Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week
Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week
The first month of 2026 has flown by and February begins with Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week. Stress and anxiety are often perceived as adult difficulties, but they touch people of all ages. Understanding emotions is a life-long lesson and it’s particularly hard to navigate for the young.
With less experience, it’s vital to provide children and young people with the support they need to navigate their emotions. The Children’s Society conducted a study which revealed that 1 in 6 children between the ages of 5 and 16 are likely to have a mental health problem, with the percentage only getting bigger each year.
Anxiety in young people can be caused by environmental factors like academic pressures, bullying, or traumatic experiences; these traumatic events can include grief, parental separation, and/or abuse. The expectation and pressure to do well in school can be detrimental to young people; 75% of adolescents say that due to the high levels of stress created by academic pressure, their grades are negatively affected.
Being a young person and a student is an incredibly busy and overwhelming period of life. There are many layers to navigate: your family, your social life, your academics, and your future. It is easy to get caught in the rush of growing up and hard to learn to slow your mind down against this rapid current… but there is time!
Let’s start with some simple coping techniques… Colouring is a calming activity that allows the child’s brain to forget their worries for a while and focus on something they enjoy. Mayo Clinic suggest that colouring engages an individual with the present; you concentrate on the lines of the drawing and direct your focus on to which colour you would like to use. Finding activities that channel a child’s concentration and improves their mindfulness is a great starting to point to dealing with intense feelings.
Journalling is also great way for children to navigate their feelings without worrying about talking to an adult. While still learning social skills, it is a big ask for a child to communicate these feelings openly, as vulnerability is a daunting subject. Writing about emotions can support self-knowledge and understanding.
That said, therapy is something that is available for all ages. Whether a child wishes to seek help within their school or an external organisation, talking is an effective technique for coping with stress and untangling those chaotic, stressful thoughts. The spoken word can be like a jigsaw puzzle: you can’t figure out the picture until you have all the pieces. The more words spoken… the less missing pieces there are.
“You’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.” ~ A.A. Milne from Winnie the Pooh
Children’s voices are just as important as adults and giving them a chance to talk about their struggles, supplying them with tools to figure out these feelings, and teaching them that it’s okay to not be certain about feelings is a critical element of personal development.