- However you may think you’re successfully masking your own feelings, your child will be picking up your vibes so if you are worried take a few moments now to reframe them. We can reframe by consciously creating a different positive picture in our mind. Imagine the best possible day your child could have and run it through your head as if it is a movie with colour and music, dialogue and action.
- You can tackle little niggles they have by telling stories with a solution for example. If they’re worried about making friends you can say, “I was really worried about making friends when I started big school but then I plucked up the courage to smile at someone and they came over and talked to me and everything was fine after that.” or talk about someone they know who maybe started at the school last year.
- New clothes and haircuts, new shoes and so on can feel special but a little scary at first. Let your child wear them around the house before they have to wear them to school so they feel comfortable in them.
- Do the school ‘run’ or journey with them a few times so they feel familiar with it and make it fun so when the big day comes they have some good experiences to draw on.
- If they are going to have packed lunches; chat about what they’d like to have in their lunchbox and agree some healthy items. Choose the lunch box together because it can be hugely embarrassing to have one they think looks babyish or boring.
- If you can, find other children who will be in the same class and invite them round to play or for tea or a trip to the cinema, pizza etc
- Children of any age can lack confidence so remind your child of when they are confident and note their physiology. How do they stand, walk, look when they are confident? Point this out to them and suggest they take up that physiology whenever they need a quick confidence boost.
- As a quick fix, looking up will take a child out of their feelings and into a more positive state of mind. Get them to look up and to the right to create a positive picture or up and left to recall a positive one.
- Show them how to anchor a good feeling by asking them when they feel good. If they are quite young you will be able to suggest something. Maybe they feel calm and confident when they’re stroking their pet? Get them to think about this feeling while they stroke their arm. Then they can do this at school to remind themselves of this nice feeling.
- Focus on the good things they will experience. If they are visual, comment on what they will see and how they will look, what the school looks like, their teacher and so on. If they are auditory focus on what they will hear and if they are kinaesthetic, what they will feel.
You can buy Judy’s books on Amazon or from our online NLP Bookstore. Judy is an NLP Master Practitioner and Trainer offering coaching for children and teens in the Home Counties and via Skype.
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