Loneliness and isolation, concerns regarding school, fears about the future – these are just a few of the pressures young people have been experiencing over the course of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a YoungMinds report.
The findings add weight to an NHS survey of parents, conducted in July last year, which found that one in six children aged five to 16 had a probable mental disorder compared with one in nine in 2017. The most prevalent concern identified by parents was their child’s worries about missing school or schoolwork.
With children having returned to school last Monday, we have yet to see how the mental effects of lockdown might affect them in that environment.
Hackney Council acknowledges that young people’s mental health has been impacted by the pandemic and has come up with a number of strategies in response – such as “meetings with school leaders to share plans for reopening […and launching the] online support, information and counselling service Kooth”.
But Hackney residents have also taken the initiative to set up schemes.
Child speech therapist Laura Boniface, based in Hackney, is aware of the multiple difficulties facing children during this time. She says: “I’ve had children on my zoom sessions where they linger at the end just to have a chat with me about the fact that they’re bored, they’ve been isolated, they really miss their friends.”
“Personal expression is so important for our wellbeing and our sense of self.”
Boniface and her sister Kate have set up the Kindness Curriculum project, launching a YouTube channel in July 2020, followed by an Instagram account in August and, most recently, a website.
“We release resources geared towards the mindfulness movement and emotional wellbeing. Children can access these at home during lockdown and schools can also use them for brain breaks and get them moving,” Boniface says.
Boniface believes: “It’s got to be as child-led as possible. We need to ask them, ‘What would be helpful for you today?’ Personal expression is so important for our wellbeing and our sense of self.”
She explains that once a child feels listened to, they will start to respond and be open about what they need. This process teaches them how to regulate their emotions in preparation for stressful situations that confront them outside of the sessions.
“We really need to [listen to what they have to say],” Boniface says. “We’re all tired, we’re all exhausted – children have really felt that, too. Teaching children to be kind to themselves is the first and most important step in learning to be kind to others.”
“We were quite ambitious.”
A further initiative, Learning through Landscapes, secured funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund in July 2020 to launch the pilot of an outdoor education programme My School, My Planet, which included Stormont House School in Lower Clapton.
Head of programmes and partnerships Heena Dave explains that children have missed out on a lot of learning over the past year, and the prevalent narrative has been that they urgently need to catch up, but motivating these children and giving them the confidence to go back into school is a challenge in itself.
She says: “Our goals are to improve children’s physical and mental wellbeing by being outside, exercising, moving and connecting to nature. Secondly, to motivate children to want to be back at school by enabling the easier transition from school grounds to classroom. Also, environmental education because, despite assumptions, children don’t really understand the issues of climate change, or don’t think they have any control over it, and we want to change that.
“And finally, the cultural element to the project is really important to us, that whatever theme they choose to learn about, they are able to route that within their own personal heritage. For example, children can map the migratory routes of birds and then link that back to where their families may have come from originally, and they can be really proud of it. We were quite ambitious but we feel passionate about all four.”
This scheme focuses particularly on children from disadvantaged ethnic groups and low-income families in an effort to address the inequalities that have existed for children engaging with nature during the pandemic.
Natural England’s ‘People and Nature Survey (children)’ revealed that 71% of children from ethnic minority backgrounds reported spending less time outside since the pandemic, compared with 57% of white children. An even greater disparity was found between children from low and higher-income families.
Dave says this lack of connection to nature can be detrimental to children’s mental health. Furthermore, children from these families are more likely to have been impacted by coronavirus-related bereavement as deaths have disproportionately occurred within these demographics.
“One child said, ‘This project – for children like me – has really made a difference’,” Dave says.
In fact, both projects have reported receiving an overwhelming amount of feedback that suggests they have been having a meaningful impact.
Dave adds: “Knowing that we were able to help, as an organisation, the children that needed it the most at a really hard time in our nation’s history has just been a rewarding experience for all of us and one that we’ve been very privileged to have.”
