School Stress and Your High School Student - What Can a Parent Do?




High School is stressful. High school students are facing record hours of homework each night coupled with the demand for many extracurriculars appropriate for college applications. Add to that social pressures to fit in and be popular and rapidly changing bodies with raging hormones -- and it’s a recipe for stress and burnout.

As a parent, you can’t protect your high school student from all stress -- that’s impossible. You can, however, help them deal with it constructively so they build healthy habits that will benefit them their entire life.

Help your high school student to get more sleep

Sleep is critically important for a teenager’s physical and mental well being and, unfortunately, it’s the thing which tends to be neglected first. It’s neglected either because homework or social obligations keep them up to late or due to stress-induced insomnia.

One way to help your student may to try some gentle yoga on those nights when sleep just won’t come. Students can watch a yoga video online and follow an expert yoga teacher through a series of gentle stretches and beginner poses appropriate for anyone -- even those who have never tried yoga before.

Share this collection of High School Stress Busting Gentle Yoga routines and your high school student will be able to relax and unwind enough to go to sleep.

Encourage active study breaks

Many high school students are sitting 6 or more hours each school day and the science is clear that long bouts of sitting have negative health and cognitive effects. One critical effect is that when a student is sedentary for too long, their brain functions slow down -- making their time studying less and less effective the longer they sit.

So encourage your student to take active study breaks every hour so so. This can be a quick game of 1:1 basketball with their brother, a run around the block or something as simple a 7 minute full body exercise video they can do in their bedroom. Taking an active study break - even for just 10-15 minutes - will help get the blood pumping in their brain, making their study time that much more effective.

Suggest any of these quick High School Stress Busting Quick Study Breaks to encourage them to take an active study break

Suggest healthy breakfasts and snacks

Your high school student is hungry - you know that for sure. Help them fill their stomachs and manage stress by having healthy nutritious choices for breakfast and snacks. Having the ingredients for protein-rich smoothies - like this Berry Blast Smoothie or a yummy Chocolate Almond Smoothie or any of these High School Stress Busting Smoothies will help them make healthier choices.

Helping your high school student manage their school stress is a key life skill. Through encouraging stress management now, you can help them build healthy, life-long habits.

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