7 Tips to Overcome School Phobia!

The child may not want to go to school or may be afraid of school just before school starts. School phobia is a condition that can be seen in 4 or 5 out of every 100 children and puts parents very difficult. So, how to overcome the child’s fear of school? Let’s move on to the recommendations we have prepared for you!

What is school phobia?

School phobia is the child’s fear of school, no desire to go to school, or a complete refusal to go to school. This problem, which is usually seen in the school starting phase, starts when the child is worried about being away from home/mother.

How to overcome a child’s fear of school?

School phobia in children can not only disturb your peace at home, but also negatively affect the atmosphere in the classroom. It can get overwhelming after a while if your child doesn’t want to go to school with a new excuse every day. That’s why, as a parent, you should be conscious of “how to overcome school phobia” and guide your child in the right direction without wasting time. We have prepared recommendations for you.

1. Prepare a scenario for the first day of school

Since the first day of school is a mystery, it is best to prepare an imaginary scenario for your child’s concerns. This scenario should be a detailed scenario covering the time your child wakes up until after school. You should visualize all the details in your child’s mind, such as getting out of bed in the morning, breakfast, putting on school uniforms, going to school, entering the classroom, meeting the teacher, meeting friends.

While imagining all this with your child, ask him if you can “see”. It is very important that you talk to him about every single detail and make it come alive in his mind. You can also perform mental visualization by closing your eyes, it gives successful results to overcome school fear, especially in children with developed visual perception.

2. Get your child to talk to you

As with any fear, the most important thing to do in school phobia is “talking”. Talk to your child and get him to open up to you. In a calm and soothing language, try to understand what is keeping him from going to school. Thus, by learning the main source of the problem, you can develop your recommendations in this direction. Remember that the child refuses to go to school not for an arbitrary reason, but because he feels anxiety and fear.

3. Being overprotective

You should be understanding about your child’s anxiety and try to speak in a calm tone. You must act patiently and consistently without ignoring your child’s problem. You should take care to take your child to school on time and take care of it on time, and you should not keep the farewell too long during separation times. Nor should you engage in behavior such as sneaking out of school from your child. Both of these behaviors lead to more insecurity in the child, which can trigger school phobia.

4. Projecting your own anxieties onto your child

Fear of school in children can also develop depending on their parents. If you make your child feel the fear and anxiety of being away from him, you can worry your child too. If you detect such a situation in yourself, you should try to trust your child’s capacity and help him.

5. Get him/her looking at it from the outside

To help your child find solutions to their fears, you can have them look at things from the outside. For example, you might ask him to imagine a friend experiencing this worrisome situation. In fact, this is a scripting method to overcome school phobia. “How would you act if you were in his place?”, “How do you think your friend should have acted?” You can help uncover your fears and the way you deal with those fears with questions such as:

During these reenactments, you can create a version that will turn your child’s negative emotions into positive ones. Thus, his child’s analytical self-perception can increase and he can learn to find solutions for his different anxieties in the later stages of his life.

6. Support her relationship with her peers

One of the ways to overcome school phobia in children is to socialize the child. Having people with whom the child can establish relationships other than family members, especially with his peers, increases his self-confidence. This is also very important in terms of feeling safe.

7. Apply to the school’s guidance service

When it comes to school phobia, it is best to get professional support before the relationship between mother, father and child, student and teacher, and teacher and parent is frayed. You can get professional support from the school’s psychological counselors in no time, before a serious crisis occurs at school or at home. In this way, the school’s psychological counselor can determine whether there is a need for help outside the school and refer to another specialist. If there is no situation that can be resolved with your efforts, school phobia treatment can be successfully applied in the presence of a professional specialist.