Children’s Grief Awareness Week 2024
It’s Children’s Grief Awareness Week, 18th – 24th November, a time to bring attention to the thousands of children coping with the death of a loved one. Children often feel alone in their grief, but together, we can raise awareness and offer the support they need.
Policy focus: grief education
This year, the Week’s policy focus is on grief education. The Government has opened a review of the Curriculum, an excellent opportunity to highlight the importance of grief education and call for grief education to be included as an essential topic.
Research from leading experts in childhood bereavement suggests grief education should be an essential component of the curriculum, highlighting that a proactive approach can offer protective factors for children, young people, their families and wider communities (including educational settings and local communities). Recent research suggests that grief education could be a protective factor against further consequences of bereavement, including social isolation and bullying[1].
A collaboration between the Childhood Bereavement Network and Votes for Schools in November 2023 saw almost 38,000 children and young people take part in a brief sensitive and gentle introduction to grief education. 81% of primary age and 65% of secondary age pupils agreed that they would know how to support a friend[2].
The Curriculum Review closes on 22 November 2024, during Children’s Grief Awareness Week.
Additionally, the importance of grief education will be debated in Parliament on Monday 2 December 2024.
This is another opportunity to highlight the importance of grief education and call on the Government to do better to support bereaved children and young people.
You can download the following template letter to write or email your local Parliamentarian, asking them to do two things:
1. Write to the Secretary of State for Education and the Chair of the Review, Professor Becky Francis CBE, highlighting the importance of grief education.
2. Attend the upcoming debate on Monday 2 December 2024, showing their support for the bereaved children and young people in their constituency.
[1] Joy, C., Staniland, L., Mazzucchelli, T.G. et al. What Bereaved Children Want to Know About Death and Grief. J Child Fam Stud 33, 327–337 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-023-02694-x
[2] Votes for Schools, Vote Topic Results: Would you know how to support a friend if someone important to them died (17 – 24 November 2023) https://www.votesforschools.com/results/health-wellbeing/would-you-know-how-to-support-a-friend-if-someone-important-to-them-died/
