Much-Needed Book List for Back to School Anxiety

More now than ever, returning to school this fall is undoubtedly going to bring about anxiety. As you know, anxiety can affect a persons body, thoughts and behaviors. Starting at the very basis of where anxiety comes from it has to do with being able to cope with the normal fears of daily living. When these fears become too much to handle, our bodies go into a freeze, fight or flight response.

This is very common with what’s going on in the world and because there are so many unknowns for students, teachers and parents anxiety starts to find it’s way in. Not only for students but within families and school classrooms as well. As school counselors, we can help ease some of that anxiety and help make a smoother transition back to school. One of my favorite ways to teach and help students is through books! Here are some of my favorite books to help students and families…

Books for Working with Anxious Students

What to do When You Worry Too Much – Dawn Huebner

This book is such a great resource to have in your counseling office! It uses CBT techniques to help students gain skills to ease anxiety. Within this book you’ll find metaphors and funny illustrations to help make the strategies easy to understand. It also provides how-to steps and prompts to help students master the skills being taught throughout the book.

How Big are Your Worries, Little Bear? – Jayneen Sanders

What a cute bibliotherapy book to have on hand! This book is illustrated so well and has a cute little bear who is such a worrier. With this book, students will see that worries and fears we face in everyday situations, can be overcome. Little bear has help from his mom to see that his fears are not that big. This book also provides discussion questions for parents and educators!

Coping Skills for Kids Workbook – Janie Halloran, MA, LMHC

Needing a workbook to have on hand in your office? This one has 75 activities to help students deal with stress, anxiety and anger! It’s defiantly a go-to resource when needing to teach certain coping skills. There are resources with in this workbook to help students learn to calm down, balance their emotions and process changing feelings.

The Anxiety Workbook for Kids – Robin Atler, Ph.D, CPsych and Crystal Clarke, MSW, RSW

This book is one of several in a series and it is so wonderful to help students work through their anxious thoughts while working through CBT activities to help them cope. It allows kids to see a different perspective about what fuels their anxiety and learn to boss back their own worries.

The Worry Workbook for Kids – Muniya S. Khanna, Ph.D and Deborah Roth Ledley, Ph.D

So many kids deal with everyday worries of “what if” and have difficulty trying new things. This book is written for ages seven to twelve and uses a CBT approach to change kids thoughts and behaviors by deciding what to do in order to take control. Kids learn to stop worry in it’s tracks!

Help Your Dragon Deal with Anxiety – Steve Herman

This is a fun illustrated book about a dragon who is always asking “what it”. He soon learns how to deal with his anxiety. I like this because students sometimes learn best by teaching others. So, why not teach a cute little dragon to cope with worry and anxiety!

Starving the Anxiety Gremlin – Kate Collins-Donnelly

I love how this book illustrates the anxiety gremlin getting bigger and bigger because he eats up the anxiety that you feed him. I feel like kids can relate to the thoughts of feeding the anxiety gremlin and watching him shrink when he doesn’t get fed anxiety. Students can see when we starve him and change our anxious patterns we can watch anxiety our own anxiety shrink! This book serves students ages 5-9.

Books to Use in the Classroom

Wilma Jean the Worry Machine – Julia Cook

I love all of Julia Cook’s books and this one is no different. The book provides a fun rhythmic story that gives students what they need to feel in control of their worries and anxiety. They learn the types of worries that are in their control and not in their control. They also learn different strategies to cope with any worry they may face. Also, includes an excellent parent and educator page with great tips!

Worry Says What? – Allison Edwards

What about approaching anxiety a little differently? This book teaches students flip their anxious thoughts and turn them into something positive. Children learn that worries are not always what they seem. Reading this book to a class or small-group can initiate some really great discussions.

The Worry Box – Suzanne Chiew

This little bear, Murray has an amazing sister! She teaches him all about her worry box and how she writes down all her worries and puts them in the box. Murray ends up taking his box with him on an adventure and the students will get to see if it really helps. This would be fun to read in a classroom and have students make a worry box of their own!

A Little Spot of Anxiety – Diane Alber

These Little Spot books are so cute! This book has an illustration of a gray spot which is a representation of anxiety and students learn how to shrink it back to a green peaceful spot. This book teaches them about the different emotions they may be feeling and learn different skills to cope and handle them.

Brave Molly – Brooke Boynton-Hughes

This is a powerful book that doesn’t have any words. Students can use their inference skills to see what’s happening. Students will be encouraged and feel empowered to face their own fears, just like Molly, instead of run away from them. The author-illustrator does a fantastic job showcasing bravery and teaching students to overcome their monsters.

Anxiety Books for Parents

Freeing Your Child from Anxiety – Tamar Chansky, Ph.D

I love this book for parents! It is jammed packed with ways to incorporate stress-free living and incorporate anxiety-free strategies at home. I enjoy hearing the successes from parents after incorporating some of these strategies with their kids. It is user friendly for parents, walking them through what anxiety is and several techniques to start using right away. It includes  “How to Talk to Your Child sections and “Do It Today” activities in every chapter.

Helping Your Anxious Child – Ronald Rapee, PH.D; Ann Wignall, D.Psych; Susan Spence, PH.D; Heidi Lyneham, PH.D and Vanessa Cobham, PH.D

This is another very helpful book for parents and counselors. This book offers adults CBT techniques to help kids overcome their fears and worries. This book is great at allowing kids to become a detective of their own thoughts. This allows them to call out their irrational worries and reframe their thinking. Parents will really enjoy having another book to offer so many different support techniques.

Anxious Kids, Anxious Parents – Reid Wilson, PhD and Lynn Lyons, LICSW

Looking at a different perspective when it comes to parenting or helping students who have anxiety. This book talks about very important aspects of where anxiety can come from and discusses approaches that fosters positive change. Reinforcing worry and avoidance can sometimes be a natural reaction for most parents. However, once they have this book in their hands they will develop a plan to get rid of anxiety prone patterns. This book is different because it provides tips and techniques for not only the students, but the parents as well.

Parenting the New Teen in the Age of Anxiety – Dr. John Duffy

This one is the next one on my reading list! I have it on my desk and it looks so good! After thumbing threw it, I knew I needed to list it on here for the parents who have students that are reaching the “teen”age.  There are so many things that can be a bit more challenging because of the depth of thoughts and emotions. This book describes the challenges teens face in a world like today’s and parents learn to adjust their parenting plan to become their partner in overcoming some of these challenges. I can’t wait to dive into this one. 🙂

What books do you like to use to teach kids about handling their big worries?

 

Want to keep reading? Here are some posts that may help get you through this Back-To-School season…

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