Helping Your Anxious Students

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For those of you who are new, welcome to the mindfulness blog! I will be posting weekly. 

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Hopefully you will find something that connects to you. Maybe you will read something that connects to you personally or that you find will help your class. My goal is to always be a support and provide information. I am always listening to new podcast, watching videos, and reading articles. If you find something don't be afraid to share. I love to learn and grow. I hope you do too!

This weeks lesson is on Anxiety and how to support students who present with anxious behaviors or express anxious thoughts.

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Starting back to school can create a lot of anxiety for students. In the video and article links below you will learn that there are genetic and environmental aspects to anxiety. Anxious children often have anxious parents.

As you watch the video or read the article think about the ways you can support your students in the first few weeks of school. How can you help an anxious student?

10 Tip for Parenting (or teaching) an Anxious Child (youtube video)

0:14 Don’t try to eliminate anxiety 1:00 Don’t avoid things just because they make a child anxious 1:35 Express positive, but realistic, expectations 2:08 Respect their feelings, but don’t empower them 2:36 Don’t ask leading questions 3:11 Don’t reinforce your child’s fears 3:34 Be encouraging 3:53 Try to keep the anticipatory period short 4:25 Think things through with your child 5:07 Try to model healthy ways of handling anxiety.

10 Tips for Parenting an Anxious Child (article on Child Mind page)

As a school we utilize the Inner Explorer program. It is an easy to use program that can help you and your students learn and explore mindfulness.

Remember that mindfulness is a great way to teach students self-management. Help them help themselves learn to manage anxiety.