Back to School Blues

-Sunita Gurung

For a child the anxiety of going back to school is very unsettling and asking him about his feelings is like asking an adult his feelings on going bungee jumping for the first time, the prospects equally gargantuan. In any given situation, a potentially new environment always poses a threat to the comfort zone which makes the children and even adults take time to adjust. Whether he is just starting preschool or entering grade, each will have their own share of nervousness. The focus here is to prepare your child both emotionally and physically so that they can have a very good beginning as well as a less overwhelming year ahead. Fortunately for a parent, there are scores of steps that you can take to make the transition less traumatic and definitely a lot of planning can work wonders.
The Preparation
As the start of the school year approaches, the very mention of it can make the preschoolers regress to their old ‘babyish’ habits or can make the elementary level kids resort to physical symptoms like stomach ache and headache. Back to school jitters even include acting aggressively like fighting with the siblings and talking back to parents. The apprehension of meeting new teachers, making new friends, going to a new school or getting separated from parents gnaws them all the time. At a time like this, it is psychologically very beneficial for the child to find their parents or at least of one of them at home at the end of the school day. But, since many working parents do not have that flexibility, make necessary arrangements so that you can be with them in the evenings and give as much time as possible. And, never miss out on the chance of letting them know that that you are always there to listen to their concerns.
Four-year-old Rehan, like every other preschooler, has difficulty going back to school after a long break but his parents Himal and Ritu make sure that they prepare him well in advance. His mother Ritu says, “We take him to a daycare centre and recreational places a few days before the school starts. That makes him happy.” He has been studying in Samdotta High School, Teenchuli, Boudha, for the past one year now. Similarly, Sangita Shakya, mother of nine-year-old Samman Man had this to share, “Every child likes to play and stay home during the holidays and don’t want their vacation to end.  I make him study a couple of hours per day during the vacation so that he is in touch with his schoolwork.  We take him out to his favorite places like the zoo as well as camping and video game shopping and to restaurants serving his favorite foods.In return, he goes to school and excels in all his works.” Samman is a third-grader at Rato Bangala School.
Address the anxieties and weed out their unknown fears
Like they say, it is the fear of the unknown that leads to anxiety. Most of the children aged seven or lower experience the initial anxiety attacks about how they will handle a social situation in a new school year. They may worry that they won’t have anyone to play with during recess and anyone to sit with during lunch hours. Or even worry about a school bully. If they were already in school last year have a talk with them and coax them to reveal any worrying situation that they might have faced. Explaining and revising strategies on how to handle bullies or other negative social situations can relieve the stress your child might be having prior to the new school year. If your child acted in an improper manner, set up guidelines based on your expectations from him along with consequences of what will happen if he doesn’t conform. Create a list of possible rewards for improved behavior.
When they refuse
You can help ease your child’s anxiety by talking to him about the activities they might be engaged in or the fun things that they might get involved in. Use them to get the child excited about the school. And, motivation helps, like Ritu shares, “I tell him that, I will come to pick you early or your grandpa will come to pick you or your friends will be alone without you or your biscuits will cry in the snack box saying, ‘Please eat me, please’’’.
“We tell him that education is important to everybody and we would not have been successful if we had not gone to school.  We also tell him that his teachers and friends will miss him dearly and he will not be a responsible person because the teacher will have to assign his job to someone else,” says Sangita.  
It helps when you talk about your own school days, the activities that you loved, the things that you feared when you were of his age and your experiences which made your school life so special. Children love to hear the childhood stories of their parents and this gets them associated with their own situation. This helps in normalizing the traumatic feelings that they might be experiencing.
What you can do
A week before
•    For the pre-schoolers, prepare the child by talking about the excitement in school and focus more on the parts of having fun, friends and learning rather than the separation from you.
• If the child is going back to higher grade, listen well without interrupting about their expectation from the new school year. Assess his last year’s performance and make it clear where he needs to concentrate.
• Plan your weeknights and let the child decide when they want to do their homework and studies, remain firm with the careless ones.
• It is very important to set rules for playtime, television and games like Playstation or PSP. Do this before the school starts so that you don’t have to deal with an upset child. Also make it clear about school night and holiday viewing.
• Put your child early to bed so that he gets habituated to an appropriate school night bedtime.
• Get your child used to the morning ritual of waking up early.
• If it is a uniform the child has to wear to school, sort out the previous year’s clothes and see what fits and what doesn’t and shop for the necessary.
• According to the need ones buy a new water bottle, lunch box or a school bag. Take your child and let him choose so that it builds up to the excitement of going back to school.
• Orient your child to the important safety information and your contact numbers and make sure she remembers. 
• Try and spend the last day or two before the school starts at home with your child.
The night before
• Sort out the school clothes, socks, shoes for the morning and make sure they are ironed, cleaned and polished and arrange them together in one place.
• If he doesn’t have to wear a uniform help him to pick out clothes and shoes for the next day.
• Put him to bed early so that he can get plenty of sleep.
• Listen to his fears if any and respond sensitively.
• Read his favorite bedtime story.
• Make a quick reminder of the rules and regulations.
On that day
• Make an effort to prepare a special breakfast for them.
• With first timers be prepared for clingy behaviors and tears. Be gentle and firm and never be embarrassed with the outbursts, neither should get emotionally blackmailed.
• Let the child get used to the environment before leaving.
• Let your child know where you will be the whole day and how to reach you.
• Even if you can’t do it every day take your child to the bus stop or better still to the school the first day.
• Bid a cheerful good bye
Going to school is an emotional experience for the parents and the children. Whether it’s the fear of the unknown or the excitement of the unseen, the anxiety or the euphoria, it all remains bottled  up inside our kids. All children will face a struggle during their academic career at some point or the other, so it becomes imperative not to view their setbacks as a threat. Their school career is full of turbulence showcasing the highs and the lows, the good and the bad moments. Encouragement and support and sensitizing their emotional graph can help a child clear the hurdles in achieving success during his formative years.