Why regulation-educated leaders are vital to relieve stress overload for practitioners

Jane Evans looks at the impact of stressed practitioners on children and suggests that leaders make stress management a priority for everyone.

Last time I checked…

Caring for young children, and supporting their development, was not the most relaxing way to earn a living. It is often full on, or grindingly slow and repetitive. The children are what make it so worthwhile.

A small smile, first few steps, excitement at going down the slide “all by myself”, that look when they see you. The knowledge that every day healthy bodies and brains are being built. Emotions are feeling valued, curiosity fostered and ignited into learning, confidence and competence nurtured. That’s what makes early years an amazing profession and vocation.

What are early years professionals saying about their high levels of stress?

In June 2018, a report was published on stress in the early years workforce. Its findings should make all leaders and policy makers’ ears prick up. It was based on the Pre-school Learning Alliance Minds Matters Survey which received 2039 responses to questions about stress and mental health in the early years workplace.

Shockingly, 25% or 1 in 4 early years professionals said that they were considering leaving the sector due to stress or mental health issues. At a time of ongoing recruitment and retention struggles this should sound alarm bells. As should the amount of daily distress this equates to for each individual.

Other findings were that, 43.8% VERY OFTEN felt stressed about work or an issue relating to work in the past month.

Furthermore, in the past year, where work or work-related issues were a contributory factor:

  • 53.2% experienced insomnia
  • 56.9% anxiety
  • 60.3% fatigue

What I share when I speak at early years conferences and events is how and why everything begins and ends, with self-regulation. Practitioners’ mental and physical health, their capacity to be endlessly patient, compassionate and emotionally available to the children. Being focused enough to be able to get paperwork done, to look past children and parents’ behaviours to see their needs, and to have something left for when they get home.

Times have changed, so must the focus in leadership

The question I always ask groups of practitioners is: “are you finding that children nowadays are more stressed and more easily overwhelmed?”. Most heads in the audience nod. The sad reality is that in 2018, young children are more stressed than at any time in our history and they bring this with them into settings. It has a knock-on effect on their behaviours and capacity to be supported through life’s ups and downs.

Life IS very different for children now; many of the world leaders in children’s development, are talking about how the lack of emotionally available adults in daily life has a range of negative impacts. In a nutshell, it causes children to become overly stressed. Especially if the adults who are around have their own stress challenges.

Dr Bruce Perry, an internationally-recognised authority on children in crisis, tells us:

“It is through patterned, repetitive neural stimulation provided by consistent, nurturing, predictable, responsive caregivers that the infant’s brain receives what is needed to develop the capacity for healthy attachment and self-regulation capabilities. The caregiver becomes the external stress regulator for the infant.”

Perry, and others, are deeply concerned about the isolated lives children are experiencing, where face-to-face, heart-to-heart connection with caring adults is limited. Screens, work pressures, adult emotional distress, a permanently-on global world, are all factors.

Do you check your energy?

The other thing I always ask everyone who works with children is:

“Most days, having got yourself up, your children up, dressed, washed, fed and with PE kit, homework, lunch and all the other bits and bobs together, out the door, delivered to school. Do you take a few breaths and ground yourself before the children in your setting arrive?”

I am often met with blank looks, or mumbled comments about “needing to get yoga/mindfulness in.” In reality, few practitioners are supported to regulate themselves BEFORE, during or after their time around the children.

After I talk about how and why regulation is the key to their wellness and resilience, and of course the children’s, many become interested in it. Once I’ve offered insight into the neuroscience, neurophysiology and neurobiology of stress and how to become, stress-intelligent, there is a will to use this knowledge in their practice at home, and at work. This is where clear leadership is crucial as not much will be carried forward or sustained without leaders making adult regulation a priority, rather than a team day activity.

Do as I say…

It’s human nature to watch what those in positions of power do, either so as to model it, or criticise it. Staff and children notice how the leaders around them behave. What they repeatedly say and how they say it. Are they good at calming everything down, which is different to telling people to calm down or not to stress out? How do they move about — rushing, slumping, rarely settling for long? Do they have a tone? Talk at or over others, say very little, smile or frown a great deal. Is their energy high, impatient, low, absent?

Powerful stuff which can be the foundation for creating more stress-intelligent environments. If leaders are modelling how to become grounded, to regulate stress, to stay on task, be good listeners rather than fixers and to meet all situations with compassion, it impacts everyone.

Leadership on mental health means embracing beliefs and habits so that they become second nature. For example, regularly:

  • Pausing to take three deep long breaths
  • Saying, “I feel a bit overwhelmed, I just need to take a breath”
  • Taking short breaks to stand up, stretch, walk about
  • Modelling feeling grateful for simple things

Doing one or two simple exercises to connect with the body e.g. — placing one hand on the heart, the other on the stomach, breathing in deeply, and letting the shoulders drop on the out breath.

Change must come soon

There are no signs that policy, beliefs and behaviours are about to change anytime soon. People remain distracted by their phones, which leaves them unavailable to naturally emotionally and physically regulate their children. In fact, children are increasingly given phones and tablets as substitutes for human interaction, hence their stress-levels.

There is a strong focus on both parents working as much as is possible, leaving them tired and absent in the early years when brain development is most rapid. Family time is impacted by this unless parents are super-human.

Children don’t get enough mucking about time as increasingly their lives are scheduled to the max. It is not what nature intended and makes caring for children more stress-laden. Therefore, early years leaders have to address this first, as their staff’s mental and physical wellbeing depends upon it. Individuals need to be supported to do their bit too but embedding simple practices in settings would go a long way to help.

The greatest beneficiaries would, of course, be the children. Having access to emotionally available and balanced adults would feel wonderful. It creates a sense of safety on every level. Ultimately, this is what will enable children to relax, be curious, feel real joy, form friendships and develop healthy bodies and brains.

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Jane Evans has worked with children and families for 25 years. She is a childhood anxiety and parenting coach, an inspirational speaker on early childhood trauma, author and media expert. Jane makes neuroscience accessible to everyone, even children. As shown in her bestselling story book, Little Meerkat’s Big Panic, where triune brain theory becomes a simple story about a meerkat getting in a panic. Also, in her TED Talk, Taming and Tending Your Meerkat Brain.

www.thejaneevans.com

janeevans61@hotmail.co.uk

Children's Centre Leader - thought, policy and practice for everyone in early help, children's centres and linked services. Download the pdf at: www.chcentreleader.com

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