Mar 24, 2015 | Children, Emotional Wellbeing, Play Therapy, Resources, School, Trauma, Uncategorized
What happens when a child is clearly really struggling in school?
Their behaviour changes; maybe they get more withdrawn, or more aggressive. Maybe they stop communicating or start shouting. They become explosive or hard to reach at all.
They become unpredictable…and it can be really hard to know what to do for the best..
So here is my question…
What happens when a child is really struggling in school?
…and I am not meaning with the child.
Experience has shown me that when things get really tricky with a child in school (and it happens in the nicest of schools from time to time), it causes an increase in staff stress. It is understandable. It is hard to be with a child when you don’t know what they might do next, when you don’t understand what is making them tick…or what is making them boom.
In your school when this happens with a child maybe it is time to stop and check-in with the list below…
1. Consider that 1 child may be being dealt with by up to 8+ people… 
who may include Learning mentor, CFSW, Teacher/s, Class TA, Senco, Deputy and or Head, and then any external professionals…
For children who are already struggling this many interactions or number of adults involved directly with them, increases the amount of people they need to ‘work out’. It actually increases their sense of needing to be on alert, and keeps their nervous system activated at such a level that explosions can happen easily from one seemingly small trigger.
2. Every one of the above adults may each have an increase of their own emotions around what is happening.
Anxiety at what might happen next, fear about how they may be criticized or regarded for not being able to ‘control’ the child, anger at what other staff do or don’t do, mixed with emotional and physical exhaustion (these kind of times can start to affect sleep)… Etc etc.
Every one of these internalised emotions will change each of the adults nervous system activation. The child will sense the tension in the individuals they spend time with as well as any lack of unity or respect between the adults and again this fuels their sense of not being safe. Another way of looking at it is the way children get nervous when they know things are not ok between their parents or close family members. They don’t have to hear disagreements or shouting to know things are not all ok… And ‘things are not ok between my special adults who look after me’ also means ‘I am not safe’.
3. Each of these adults will have their own take on what needs to happen.
If there is no cohesive and shared understanding of what is going on with this child and why they are behaving like this, then each adult will start to chip in their own ideas as to what needs to happen.
Very quickly the struggling child now has several different changes happening and may or may not understand why, may or may not feel happy with the changes and may be caught in the middle of mis (or non) -communication between the various adult parties and their various new ideas for how things should be. This can so easily add to their sense of being out of control and too much change. If it doesn’t help increase their sense of safety, it will almost certainly significantly DECREASE it…leading to more of the ‘I’m struggling’ behaviour.
4. Children can be complex. They can also be incredibly straightforward. There will always be a reason for a change in behaviour.
At times like this it is so important for a school staff ‘sub-team’-around-a-child to be contained, well led, clearly guided, trained-up and brought together to work as a complete container for the child. If it is not clear to those in school as to what is going on and why, then it can be really helpful to get an outside perspective. But not one that only looks at the behaviour!
The home background may be a significant factor and if the child is not understood in light of this then the child is not understood.
The issue may be something in school.
The issue may be a combination of home and school dynamics.
The issue may be finally they are no longer able to keep a lid on their previously internalised feelings about something that happened to them a while ago (that others may have forgotten or thought didn’t affect them).
When a child is struggling it can be really easy to put all the attention and focus on the child and changing them. The big unspoken desire of the adult – collective involved is often for the behaviour to just stop. This focus may mean missing out noticing some of the key ways a child is being helped or hindered by school staff, through a difficult time. Above all, children and adults want and need to feel safe.
Qu: What needs to happen to increase that sense of safety during the school day?
Ans. child:……………………………………………………………
Ans. each key adult involved:………………………………………………………………………
Further Questions to Consider If/When this situation arises
- Is the reason for the behaviour or why the child is struggling clearly understood by anyone?
- Who are the adults in daily contact with the child & family?
- Is the behaviour understood in light of the reason by all the adults in daily contact with the child?
- How is this situation making each of the adults feel?
- Is there clarity as to how the adults and their emotions and subconscious feelings and thoughts might be affecting their own behaviour, their nervous system and the child?
- Is there clarity as to what helps this child feel safe?
- What do the key adults need to help them feel safer (ie to lower their own nervous system activation?)
- Are all adults briefed and agreed together before any new changes are brought in?
- How is the communication between these staff?
- How is the sense of respect, team and being on the same page between staff?
- Who and how and when is this sub-team around the child being supported / contained through this time?
.
Dec 11, 2014 | Children, Emotional Wellbeing, Health, Play Therapy, Resources, School, Uncategorized
Overwhelm
Burnout
Compassion fatigue
Stress
Exhaustion
Crazy
I have heard all these words in the last few weeks as I have spoken with a variety of professionals working in and with schools. So many children are struggling. The need is still huge… and that may or may not change anytime soon.
For those who resonate with this, then there are some good questions to ask yourself and really, slowly and honestly answer:-
- Why do I feel like this?
- What do I secretly want to do/ achieve?
- What can I actually offer?
- How will I know when I have made a difference?
- How many children / families will I make a difference to before I consider I have done a good enough job?
For many people – especially those that really care about children, and are really good at their jobs (teacher, therapist, family support worker, mentor, senior staff, etc etc) – the sense of “I could help so many more….” which is often internalised as “I should help so many more….” is a real threat to mental health and emotional well-being.
This gremlin lurks at the door of our subconscious and holds hands with the ever present ‘not enough’. Sometimes it stands on the shoulders of ‘professional failure’ sometimes it giggles and whispers with ‘going to be found out’.
I have been there on occasion in the past – I can relate. However, there is something I think that is really, really powerful in helping breakthrough the sense of inner (and sometimes outer) ‘I’m not doing enough’ that is often at the root of these feelings.
Asking yourself this question- ‘what is my part to play?’
We care. We want to change the world.
Some people want to save the world – or at least all the children in it…
Is it possible that we can save the world?
Is that our role?
Is that our remit?
Coming back to clarity of what each of us is called to be and do can really help. Understanding our unique purpose gives us power to know the things we are responsible for and the things we are not. We can set boundaries around our behaviour and our own gremlins and show them clearly the areas we can hold ourselves accountable in.
And we can consider the biggest story of the season – 
the one being played out all over the country at the moment – the story that some would say is actually the one that is about starting to save the world.
The Nativity.
What would have happened if the Wise men weren’t free to travel and respond to the times because they were also trying to be inn-keepers?
What if the shepherds tried to be more pensive and inwardly reflect on things as Mary did?
What would have happened if Mary or Joseph weren’t content to just make a journey and deliver a baby but felt they should also rush over the hills to spread the news to the villages?
The story is bigger than any single one of them. They each had a unique part to play.
We still do today…
In this bleak mid-winter we can all be wise (wo)men…and….(be ok to) do our part.
Jun 26, 2014 | Children, Emotional Wellbeing, Resources, School, Trauma
The last few weeks of school and most staff are counting the weeks if not days, or should I say more specifically, ‘get ups’. Time speeds up…so many extra things to get done, reports, trips, sports days, assemblies, parties (or graduation balls- still can’t get my head around the fact that 11 year-old’s go to ‘balls’ in limousines ).
And in the midst of it all, children are hurting. This is the ‘Season of Orphans (Outside of Africa)’
It is well known that as things get more off-timetable, some children thrive thinking it is the best thing ever and others really struggle with the change in routine. For them it is a change in predictability, a change in knowing what happens here, a change in how safe I feel in this place.
It has really struck me recently how for so many schools the process of children moving on up to a new class, or key stage, or school has been turned into an event and labelled. We say ‘transition’ and infer meaning of extra visits to new classrooms, social story books with photos of new desk, peg, teacher etc. Don’t get me wrong, these are all helpful activities, but still we miss the main point… The same way we say the word bereavement and miss the agony that the actual process of being bereaved often involves.
If a child has a home life that is barely ‘good enough’, if their relationships with adults there are not safe, consistent and good, then you can bet those children will probably have dared to invest themselves in ONE key relationship in their school world. That relationship is sometimes their teacher, more often it is their TA or LSA; Mrs X.
For them this time of year is nothing short of hell on earth. They realise the end of term is coming, they start to realise they have to move on, and the penny starts dropping that really, what that means is they won’t be with Mrs X any more. If you have had an experience in life when you found out a parent or special grandparent, or someone very close to you was going to die soon, you might be able to come close to the feelings of what these children are trying to navigate (although for them it is probably even more intensely).
You may think I am being over dramatic.
I’ve heard it said that “it’s really not such an issue”, that “children are resilient.”
For many children I would agree, yes they are resilient, and they will navigate transitions in school and in life with probably nothing more than some nightmares, sick feelings, worries and excitement. However for the children I work with; children who do not have such ’emotional resilience’ because they have already been hurt by life, this is the understated truth for them. Their world is different.
We say ‘transition’
What it means to these children –
I am being abandoned
I am lost without her
No one else ‘gets’ me like she does
I only feel safe when she is nearby
I feel vulnerable
I’m Angry that she is going to leave me
I am totally terrified to have to face all these changes and new things on my own
No one else is like her
Overwhelming fear
Utter heart breaking, life changing, loss
Why is this happening?
I am totally powerless…
School is supposed to be my safe place – why are they doing this to me?
Suggestions for honouring children through this time.
- Do not say to a child you know how they feel. You don’t. Show them some respect in acknowledging that you can’t imagine how they might be feeling.
- Do not expect they should be able to keep a lid on it, behave normally, or get used to it.
- Do NOT say to them, or try to persuade them it is going to be exciting, as you will totally alienate a child who is already feeling alone and not understood.
- Give them chance to actually find out and express how they are feeling…and hear it without trying to change or diminish their feelings (if you tend to need to fix things this will be harder than it sounds).
- Acknowledge this is really, really, really hard and you are genuinely sorry they have to go through it.
- Have the special TA spend time with the child making 2 duplicate memory boxes of things only the 2 of them know. The TA will keep one, the child will keep the other.
- Have the TA and child together make a list of all the special things she knows about him.
- If he thinks that it is important for his next TA to know, the TA could write a letter to the next one, with a copy for the child to keep too.
- Whatever your role in this, keep your own emotional memories of being bereaved close to mind to help you keep your honour and respect for this child and what they may be going through, real.
Jan 20, 2013 | Emotional Wellbeing, Health, Real Life Stories, Resources, testimonial, Trauma, TRE
There seem to be so many people out there who, like me, have been through the experience of a car crash and survived, but they don’t really know what to do in the first days, weeks or months to help themselves recover and heal their mind as well as body.
I believe that this is a major reason for a lot of post traumatic stress that people don’t even realise they have…yet it affects them, and those around them in all sorts of ways; moods, snappy, emotional, struggling to articulate what you mean, concentration, planning etc are just a few…
All of these are symptoms of stress that show the impact of the trauma is still sitting in the body, and it can still be there even after months or years.
People often feel like they are going mad, because they don’t understand the changes in them and their personality or ability.
The people living with them often start to wonder if their loved one is going mad too, because they don’t understand either…
Obviously not everyone who experiences a car accident will be like this – but it is amazing how many people I have spoken to, who really relate. It is actually very common – and not because of madness!
So I wrote After the Crash – eBook. I wanted to see if I could offer some practical help and encouragement to survivors and their friends, family and colleagues. Obviously my professional therapeutic training fed into it – but I purposely kept it all really simple and easy to read. I remember what it was like trying to read something after my crash!
The feedback I have had already is just humbling – even people who know someone who had a crash years ago, now seem to be understanding what they went through in a whole new way.
If you want to check it out for yourself then you can buy the e-book here
Buy now
After the Crash eBook
I just wanted to say how impressed I was with you ebook. I particularly like the way it is set out; small bite sized pieces of information – absolutely vital for those who have recently experienced trauma. I hope that one day your book will be given to everyone who presents at their GP or A&E Department after a car crash. Being given a copy of this book immediately following a collision might prevent years of unnecessary suffering.
Jan – Therapist, Supervisor, Life Coach, NLP Practitioner
Thank you so much for sharing this Claire. She (friend) burst into tears when she read it and said ‘someone really understands what she is going through’. You are an angel.
Clive – Firefighter
Thanks so much for taking the time to put all this together. Fantastic advice. I’m certain it will help my friend. Especially for all the hidden and underlying issues that you couldn’t hope to be aware of. Thank again.
S – Youth Worker
Thank you for everything… you’ve been the first person to take me seriously & understand. As you suggested I went to the GP and he signed me off for a week. I burst into tears when I sat down! My partner’s told me not to cry as it’s bad for me as it tenses me up…you get some idea of what I’m living with!! This ebook is going to help us both!!
C – Psychologist
If there is no cohesive and shared understanding of what is going on with this child and why they are behaving like this, then each adult will start to chip in their own ideas as to what needs to happen.
