Resilience is one of those skills that all kids need and should have. It refers to their
ability to cope and adapt in situations when confronted with challenges such as
adversity, trauma, tragedy, or even stress. At school, students with resilience are better
able to take risks with their learning, cope when things don’t quite go to plan and solve
social problems with their peers. Covid-19 has meant children have had to bounce back
from a lot this year - changes to routine, home learning, not being able to do sport or
other extra-curricular activities and possible uncertainty and change in the family. We
can build resilience by helping our children to know how to cope with change and
uncertainty, manage disappointment, learn from difficulty and persist with challenges
and help them manage the emotional challenges they experience every day. Resilience
is essential to one’s wellbeing and mental health and is a skill that can be learned from
an early age through the support of an adult role model.
Being resilient does not mean your child won't experience any difficulties, rather that
they will better equip them to manage challenging situations. Dr Michael Carr-Greg
explains that “we need to allow our kids to experience adversity. There is a tendency to
shield our kids because parents have become a bit over-protective”. While protecting our
children from challenging situations or experiences of failure is a natural instinct for
parents, experiencing failure is all part of the process. Encouraging children to take
healthy risks will help them trust their capacity to deal with uncomfortable situations
and increase their capacity for courage.
In this edition of SchoolTV, parents will gain an understanding of how to support their
child’s brave behaviour to help them adapt and build resilience. Below is a link to the
Resilience edition of SchoolTV that has more information for parents on resilience and
how to support this in their students. https://stsebastiansyeronga.qld.schooltv.me/
newsletter/resilience