We never associated the term “kids” and “mental health” even a decade back but gradually the phenomena of working upon the mental wellness of kids started gaining popularity. Experts started exploring the pressures of studies on young minds. Children in primary schools too started complaining about anxiety and depression. These emotional states were never imagined or associated with children before, especially with those who belonged to financially and emotionally secure families. 

There have now been parental pressures to do good in studies from a very tender age. There are exam pressures. Comparisons have increased and kids are getting bogged down under this pressure. Though teachers are conducting classes from afar, they still have the capacity to create emotional balance. 

Kids’ home environments are difficult to regulate. Teachers are powerless in taking control of children’s environments in online settings but their pupils’ lives still revolve around them. A loving voice of a teacher even in virtual classrooms goes a long way in promoting happiness in kids. 

Even when the classrooms are virtual, teachers are still role models and if they display understanding behaviors from afar, they create a great pillar of strength for the students and promote motivation to login into classes every day. Nothing hurts a student as much as a hurtful or partial teacher. Teachers can frame positive mental health by just being there to listen impartially, to praise but not just selectively.

What we have is what we give to others. Teachers should always cultivate emotional competence and mental well-being inside themselves to feel happy and content. This would promote the same feeling in their pupils. Children acquire positivity by looking at how the adults behave. A disturbed teacher would not be able to promote the mental health of pupils. It's the emotionally intelligent and balanced ones who have the capacity to do so.

In these pandemic times, teachers quickly adapted to technology for the sake of their pupils. They would now need to go a step further by identifying the scope of support that they can provide apart from education.There are hardly any solutions that teachers can provide from far-off but just listening would help the students in oozing out the blues. There should be one or two classes in intervals just for talking and sharing emotions.

Teachers have done a marvelous job in the whole pandemic period. They have mastered the skill of teaching with a completely different methodology, something that they were not accustomed to. It was one of the toughest professional demands. Hats off to them for faring so well. Their physical interaction with their pupils might have reduced drastically but their impact on their pupils’ lives would remain intact. Working upon the emotional chords even from a distance would go a long way in promoting good mental health and the emotional wellbeing of the students.