behaviour.

We use clinical frameworks, neurobiological research and evidence-informed approaches to repair family relationships and develop networks of caring adults that focus on what the child needs.

Take Two can provide specialist clinical consultancy services, including training and reflective practice for other organisations.Contact us for more information.