Introducing the most brilliant way to overcome childhood anxiety.

Please read this if you are a teacher, parent or coach because the solution to childhood anxiety is easier than you think.

Dear Parenting Toolbox reader,

Today’s Parenting Toolbox’s main article is much longer than normal. I take pride in tight, bright, and right articles, so I edit ruthlessly, chopping out words, sentences and whole paragraphs. But as this is such an important topic I haven’t been as tight in my editing as normal. Rest assured, it’s bright and right. Now read on.

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Like an out-of-control plague, childhood anxiety is running rampant through families and schools across the developed world.

Since the release of my book Anxious Kids (co-authored with Dr. Jodi Richardson) in 2019, anxiety has continued to increase among children and teens.

The Covid pandemic and the rise of social media are partly to blame. But this anxious generation has been decades in the making.

A tragedy in three acts.

American Psychologist Johnathan Haidt describes Childhood Anxiety as a tragedy in three acts. Act 1, a breakdown in local communities, began in the 1960s, which led to Act 2, the reduction in play-based childhood that began in the 1980s. This reduction accelerated in the 1990s and 2000s as children moved indoors and away from unsupervised play.

In the 2010s, Act 3 began with the widespread use of smartphones and the increase in screen-based childhoods. Children spent more time indoors, glued to screens, which decreased their engagement in physical risk-taking activities. This also meant they missed out on the psychological benefits that come from facing and overcoming risks.

Additionally, children's resilience declined, and fear became more prevalent as children overestimated danger and underestimated their ability to cope. It became normal for children to catastrophize.

Anxiety has a known genetic link, but the environment a child grows up in, and the education they receive also have a significant impact.

It can make anxious personality types more fearful and can trigger anxiety in calm, easy-going children. Even kids who are naturally less prone to arousal can experience high levels of anxiety when they are in an environment that does not support their developmental needs.

This is not the place to outline the type of environment that meets children's real development needs—that’s an article for another day. But this scene I saw recently offers a snapshot. Allow me to paint the picture.

It’s an 8-degree wet, windy day on a Victorian beach facing the wintry might of the Southern Ocean. I’m in the water swimming when I spot a long line of 20+ four- and five-year-olds walking along the sand. The kids, wearing a uniform of red slickers, blue rain hats, and rain-proof pants, were heading to the nearby rock pools, presumably to explore. They were accompanied by two hardy teachers and two even hardier parent helpers.

Despite the incredibly inclement weather, the kids stayed on the beach rather than going indoors. I watched as they turned over rocks, picked up and replaced shells, and gathered in small groups around adults to look more closely at the specimens they’d collected.

From a long-term resilience perspective, where would you rather your child be—at the beach, in the cold and wet, safely exploring, or sitting in a warm classroom?

I’m hoping you chose the former, as the lesson for these children about physical and psychological hardiness is immense and long-lasting.

NOTE: The preschool children's appearance at the beach was no coincidence. It took place in the beachside town where the author lives. The town’s preschool children spend one day a week at the beach all year long, regardless of the weather. This program reconnects kids with the outdoors, develops resilience, and builds psychological strength. The town’s residents take great pride in the program, the preschool, the teachers, and the children.

What doesn’t overcome anxiety.

Before we look at solutions to the anxiety epidemic that’s plaguing families and schools, let’s look at what doesn’t work. First, it’s crucial to acknowledge that anxiety is incredibly hard to manage.

As someone who has dealt with anxiety for a long time, I can attest that some days you win the battle, but the war still rages in the background. 

Avoidance

People with anxiety are essentially battling against evolutionary forces that are designed to keep us safe. When we encounter a spider, our bodies react the same way as they would if facing a lion, tiger, or any other predator. This fight-or-flight response has been essential for human survival, but it doesn't distinguish between different types of threats. As a result, we react in a similar manner to all perceived dangers; whether it's a predator, a spider, or giving a speech, we avoid them.

But avoidance is a mirage. A child may feel temporary relief from anxiety by not going to a birthday party, but those anxious feelings will return when the next party invitation arrives.

Distraction

You can distract a child from his worries for a limited time, but they will return. Anxious thoughts keep coming back because nature designed them to be "sticky". Your ancestors wouldn't have survived those predators if they lost focus and forgotten them. The evolutionary survival mechanism means those anxious thoughts will keep returning.

Exposure

The gradual exposure therapy, which involves gradually exposing children to the things they fear, is effective. However, it is quite challenging to implement. Camilo Ortes, a well-known clinical psychologist specializing in childhood anxiety, reports that many therapists are reluctant to use this therapy because it initially intensifies anxiety before helping to reduce it. As a parent and teacher-administered intervention, exposure therapy is out of the question.

What will overcome anxiety.

Imagine a solution to childhood anxiety that leverages exposure theory and is enjoyable for kids. It sounds too good to be true, but it’s not.

The solution is to give kids a mega-dose of childhood independence through play, exploration, and greater freedom. Before I explain how that works, it’s important to acknowledge three obstacles that have emerged in recent decades. First, parents spend more time with their children than ever before. Second, children are taking fewer risks. Third, children play less with each other than in the past.

These three reasons together have contributed to plummeting independence. Less independence is at the heart of childhood anxiety.

It will continue to erode childhood confidence unless we change tracks. More on this later.

How lack of Independence contributes to anxiety.

Childhood confidence is not widely discussed, but it’s an antidote to anxiety. Yes, kids need encouraging adults in their lives, and they need to experience success in similar environments to feel confident when facing a new situation. But to have inner confidence, kids need exposure to situations where they experience HFDDDs: Hardships, Frustrations, Discomfort, Disappointment and (mild) Danger.

There are many things that thwart children experiencing HFDDDs, such as indoor childhoods, adults solving children’s problems or stepping in and rescuing them before they experience frustration and disappointment.

In contrast, independence-building is a great way for children to get experiences that expose them to HFDDD’s and, inadvertently, inoculate them against anxiety.

How Independence works.

Independence reduces anxiety by exercising many of the psychological muscles needed to counteract anxiety. Most importantly, it builds confidence by exposing individuals to real-life situations unrelated to their fears. For example, if someone is afraid of the dark, they could be asked to walk to the shop to get some milk.

Overall, exposure to new situations involving challenges helps build resilience, confidence, resourcefulness, flexibility, and the ability to take smart risks.

The many faces of Independence.

In my book 2017 book Spoonfed Generation: How to Raise Independent Children, I outlined 5 types of independence:

• Capability (Looking after yourself): e.g. dressing yourself

• Outside (Expanding Horizons): e.g. catching a bus

• Taking responsibility (Problem-solving): e.g. allowing a child to figure out what to do when late for school.

• Risk-taking (Developing autonomy): e.g. letting a young child decide what to wear.

• Inside (Helping): e.g. allowing a child to cook a meal.

These five different types of independence involve tasks that expose kids to Hardships, Frustrations, Discomfort, Disappointment, and (mild) Danger.

How to administer a mega-dose of Independence to kids

Consider every instance of childhood independence as a Solo Mission. This means that kids should handle things on their own with minimal adult intervention, except for some teaching, remote monitoring, and empathetic coaching.

There are many ways to approach these Solo Missions with kids. However, this tried and true approach is a good starting point for parents:

1. Discuss the concept of Solo Mission as a family.

2. Encourage children to devise their own Solo Missions to accomplish on a regular basis – daily/every other day/weekly.

3. Kids keep a record in a journal outlining what they did, how they felt before and after, and what they learned.

4. Remember to schedule regular family meetings to discuss solo missions and independent endeavours.

5. Use the Five Types of Independence as a guide. Some kids may need more of one type and less of another.

6. Conduct a 30 Day Independence Challenge in which kids choose a different Solo Mission to master each day or every other day. At the conclusion, celebrate as a family.

7. Finally, this is the clincher. Join your children in identifying some Solo Missions for you to conquer. Taking part in this challenge will send a powerful message to your kids.

How schools can help.

As a former teacher and speaker with a 40-year history of working in schools on four continents, I know building children’s self-reliance is in a teacher’s DNA.

Teachers don’t want another societal problem to solve, but in the spirit of promoting independence and reducing anxiety, please consider the following ideas if you work in a school:

• Tell parents the story of independence consistently and through different media. It can't be retold too much, just in different ways.

• Develop proprietary language for your school focused on fostering independence, especially centred around the Five Types of Independence.

• Conduct a 5-week Independence Challenge with parents in your school.

• Spend time focusing on and expressing different aspects of Independence-building (Value of the Week, etc.).

Finally…..

I’ve written extensively about how to help kids manage anxiety, but it’s better to cut it off at its source by promoting independence in kids from the earliest possible age.

You know what independence looks like, how it works, and how to implement it.

Now it’s time for action before the tidal wave of childhood anxiety becomes a tsunami.

Whether you’re a parent, teacher or coach, you can play a vital role in building real independence in kids and inoculating them against the curse that is childhood anxiety.

Thanks for completing this poll. If you answered Definitely Yes, please message me and tell me about the ideas you’ll use and why. I’d also love to hear from readers who said Definitely No.

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Parenting Toolbox Weekly Words of Wisdom

The great British psycholgist John Bowlby once said, “Life is a series of daring explorations from a secure base.” I agree and would add. “If kids are to thrive they need a secure family base and opportunties to explore, experiment and discover.”

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A Note for Teachers: A number of principals and teachers have contacted me recently asking if they can share the text in Parenting Toolbox with their communities. It’s great to know that these articles are helping. Please share the entire newsletter with your school communty by social media or using the share button (anyone in this newsletter will do), which means putting in individual email addresses. If you want access to the text only then please message me to find out how to make this happen. Also, please message about how I can help parents in your school community.