‘Mum, I’m feeling socially awkward . . . ’ Helen Kinsey-Wightman
As regular readers of this column might remember, I have whānau in the UK. Their experience of Covid-19 has been significantly different to my own and not in a good way. Writing this on Waitangi Day, yesterday the UK reported 60,578 new Covid cases and 259 deaths. Last week I chatted to my family about the effects that the pandemic has had on them personally. My Mum, who is 78, reported that she and her friends are quite reluctant to head out for anything except essentials and that they all experience a greater sense of isolation despite being well connected to friends and family previously and that the Winter has exacerbated this. My sister talked about her 14 year old son who has always been confident and popular in his friendship group. He has recently begun describing himself as ‘socially awkward.’ I can certainly identify with this change in my own children. Towards the end of the Summer holidays as I returned to work, I enrolled my 11 year old – who has been living in Auckland this year – in 3 days of holiday care. The weekend before I reminded him of the activities he would be taking part in and what he would need to get ready. Without any warning he had a meltdown. When he had calmed down, we talked about what had been going on for him. He admitted that he was really nervous about walking into a room of kids he didn’t yet know, he reminded me that he hadn’t really been to school much in the last 2 terms and he had forgotten how to meet new people. We talked about some strategies to use and I remembered to praise him everyday for flexing his bravery muscles. This may be something we talk about with our students in class or mentoring time, to let them know that we understand it might have been difficult returning from lockdowns and online learning, to kanohi ki te kanohi class situations and that we are proud of them for being resilient and adaptable and then ask what they might be struggling with so that we can support this. We have been back at school for a week now and mask wearing has added a whole new dimension to the experience. From a physical perspective, we all know the challenge of effectively communicating verbally through a mask – we may have thought through the issues for hearing impaired students and staff, but we may not have given equal thought to the social and emotional impacts. A Frontiers in Psychology journal article1 describes a German
study of the effect of mask wearing on the ability of adults to read emotions. The study reported, ‘Lower accuracy and lower confidence in one’s own assessment of the displayed emotions indicate that emotional reading was strongly irritated by the presence of a mask. We further detected specific confusion patterns, mostly pronounced in the case of misinterpreting disgusted faces as being angry plus assessing many other emotions (e.g., happy, sad, and angry) as neutral.’ We can therefore assume that for young people and teens whose brain development means they are less able to read emotions from facial expressions under normal circumstances – the challenge of functioning whilst wearing a mask will necessarily be greater. The study recommends reminding ourselves that ‘Facial expressions are not our one and only source of information;’ as teachers we should therefore seek to use body posture and body language to communicate emotion. In addition, when speaking to young people we may need to name our emotions, ‘I know it’s harder when we are wearing our masks to see how we are feeling. I’m feeling sad about what you just told me but I’m not angry with you. How are you feeling?’ If we conclude that many of our previously positive, resilient and socially confident young people may – since Covid – be experiencing a lack of resilience and perhaps feeling ‘socially awkward’ how can we support teachers to support them? We can encourage teachers to have some explicit classroom conversations about the effects of Covid on wellbeing. We can also encourage them to tell stories about how students could be feeling, ‘I read an article that said some young people feel more socially awkward since lockdowns and home learning – do you think that is true?’ We may then need to use drama and role play to practice walking into a room of new people and striking up a conversation. In addition, the increased role of Zoom, Google Classroom and social media in young people’s lives may make it harder to use more traditional forms of communication that are necessary to function in an adult world. My Year 12 class often asked for help in writing emails – particularly when expressing something difficult like asking for an extension or explaining the struggles they are having with learning in a particular subject. My 20 year old son freely admits that he often procrastinates and has to psych himself up for several days before picking up the phone to ring
someone who is not expecting his call. How can we build these experiences into learning and remind parents to do the same? Perhaps we can also use the fact that mask wearing hides our facial expressions to have more wellbeing conversations, ‘I can’t see how you are feeling under your mask – how are you doing?’ We could also encourage more body language – give me a thumbs up if you agree. I have found the thumbs up, thumbs down (and an in the middle wiggle) works with students right the way up to Y13 to get a quick gauge on how a class is feeling. As in, ‘How are you all feeling about your workload at present?’ If it is obvious there are lots of thumbs down or in the middles, a few minutes of sharing strategies can be really supportive. As we navigate this new landscape together, it is good to talk about the things we can do to support each other so that whilst physical closeness might be more challenging, emotional connection is not lost. Waiho i te toipoto, kaua i te toiroa – Let us keep close together – not far apart.
MAGAZINE
You can now access the current and past issues of NZ Principal magazine online
References 1 Wearing Facemasks Strongly confuses counterparts in reading emotions Claus Christian-Carbon https://www.frontiersin.org/ articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.566886/full
You can search by magazine issue, article name or author visit www.nzprincipal.co.nz
clean Keep
Get extra protection for your school’s bathroom and kitchen areas with Resene Kitchen & Bathroom, formulated with anti-bacterial silver and added MoulDefender.
Bring out the best in your school with Resene School Services!
Find out more at: resene.co.nz/schoolservices
A refresh of the
National
Curriculum is underway
The national curriculum will be refreshed over the next five years, so it is clearer, more relevant and easier to use.
The Ministry of Education is working with educators and communities, on the new framing of Te Marautanga o Aotearoa and The New Zealand Curriculum to ensure they’re clear what our tamariki need to learn to be successful now and in the future. An example of what a refreshed curriculum could look like is the draft curriculum content for Aotearoa New Zealand’s histories and Te Takanga o Te Wā which were released for feedback in 2021. The most important shift proposed for Te Marautanga o Aotearoa is to address equity, trust and coherence, and reflect a more authentic indigenous curriculum that is holistic and ākonga focused, grounded in te ao Māori. The New Zealand Curriculum framework and learning areas will be refreshed beginning with Social Sciences to support the implementation of Aotearoa New Zealand’s histories in 2022. The large number of achievement objectives currently in the curriculum will be reviewed, so they provide greater clarity about progress to ensure all learners are reaching the milestones they need to.
Have your say The refresh of The New Zealand Curriculum offers a once in a generation opportunity for a curriculum that is shaped around the learner – their voice, needs, and aspirations. Ākonga want to learn from a curriculum that is meaningful to them and their whānau. From March – May 2022 we will be seeking feedback on the draft Social Sciences learning area, and we want to hear from you. So get involved, have your say, and make your voice heard as we refresh The New Zealand Curriculum together.
FURTHER INFORMATION
on the refresh of the national curriculum, including timelines is available at education.govt.nz/ our-work/changes-in-
education/curriculum-andassessment-changes/newzealand-curriculum/
REGISTER
to give your feedback on Social Sciences at www.haveyoursay.co.nz/ social-sciences-andvision