Support guide
Adolescents 12+ Adolescents are able to grieve as adults do. However, they have added pressures of coping with all the physical and social changes that happen to them. It may often be hard to tell whether their conduct is an expression of grief or merely typical adolescent behaviour. Friends play an important part of the grieving process for adolescents. unaffected. This is a type of conscience development, which may heighten a sense of guilt. Irrational links may be made between ‘naughty’ behaviour and the death of a younger sibling. 5-8 years Most children now develop an awareness of death having a cause, being irreversible and as something that can happen to anyone. Children are more developed verbally and may convey a cognitive understanding. However, defences such as denial of painful feelings are natural and outwardly, a child may appear
8-12 years Children’s understanding of the finality of death is
nearly equivalent to that of an adult, though abstract concepts may still be difficult. An important factor is the child’s deepening realisation of the possibility of their own future death and the fear this engenders. However, children’s ages do not provide an automatic level of understanding. Children mature at different rates; in addition, significant losses may cause regression to a previous stage of development. Knowledge comes through experience: what a child understands depends as much on his or her experience of the world as on age. Be as truthful as you can be.
SEND - Special Education Needs and Disabilities For a child with special educational needs and disabilities, their functional level of understanding (rather than actual chronological age) will be the biggest factor in how the child reacts to a death, and what they will be able to understand. Children with SEND can often have spiky developmental profiles and therefore do not always fit neatly into one box. The bereaved child you are supporting may display aspects of one or more of the age groups/developmental stages described above.
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