Anxiety Resources
Counselling Directory
Offers a wide range of free resources to help anxious children: https://www.counselling-directory.org.uk/blog/2017/09/28/new-free-resources-to-help-anxious-children. These include:
Health for Kids!
Provides young children with simple tips on how to stop feeling worried: https://www.healthforkids.co.uk/feelings/feeling-worried/
- Also offers fun games, including “Lanterns”, which helps children to visualise their worries floating away: https://www.healthforkids.co.uk/game/lanterns/
Kids Health
- Information sheets and advice about worries. You can find them here:
- This website also has yoga videos which may help you to relax when worries come up — Video: Welcome Home Yoga (for Kids) | Nemours KidsHealth
- Factsheets about supporting your child or young person with anxiety and worry:
Teen Health
- Information sheets and advice about anxiety. You can find them here — Anxiety (for Teens) | Nemours KidsHealth
- 5 ways to deal with anxiety
- You can also find information about yoga, meditation and breathing to help you relax when you’re feeling anxious here - Yoga: Meditation and Breathing (for Teens) | Nemours KidsHealth
GoZen!
- Informational programs (ages 5-15) to teach you some research-based coping, resilience and happiness skills! They have a range of programs for Anxiety, stress, mindfulness, and many more - Stress Management, Anxiety Relief, and Resilience Programs for Kids | GoZen!
Action for happiness
- 30day coping calendar to help you keep calm, stay wise, and be kind! - All Calendars | Action for Happiness
Memiah
- Online PFD about “Worries and Anxiety” for kids which contains easy to read information on what anxiety is, what it looks like, and tips for dealing with it - Worries and anxiety factsheet for kids - Counselling Directory and Happiful Kids (memiah.co.uk)
Barnardo’s
- Guide for young people who are dealing with anxiety which has all types of helpful information for managing it - What is anxiety? | Barnardo's (barnardos.org.uk)
Stem 4
Is a charity that supports teenagers in their mental health.
- Advice here: https://stem4.org.uk/anxiety/
- Downloadable resources here: https://stem4.org.uk/resources/
- Free app ‘Clear Fear’ which is designed to help children and young people manage symptoms of anxiety. You can download this from the App Store and Google Play — https://stem4.org.uk/anxiety/anxiety-steps-to-change/
- Main website link: https://www.clearfear.co.uk/
- Advice for parents here: https://stem4.org.uk/anxiety/anxiety-for-parents-carers/
- They also have an app called Combined Minds for those supporting a young person with their mental health. This is free and available to download on Apple App Store and Google Play — https://combinedminds.co.uk/
The Mental Health Foundation
- Free downloadable guide called “How to Manage and Reduce Stress” which provides information and advice on how to prevent and deal with stress - How to manage and reduce stress | Mental Health Foundation
- The Anxious Child: A booklet published by theMental Health Foundation for parents and carers wanting to know more about anxiety in children and young people — The Anxious Child | Mental Health Foundation
Anxiety Canada
- Anxiety in Youth | Anxiety Canada — offers an anxiety management program based on CBT called “My Anxiety Plan (MAP)”
- MAP helps parents and carers coach anxious children or teens using practical strategies and tools to manage anxiety and includes 6 units with 46 lessons.
- It is a free program and you just need to sign up and make an account.
- For more information please visit https://maps.anxietycanada.com/courses/child-map
Young Minds
Has information on various disorders including Anxiety.
They include general information on the symptoms, the treatment, where to get help and more on their page.
- Anxiety and Anxiety Disorders | Signs and symptoms | YoungMinds
- Offer tips for parents on how to help their children with anxiety — Supporting A Child With Anxiety | Tips and Advice | YoungMinds
- Parents Lounge: Parents' A-Z Mental Health Guide | Mental Health Advice | YoungMinds
Every Mind Matters
Offers information on various mental health problems
- Have dedicated page with information about anxiety, useful tips, videos, and extra resources — Anxiety - Every Mind Matters - NHS (www.nhs.uk)
Mind
Has information and support about various anxiety and panic disorders including their symptoms, treatments and useful contacts - What are anxiety disorders? - Mind
Royal College of Psychiatrists
Offers information about worries and anxiety in young people - Anxiety: for young people | Royal College of Psychiatrists (rcpsych.ac.uk)
- Webpage that describes the different types of anxiety that children can experience, and some of the reasons behind these - Worries and anxieties for parents | Royal College of Psychiatrists (rcpsych.ac.uk)
NHS
Offers self-help guides for various Anxiety difficulties which contain general information on causes and symptoms of anxiety, as well as topics for managing the anxiety and treatment paths.
- General Anxiety — Anxiety.pdf (ntw.nhs.uk)
- Social Anxiety — Social Anxiety.pdf (ntw.nhs.uk)
- Stress — Stress.pdf (ntw.nhs.uk)
- Health Anxiety — Health Anxiety.pdf (ntw.nhs.uk)
- Obsessions and Compulsions - Obsessions and Compulsions.pdf (ntw.nhs.uk)
Good Thinking
Provides digital mental health support for London.
- Includes NHS approved apps, guides, workbooks, podcasts and blogs
- Relating to different mental health difficulties such as low mood, anxiety, sleep, and stress
Main page: https://www.good-thinking.uk/
Child Mind Institute
Provide a helpful guide teaching parents how to learn the signs and symptoms of different anxiety disorders, and how they are treated
NHS informs
- Factsheet on anxiety disorders in children - Anxiety disorders in children | NHS inform
Action for Children
- Helpful introduction to anxiety in children and young people, including common signs and examples of strategies for managing anxiety as parents — Parenting support | Action For Children
FutureLearn University of Reading
- A free and informative course specifically designed for parents of children and young people experiencing anxiety due to COVID-19
- Topics include: anxiety and its causes, importance of support, spotting symptoms and guidance for parents.
- Course lasts 2 weeks and is available through the following link: https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/youth-mental-health-during-covid-19
The Psychology Foundation of Canada
Books
Up and Down the Worry Hill: A Children’s Book about Obsessive- Compulsive Disorder and Its Treatment (ages 7-10) by Aureen Punto Wagner –Recommended by Child Mind Institute
- Describes Behavior Therapy for OCD in a manner than children can comprehend.
Have No Fear! By Nicole C Kear –Recommended by ChildMind for ages 7-10
- What is it about? Seven-Year-Old Veronica wants to help her classmate Maya conquer her fear of bugs.
How Big Are Your Worries Little Bear? By Jauneen Sanders – Recommended by ChildMind for ages 6-10
- What is it about? Anxious about school, soccer practice, and monsters under his bed, baby bear worried day and night but with the help of his mom he learns to draw out his worries
I Bet I Won’t Fret: A Workbook to Help Children with Generalized Anxiety Disorder by Timothy A. Sisemore—recommended by the Depression and Anxiety Association of America
- With fun and engaging exercises to help relieve anxiety and worry.
MORE: Therapeutic stories on Anxiety recommended by Little Parachutes:
https://www.littleparachutes.com/category/feelings/anxiety/
Starving the Anxiety Gremlin: A Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Workbook on Anxiety Management for Young People (Gremlin and Thief CBT Workbooks) by Kate Collins-Donnelly
- What is it about? Aims to help young people understand different types of anxiety and how to manage them
Conquer Negative Thinking for Teens: A Workbook to Break the Thought Habits That Are Holding You Back by Mary Karapetian Alvord and Anne McGrath—Recommended by the Anxiety and Depression Association of America
- What is it about? Written by licensed psychologists, this book offers a simple and effective cognitive-behavioral approach to deal with the negative thoughts that result from feeling sad, worried, angry and stressed
Conquer your fears and phobias for Teens: How to build courage and stop fear from holding you back—Recommended by the Anxiety and Depression Association of America
- What is it about? Written by licensed psychologists, this book offers a proven-effective approach to help teens overcome fears/phobias through CBT
Rewire your Anxious Brain for Teens: Using CBT, Neuroscience, and Mindfulness to Help you End Anxiety, Panic, and Worry by Debra Kissen, Ashley Kendall, Michelle Lozano, and Micah Ioffe—Anxiety and Depression Association of America
Apps
- Breath, Think, Do Sesame app is intended to teach children ages 2-5 years skills including problem solving, self-control, planning, and task persistence.
- It also includes a “Breathe with the Monster” activity to help children practice taking deep breaths to calm down.
- This is free and available to download on Apple App Store and Google Play.
- Available in English and Spanish.
- The Cyber Smile Foundation have a gaming help centre which provides advise about gaming safely including issues like cyberbullying, abuse, and toxic comments from other gamers:
- ‘Clear Fear’ is a free app which is designed to help children and young people manage symptoms of anxiety.
- You can download this from the App Store and Google Play.
- Link: https://www.clearfear.co.uk/
- Calm: award winning meditation app to help with sleep, increasing confidence, reducing stress and anxiet
- Contains guided meditations, breathing exercises, relaxing music, sleep stories, masterclasses and many more
- Some features are free but full access costs 7.99/month
- Headspace: mindfulness/meditation app which helps you train your mind to experience less stress, better sleep, focus and improved relationships
- Have a “medidate with kids” section that is divided into different age groups (5 and under, 6-8, and 9-12)
- Also contains 3-min “cool-off” meditations
Free 2weektrialand then costs
- : meditation app for kids with guided visualizations and affirmations
- Everyday meditations, healing activities, guided journeys, affirmations, issue-based meditations
- Free to download
- Stop, Breath, and Think Kids offers children a fun and easy way to identify and process their emotions
- Contains counting breaths, friendly wishes, frog jumps
- Free to download
- Breathing Bubbles : app that helps kids practice releasing worries and helps them focus on good feelings
- You can choose the emotion you are feeling and how strongly you are feeling it
- Manny the Manatee walks them through deep breathing and visualization
- Free to download
- Smiling Mind: designed to help people with the pressures, stress, and challenges of daily life
- Contains sections on Mindfulness for kids aged 7-18
- Free to download
- Chill Outz: collection of fun animated stories teaching children mindfulness techniques to stay relaxed
- Contains 5 individual stories
- Costs 4.99 to download
- MindShift: CBT app to relieve anxiety
- Free app for adolescents to gain insight into and basic skills to manage their anxiety symptoms
- Offers active coping strategies tailored to different types of anxiety disorders
- Tools include breathing exercises, mental imagery, mindfulness strategies in text and audio formats
- Breathe2Relax: simple, intuitive, app designed by the National Centre for Telehealth and Technology to teach breathing techniques to manage stress
- Can be personalized to a pace that is relaxing for you
- Includes videos, reading materials, and charts to map personal progress
- Free
- Live OCD Free : interactive app designed to guide users through the evidence-based treatment, Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) for COD
- Provides a cognitive toolkit, ERP reminders an guide
- Free
- Panic Relief: targeted to help individuals with panic disorder
- Provides empirically supported coping tools to manage and move through panic attacks (Free but you can upgrade for a small price)
Videos
- Anxiety in Children: Nip in the Bud:
- Anxiety and Me: Real Life Child Mental Health Experiences: Nip in the Bud:
- How Parents Can Help With Child Anxiety: UCLA Center for Child Anxiety Resilience Education and Support (CARES) Center :
- Helping Anxious Kids: Practical Tips: Anxiety Disorders Association Manitoba:
- Link:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri1CKtfyEuEDan Siegel: Name it to tame it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcDLzppD4Jc&t=133s
- Dan Siegel, clinical professor of psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine and Executive Director of the Mindsight Institute, explains the brain-science basics and the two simple steps to calm a child who is experiencing intense emotions
-
Anxious | The Feels: A Story About You and Your Feelings | Kids Learn Emotions | UniLand Kids (for younger children):
Anxiety Canada has a webpage with video resources covering anxiety through workshops, presentations, informative clips on nightmares, fear, phobias, OCD and more (for children and adolescents)
Managing Worry and Anxiety for Kids: explains what it means to worry and provides relaxations strategies for managing worried feelings in rapping.
What you can do for anxiety –a video by Every Mind Matters with Professor Paul Salkovskis, Consultant Clinical Psychologist from University of Oxford
Managing stress—a video by the BBC
Sesame Street: Relax (Word on the Street Podcast) (for younger children):
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cq_eDGKs5MUMindfulness Meditation for Kids by New Horizon - Meditation & Sleep Stories:
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk_qU7l-fcUKids Yoga for Anxiety by Cosmic Kids:
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TZXvhYylMo
Peace Out Guided Relaxation for Kids, a series of guided relaxations and visualizations for kids, written and voiced by Jaime from Cosmic Kids.:
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBnPlqQFPKsKids Yoga & Mindfulness to Wind Down by Cosmic Kids:
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laDRCHhSTxM
Be the pond | Cosmic Kids Zen Den: Mindfulness for kids by Cosmic Kids:
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wf5K3pP2IUQ&app=desktopSesame Street: the Count teaches Cookie Monster a calming breathing exercise.
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6ju2-IjWhs
Podcasts
- In Conversation…Anxiety: The Association for Child and Adolescent Mental Health. Professor Cathy Creswell, Professor of Clinical Psychology, University of Oxford, discusses anxiety and ‘Emerging Minds’ – action for child mental health, with freelance journalist Jo Carlowe. She discusses some of the issues surrounding anxiety in children, the latest research and developments, and the different treatments available.
Resources for teachers
Mentally Healthy Schools
- Provides teachers with helpful information about anxiety, including spotting the signs of anxiety in children, common anxiety disorders in children, top tips, and what schools can do
- They also offer a wide range of resources for teachers, which can be accessed here:
- Link to access: https://www.mentallyhealthyschools.org.uk/resources/
MindEd
Is a free educational e-learning resource for professionals on children and young people’s mental health. The following sessions are intended to help teachers and schools better understand how anxiety affects children:
- The worried child (describes anxiety and worry in young people and discusses how to react to them)
- Anxiety disorders (describes how common anxiety disorders present in young people, and how to assess and treat them):
Child Mind Institute provide a useful guide for teachers in which they outline common types of anxiety in children, and explain what symptoms of anxiety might look like in the classroom
- Link: https://childmind.org/guide/a-teachers-guide-to-anxiety-in-the-classroom/
- Anxiety in children: Factsheet for teachers by Counselling Directory
- Link: https://cdn.memiah.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/counselling-directory.org.uk/2017/09/Anxiety-in-children-factsheet-for-teachers-Counselling-Directory-and-Happiful-Kids-3.pdf
- Anxiety: A video by Dr. Peter Fuggle, Clinical Psychologist and Director of Clinical and Service Improvement at the Anna Freud National Centre discusses how school staff can support pupils who may be dealing with anxiety
- Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9UaMZ3hLAU