Teens' anxiety levels dropped during pandemic, study finds

[Dohorseseatapples]

Having witnessed the state of teenager’s MH decline over the last 20 years in schools, it’s an interesting view point.

My first thought was ‘No shit Sherlock’.
AIBU to agree with this report?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53884401

I'm not surprised at all. I remember secondary school as the worst experience of my life. If I was sent home for months and did all my work online, I would have been ecstatic. In fact, that was the dream. All I wanted was to have all my work sent home and never go back to school.

Hopefully this will encourage a review of how school impacts mental health.

Yes, I was expecting an even greater drop in anxiety after kids left school!

Meanwhile in the sidebar is a link to another BBC article today quoting Boris Johnson as saying "it is far more damaging for a child's development and their health... to be away from school any longer". It seems some children might disagree with him on that. But what do they know about their own well-being?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53882175

Home education groups have seen a lot of interest recently from parents who are thinking of taking kids out of school. As you might expect, some are motivated by concerns about Covid-19 transmission at school. But a really large number are considering home education as a result of seeing how much more relaxed and happy their kids became during their recent months away from school.

My 14 year old DS has been much more relaxed. He has really struggled with Secondary school and has been much more happy and confident whilst being at home.

Now they have a deadline for going back i can already see him starting to worry about it and his mood changing when anything about school is mentioned.

Not surprised by this. My DD was a different, much happier girl after just a couple of days of lockdown, with all the social pressure to look right / fit in / go out etc simply removed at a stroke.

Dd1 has just completed year 7. Honestly she loved term one but term two age seemed a bit overwhelmed and hated the girls’ bitchiness / swearing to show off etc. Lockdown came at the perfect time for her and I’ve seen her confidence grow. I’m hoping that her new confidence and maturity will help her as she enters year 8.

Yes my first thought was "no shit" too. Teenagers who were able to spend several months getting up when they like and lounge around the house all day are less anxious than when they have to get up early, sit through lessons, play sports they hate, get bullied, feel pressured to fit in with everyone else. Who'd have thought it?!

I remember my teenage years. I loathed school. Average achiever but never fitted in. Bullied enough to be constantly looking over my shoulder and never trusting anyone. Hating standing on the playing field in the fucking rain playing a sport I didn't understand or remotely care about. A spring and summer away from that would have been wonderful.

Not my teen!
She’s really struggled and has been very down/sad for periods of time throughout this period. It’s a real effort at times to keep her motivated and get her out of the house. She’d lie in her room all day looking at her phone if I let her - and that’s not good for anyone.

I’m not surprised by the findings. I found secondary school a horrible place to be, and I wasn’t even bullied that badly compared to some. I can only imagine it’s even worse these days with the influence of social media. Being away from what is often a very toxic environment must have been such a relief to some children.

They needed a study to determine this? It's on a par with discovery that milk makes cornflakes soggy.

Not here at all. But he wasn’t more anxious at home, just happier, more motivated and positive learning at school with friends rather than behind a screen.

The survey was done in May when schools had only been shut for a few weeks. It would be interesting to see how the prolonged closure has affected anxiety levels and mental health.

My 17 year old suffers from daily headaches and chest pains due to stress. They chest pains went and the headaches greatly improved during lockdown. When A level results have out and her moderated results looked like she'd be taking exams in October, the chest pains came back immediately. When it was announced they could have their CAGs, the chest pains went again!

I'm not at all surprised, my teen said life goes back to being shit when school goes back.

@Reallybadidea

The survey was done in May when schools had only been shut for a few weeks. It would be interesting to see how the prolonged closure has affected anxiety levels and mental health.

Yes well spotted and valid

Makes an interesting counterpoint to all the "this generation has been thrown under a bus" posts though. I must admit that I have always believed that so much of the trauma of shutting schools for a term belonged to the parents rather than the children.

I am not surprised but I think not completely related to no school. No one could go out and socialise so no FOMO from looking at social media and seeing what you've been left out of, no envy of people doing stuff you can't afford etc.

I admit to feeling a bit like this myself. In fact when lockdown started to be relaxed and people started meeting up I did start to get that sinking feeling of dread again. (I tend to be the "spare friend" on the periphery of my friendship groups).I

My son is a teen and though he got very bored he didn't seem unhappy as such.

My son is much happier and I'm concerned that that will be lost when he returns to school

Porcupine do you have school age dc?

I have no doubt it is more detrimental overall to dc to be out of education. There will be anxious dc in schools, I know, maybe more will home school permanently.

No. Not surprised at all. I'm a teacher at secondary and my role involves teaching KS3 children who don't have the best time at school.
Schools are very much a 'one size fits all' environment.

It was a study of 1000 year 9s. I suspect Yr10s might have produced different results!

mrsBtheparker

They needed a study to determine this?

They didn’t did they?!!

Yes, school is stressful for many in many ways. Pressures on children are too great. Pressures on schools and therefore children have increased significantly overtime. Somewhere we have lost the intrinsic value in learning.

A 'reset' would be fantastic, more flexibility in the system. Some schools do offer a 'flexible' home school/ part time offer, this should be a much more widely promoted policy. Children should enjoy learning.

I can completely see that for many children this has been a huge relief. I think we focus on disadvantage and of course we must make sure the offer supports them, but we also must focus on others.

Can I ask those with secondary school children - what is it that makes them such stressful places to be?

I assume its a combination of factors but some things must have changed in the past 20/30 years - is it social media, are other children more horrible, more pressure?

This is a great offer - 'flexi-schooling' designed to support individual pupils.

longmarston.n-yorks.sch.uk/n-yorks/primary/longmarston/site/pages/ourschool/flexischooling