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Supporting children and students with anxiety

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    This page outlines how education staff, care services, parents, guardians, and health professionals work together to manage a child or student with anxiety in education and care settings.

    About anxiety

    Anxiety is more than just feeling stressed or worried. While anxious feelings are a common response to a stressful situation, they usually pass once the situation has passed, or the stressor is removed. When anxious feelings don't go away, happen without any particular reason, or make it hard to cope with daily life, it may be a sign of an anxiety condition.

    Find out more about anxiety including:

    • signs and symptoms
    • treatments
    • support strategies.

    Health support plans and agreements

    If a child or student has anxiety, the education or care service should refer to health support planning for children and students in education and care settings to ensure that the appropriate plans and agreements are in place. This is in addition to the anxiety-specific plans and agreements listed on this page.

    Support plan

    A sensory overview support plan – HSP431 (DOC 389 KB) may be developed by education and care staff in collaboration with the child or young person and their family. This can provide an understanding of the sensory issues and support the development of strategies to minimise sensory seeking or avoidance.

    Behavioural support strategies

    Regulation scale to identify behaviour

    The regulation scale – HSP432 (DOC 182KB) is a tool that education and care staff can use to help children to identify:

    • what is happening around them that is impacting on their anxiety
    • what signals their body is giving them
    • ways to respond to their body’s signals that will help them manage their anxiety.

    The regulation scale guide – HSP432a (PDF 502 KB) supports the development of the regulation scale. It can be used with interoception activities to help the child develop meaningful interoception skills.

    Some examples of completed regulation scales include:

    Understanding student behaviour

    The understanding behaviour template – HSP433 (DOCX 449 KB) helps to identify why behaviours are occurring how to change it.

    The template can be used to:

    • identify possible triggers for the concerning behaviour
    • document what is happening when the behaviour is most likely to occur
    • compare when the behaviour is least or most likely to occur
    • help you identify the purpose of the behaviour
    • identify teaching environments best suited to the young person.

    Educational adjustments

    Educational adjustments support students on an individualised basis. Adjustments should be determined by the parents and education and care service and documented in the health support agreement.

    Examples of adjustments may include:

    • working on difficult concepts in the morning
    • developing creative presentations of course material
    • having games that develop working memory as part of the daily routine
    • interoception activities in the daily routine, especially prior to complex tasks.

    Training for education and care staff

    Children and young people with ADHD may have low levels of interoception, which means they are unable to understand or connect with their bodies in ways that would enable them to self-regulate. It is important teach interoception to help children and young people develop skills in this area.

    Learn more about interoception and how it can be applied in the classroom including:

    • benefits of teaching interoception
    • interoception tools and resources
    • models of interoception in the classroom.

    Friends Resilience have developed a range of age specific programs for education and care services to guide the social and emotional development of children and young people through teaching them resilience.

    Anxiety awareness

    The Lifespan Health and Wellbeing Research Centre provides resources and questionnaires that may assist education and care services to support children with anxiety, including:

    How parents and caregivers can help

    Parents or guardians must:

    • notify the school, preschool or care service if their child has depression
    • complete health care plans and agreements with their health care professionals and provide them to the school, preschool or care service
    • provide required medication to the school, preschool or care service.

    If a medication agreement is in place, parents and caregivers must fulfil the roles and responsibilities outlined on the medication management and care page.

    How health professionals can help

    Health professionals support schools, preschools, care services and families by helping to develop the care plan and any supporting medication and care agreements.

    Disability advice and research

    Phone: 8226 0515
    Email: education.health [at] sa.gov.au

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