Butterflies Before the Bell: Feel Your Best Self Strategies Can Help with those Back-to-School Nerves
Written by Dr. Sandy Chafouleas
It's the week before school starts. Backpacks are ready, lunch menus are prepped, outfits are laid out. And then it starts: those stomachaches that appear out of nowhere, the sudden tears over nothing, the snappy remarks that come with increased intensity. Maybe it's your kindergartner who is meeting their teacher for the first time. Maybe it's your sixth grader who is navigating a new building and a locker combination. Maybe it's your teenager worried about changes to their friend group.
Back to school can bring opposing feelings at once — excited but also scared, or "scited," as Shrinking (Season 3, Apple TV) put it. Usually kids can navigate feelings when change is about to happen, but sometimes a little help is needed (for them and for ourselves). A few years ago, I wrote a Psychology Today piece with four questions to help caregivers open conversations about back to school:
1. How can we set up our best daily routine for this fall?
2. How will we know if our routine is working?
3. When we need to get our feelings back on track, what should we do?
4. What else do we need to think about to be ready for our best fall?
Our instinct as caregivers is to jump in and problem-solve, but kids also benefit from being part of the solution. Feel Your Best Self (FYBS) offers fun, quick tools matched to the moment. Here are three, one from each category: Belly Breathing to settle the body, Push the Clouds to shift anxious thoughts, and Feel It Together to lean on connection.
Settle the Body: Belly Breathing
Belly Breathing is one of the simplest FYBS Calm Your Self strategies: put a hand on your belly, breathe in slowly to fill it with air, hold for a count of five, and slowly blow it all out. It can be a great strategy to put in place when those anxious symptoms are showing in the body, like a racing heart or stomachache.
Research shows that even one minute of slow breathing can calm a child's body — lowering heart rate and easing that fight-or-flight feeling. In school settings, breathing breaks have even been linked to lower test anxiety and better performance. The same logic applies before walking through a new classroom door.
Try it: Practice Belly Breathing together at bedtime a couple of weeks before school starts: keep it simple as practicing during non-stressful periods makes it easier to put in place when it’s really needed. Then do one round together in the car or at the door on those first back to school mornings.
Shift the Worried Thoughts: Push the Clouds
Push the Clouds is a FYBS Catch Your Feelings strategy: imagine heavy feelings as dark clouds in the sky, push them away while saying a simple rhyme ("Push the clouds away, until the sky is clear, send away the heavy thoughts, and bring the sunshine near!"), and keep pushing until the sun shines through.
This strategy helps reframe catastrophic "what ifs" (e.g. what if no one remembers me, what if my teacher hates me) by teaching kids to swap an unhelpful thought for a lighter one. Research shows that even brief, one-time versions of this kind of reframing can reduce anxiety symptoms in kids. Push the Clouds is particularly good for younger worriers whereas its counterpart, Turn the Dial, leans into perspective-shifting skills that older kids might prefer.
Try it: When your child shares a specific worry ("What if I can't find my classroom?"), invite them to picture it as a stormy cloud and physically push it away with their hands while saying the rhyme. The physical action paired with the words gives anxious thoughts somewhere to go.
Lean on Connection: Feel It Together
Feel It Together is a FYBS Connect with Others strategy, and it may be the one that comes most naturally to you already as the caregiver: pay attention to feelings that are heavy, share those feelings with someone you trust, and notice whether sharing helped them feel lighter. But remember: the focus is on listening, not fixing.
The key isn't just talking: it's how the listener responds by validating and active listening. Research shows kids who talk through big feelings with someone who really listens tend to understand their emotions better and get along better with others.
Try it: In the car or at breakfast, ask your child to share one heavy feeling about the day ahead. You can even model it yourself: "I felt a little nervous when I started my new job last year." Then just listen and reflect back what you hear: no need to jump to solutions.
These three strategies work together in a single morning: Belly Breathing in the car, Push the Clouds when a worry surfaces, Feel It Together at breakfast. They're not the only options: that’s why FYBS offers a full toolbox to explore.
Remember: the goal isn't a worry-free first day. Some nervousness is normal. Coping strategies aren't about making the butterflies disappear, but bringing them to a manageable size.
Our FYBS Family Toolkit has all 12 FYBS strategies to explore. And if you are looking for more ideas specific to smoothing transitions or need help with more intensive behaviors, the Child Mind Institute’s Back to School page offers more resources. Great job starting off now: positive coping skills in place today set kids up for the long run.