Helping Students Manage Holiday Stress

December 5, 2024 byJulie Hersum

4 min to read

An elementary school age girl baking cookies with her father during the holidays.

This article was originally published November 2022 and updated December 2024.

Tidings, tinsel, and gifts galore—the holidays are often portrayed as a magical season full of fun and celebration. But even when there’s joy, the reality is, often students and their families also struggle to manage holiday stress and balance hectic schedules, and many experience burnout.

Holiday Stress and Mental Health

The extra activities of the holiday season, on top of end-of-semester assignments and exams, can mean added stress for your students, who may feel pressured to stretch their schedules too thin. Younger students, especially, may not yet have developed effective strategies for managing overwhelming busyness coupled with the added holiday stress. Some studies even suggest that sixty-two percent of people surveyed found the holidays “very or somewhat” stressful.

Recognizing that dealing with holiday stress is the first step toward helping them cope and setting them up for success during the holiday season.

How to Handle Holiday Stress for Children

If the holiday season seems to negatively impact your student’s stress levels, try some of the following tips to reduce your student’s stress. They may even help the entire family.

1. Create an Event Schedule Together

Predictable scheduling is a key factor for success in creating a stress-free environment for your student. Many kids can find all the new activities and end-of-year school assignments fun but also overwhelming, which is why it is so important to discuss your family’s holiday schedule before the chaos of the holidays begins.

From monthly agendas to daily schedules, organization and routine help instill a sense of calm and confidence. Sit down as a family and write down all of your plans and obligations as well as important dates. Create a family calendar detailed enough to include times and dates. Seeing when final exams are in relation to holiday parties and festivals can help families create space for students to decompress. Creating a calendar can help students feel like they are a bit more in control during a constantly changing time of year.

While you may want to keep up with some winter learning activities, remember that to manage holiday stress, kids need rest and time for decompression just as much as adults do.

2. Create a Space for Quiet Time

The holiday season often includes inviting family and friends into your home. For students who also learn at home, house guests can mean introducing new people—and distractions—into their learning environment, which can lead to some children feeling overstimulated. An easy solution is to designate a quiet space in your home.

Take a corner of your house or your child’s room and stock it with all the supplies your child needs to manage their stress and re-instill a sense of inner calm. Headphones and a playlist of gentle music or guided meditations as well as puzzle books or coloring sheets can do wonders to help children relax and refocus.

3. Enjoy the Season

There’s nothing like a cozy day indoors when the temperature drops, but a little fresh air is important, too. In fact, when it comes to holidays and mental health, fresh air and exercise are essential for mood boosting and alleviating stress. It can be hard to remember to take time to enjoy the season when students feel pressured to study or help the family prepare for the holidays. Make time in your daily schedule to pause and encourage your child to stop and notice the little things about the holiday season to appreciate. This could be anything from taking an hour after dinner to bake cookies or a weekend day trip to a festival or park. A moment of pause can help students remember what makes the holidays so special.

4. Talk It Out

While the end of the year can be a lot of fun for kids, some may have lingering anxiety about the year and the semester coming to an end. For some students, the end of the semester also means leaving classes they love or even transferring schools and leaving friends behind. Some students may see the end of the year as a time to reflect on what they accomplished and become frustrated or sad that they had not met the goals they had set for themselves at the beginning of the year.

It isn’t always easy to get kids to open up, but if families suspect their student is stressed about the end of the year, they can help by facilitating conversation that can help students through this tough time. Help your student create a gratitude journal so they can reflect on all they have accomplished in the last year and what they can look forward to in the new year. Help them set SMART goals for themselves to break down their New Year’s Resolutions into more manageable steps.

The End of the Year Doesn’t Have to Be Stressful

Dealing with holiday stress isn’t always easy, especially when families don’t have the flexibility to set their own schedules for the learning day. Students enrolled in online schools like Connections Academy can take the time to enjoy the holiday season while also learning at home from certified teachers.

Learn more about enrolling in online school by downloading our free eGuide.