How to talk to your kids about back to school nerves

Schools, parents and pupils in Surrey are preparing for the new school year, but for many this can be a nerve-wracking time.

According to Department for Education data, Surrey pupils missed 5.8% of school sessions during the 2025 autumn term.

This is below the national average but the figure remains above the county's pre-pandemic level of 4.3% from 2019, after the Surrey absence rate peaked at 7.0% in 2022.

In the autumn term 2025, 15.1% of pupils were classed as persistently absent, meaning they missed more than one in ten school sessions.

Aoife Kearney-Grieve, a cognitive behavioural therapist at Mindworks Surrey said there was a lot that that goes into school absences but anxiety was definitely a factor.

"Covid had a very big impact, especially for those that were going through their developmental stages," she said.

"They missed out on things like socialisation, communication, just even figuring out how school works in general."

Mindworks Surrey, an NHS-led mental health service for children and young people, has launched Small Steps Back to School - a campaign offering practical advice on common back-to-school concerns.

Here are Kearney-Grieve's tips for handling first day anxiety:

Having a space to talk about worries is really important, according to the therapist.

"I would remind parents as well to create that space of connection and also normalise these worries," she said, suggesting parents approach "with care, reassurance and also kindness".

Older children can be more "resistant or reluctant" to speak to a parent or carer but Kearney-Grieve encouraged them to do so, "even if it's just a chat".

She said: "No one's too old or too cool... for help and support, be it something small or maybe a little bit bigger."

"Judging how your experience is going to be following your first day, based on how the first day is, is sometimes not helpful," Kearney-Grieve said.

She said that "everyone's finding their feet" for the first time and the first day can be "quite overwhelming".

"Just because the first day feels a bit tricky, a bit nerve-wracking, doesn't mean that the days to follow are going to be the same."

Back to school worries are normal, according to Kearney-Grieve, and affect lots of people.

The therapist compared it to an adult's first day at a new job, with anxieties over who you would be working with and what the expectations were.

"I would imagine those worries are very similar," she said.

The therapist said that children going into exam years can have "heightened awareness that the year ahead is going to feel particularly challenging".

But Kearney-Grieve advised pupils to go easy on themselves too.

"It's also very important that you have balance, that you continue with your extra-curricular activities, you see your friends, that you try and stick to a relatively consistent sleep routine," she said.

There is plenty of support available from organisations like Mindworks Surrey and from schools themselves, according to Kearney-Grieve.

"There are so many people at school that are there to be in your corner," the therapist told the BBC.

"As you get older, this idea of stigma being attached to accessing support feels a bit troublesome," she said, but encouraged young people to seek help if they needed it.

The details of more organisations that can help with mental health issues can be found at BBC Action Line.

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