Listen: mental health expert offers back to school transition tips

Going back to school is an important emotional transition and does require some thought and planning for the psychological consequences. Here mental health expert Noel McDermott looks at changes parents can make to ease this, depending on the child’s age and school experience. As transition issues are a lifelong thing (change is the only constant), back to school and also holiday prep from school are great ways to develop best practice with your kids, giving them an invaluable set of skills for the rest of their lives.

Changes to these areas will likely produce transitional phenomena which are behavioural and emotional disturbances that might see A) a reversion to previous coping mechanisms (regression) or B) the development of new coping mechanisms (adaptations.) Typically coping mechanisms are designed to manage distress and some will be fine and some might be upsetting or even destructive.

Specifically, it’s important to manage the daily diary back to a ‘work’ schedule in regard to sleep, but also in regard to daily tasks. Depending on your child’s age it may be useful to add school work into their schedule. Maybe look at their school peers and have them round to work together. Also ask your child about school and how they feel about it and what they are planning to do. Avoidance increases our anxiety about a thing so the opposite reduces our anxiety about it. Graduated exposure to a triggering topic allows us to emotionally manage it better.

Aston spoke to psychotherapist and mental health expert Noel McDermott.