- Welcome to another Ohio Learns 360 webinar.

My name is Steven Gel, health reporter with Idea Stream Public Media, and today I'll be speaking with Mohey Parva, senior child and adolescent psychotherapist with Manhattan Psychology Group.

Let's get started.

- Course.

- So first, could you tell me a little bit more about your work and your experience in the field?

- Sure.

So at the moment I work at Manhattan Psychology Group.

I work with children and adolescents and families as well.

I work primarily with children, adolescents presenting with anxiety, depression, OCDI work with families where they're struggling with parenting skills, so they need some help with managing their children's behavior, either at home or at school, if they're noticing any kind of behavior difficulties or, you know, aggressive behavior at home, at school, difficulty focusing in the class, difficulty following directions, those kind of things.

- So looking at test anxiety, the first thing I'm wondering is how common is this in children?

- It's very common, actually.

I do see a lot of clients currently also who struggle with, with test anxiety, and it could be a, because of a few different reasons.

So we have, you know, you can have some students who are just very perfectionistic and so for them they're thinking, I have to get this a, in this class, I have to get this perfect score.

If I don't get it, I, you know, I'm a failure or it means this about me, or I might be a disappointment to my teachers or my parents might be disappointed.

So you have test anxiety that shows up a lot with those kinds of students.

And then you also have some students who struggle with just organizing their themselves, structuring their time, just not having good study strategies.

And that obviously leads to then not feeling as confident when they actually have a test.

So, so you see this a lot with, with both kinds of students.

- You mentioned that some factors can lead to anxiety.

Any others that seem to present themselves often?

- That's a good question.

Yeah, so I mean you, I also see some clients who I, who I'm seeing anyway for like anxiety who I'm seeing for basically, I think, I think I would say more for just anxiety, whether it's some generalized anxiety, in any case, it does end up like depending on what else is going on in their lives, you do end up seeing some test anxiety as well.

Whether it's like, you know, maybe there's some pressure from the parents, maybe there's some pressure at school, maybe there's some other external factors that are going on that's leading to them, you know, having these, these thought patterns because a lot of the reason why this anxiety is so high is because these clients, these students are, are having these thoughts that are going through their mind about what would happen if they don't get that good score.

And there's a lot of, you know, depending on environment or how they grew up or maybe there was a lot of pressure when they're growing up to get certain scores or academics were really important, or maybe the families, you know, come from very strong academic backgrounds.

So the growing up with that kind of, so that's sometimes that's something that I've noticed a lot that that then, you know, is like a belief that they hold about themselves, which leads to then this anxiousness during, before or during taking tests.

- Thank you.

So you talked about sort of generalized anxiety.

Do you find generalized or social anxiety might be different than test anxiety?

And what does that mean for treating a child?

- Yeah, absolutely.

So with generalized anxiety, how it's different from test anxiety is, you can see this in a lot of different situations, not just related to school, but it could be related to problems that they're having with their friends, or it might be something related to, you know, going outside and doing things.

It could be related to other areas of their lives where there this anxieties also showing up with social anxiety.

So all this sort of falls under that big umbrella of anxiety.

And then you have all of these other diagnoses that come under it With social anxiety, it's specifically anxiety in relation to interacting with other people.

So generally there's, you know, these thoughts that go through people's minds that what is that person thinking about me?

Maybe they're judging me.

Can I go up to, if I go up to this person in the store and ask them where the milk is placed, they're gonna think something about me.

Or if I present in front of my class, if I see someone smile at me, it means they think that something I said was stupid, you know?

So there's this automatic, automatic click in their mind that that person is thinking something negative about them.

And there's also a lot of overlap sometimes with these anxiety diagnosis.

You'll see, you know, kids who might have social anxiety also might have some generalized anxiety or, or vice versa.

- When you're dealing with this, how much role does negative self-talk internal self-talk play in driving this kind of anxiety?

- That's a great question.

So it actually plays a huge role in how the anxiety is manifested because, so I'm a, I'm a cognitive behavioral therapist, which means that we look at how thoughts influence our feelings and they influence our behaviors.

And a lot of the times what people are telling themselves influences how we feel.

So if you are in a situation, I explain this to little kids, you know, like if you are, if you see, if you're scared of bugs and you see a little spider crawling on your desk and you think to yourself, oh my god, a spider is gonna bite me and I'm gonna die, you know, that's gonna lead to extreme anxiety.

But if you think to yourself, well, I don't like spiders, it's crawling on my desk.

I mean, I could get rid of it by doing this, that still might lead to some anxiety, but it's not gonna be as high.

So what you, what you say to yourself is so important in how you, you manage the anxiety and then there's, you know, ways in which we teach them how to, how to change some of that self-talk or how to change some of those thoughts to make them more realistic.

- And if a child has test anxiety, what do you teach them in terms of coping mechanisms in the moment to get out of this sort of this spiral they might find themselves in?

- Yeah, so one of the things that's so powerful is mindfulness.

So I do a lot of practicing of just any kind of mindfulness, whether it's in the form of breathing exercises, whether it's in the form of visualization, it's, it's all about grounding them in the present moment as opposed to focusing on something that's gonna happen in the future.

So even a simple breathing exercise, like breathing in for four counts, hold your breath for two counts, breathe out for four counts.

This is just a really simple exercise we even have the parents practice this with, with them when they're, when they're not stressed out.

So that it's easy for them to then practice when they are in a situation where anxiety is high.

And then visualization, as I said, is having them imagine being in a place that makes them feel happy or safe.

Or it could be, a lot of times kids will say like Disneyland or they'll say their bedroom or just some place that makes them feel safe and actually imagine themselves there, imagine what they're seeing, imagine the sounds, imagine what it, what it feels like around them that can help them stay grounded in that, in that current moment that they're in.

- Thank you.

When we talk about mindfulness, does any of that play into them recognizing this negative self-talk and maneuvering out of that Being aware?

- Yeah, exactly.

So sometimes when our anxiety is really, really high, we're more likely to be having some negative self-talk that might not be very realistic.

We might be having some thoughts that are not based entirely on facts.

And so when we start practicing some of these breathing exercises, some of this mindfulness, it just lowers that intensity of the emotions that we're then able to evaluate those thoughts, think about, you know, what really was it that I was thinking, how much do I believe that now?

And most of the time, you know, you're able to then assess those thoughts and then find a different way to think about that same situation - And looking for a moment at the role of families and parents in all of this, I was just hoping you can gimme an idea of what warning signs parents should look for to see if there might be something like this happening.

- Yeah, so if you are noticing that, you know, firstly when, when kids have this test anxiety, it could be either anxiety that's before the test, anxiety during the test, anxiety after the test.

So recognizing when that's showing up for your child, and if it is, if it's showing up before the test, you're gonna see, you know, complaints about having a stomach ache, you know, they might be refusing to go to school.

That's a really common one that I've seen when, you know, there's a lot of test anxiety or during a test when they're actually taking a test, they, they might say that they blanked out during the test, they couldn't remember anything.

They may have trouble focusing, they might wanna just leave the classroom.

Sometimes you'll see kids just thinking about the test and they'll start crying or reporting like their heart is racing really fast.

These are all just common symptoms of of anxiety that, that get triggered.

Also during just thinking about an upcoming test, - Do you find any association between this anxiety and perhaps a DHD?

- Yes, that's, that is something that, you know, we've noticed as well with that anxiety, with kids with anxiety.

They, I mean, kids with who have a DHD also struggle with some like executive functioning skills.

So they might struggle with organizing themselves, they might struggle with like planning, planning for the test.

And so, you know, when you already struggle with some of those things and then there's an upcoming test, you're gonna feel like you're not as confident about taking the test.

And that can lead to some, some anxiety.

So for those kids who struggle, so it's really important to figure out, you know, like what is really causing, what is a root cause of your anxiety?

So with these kids who, you know, might have some symptoms of A-A-D-H-D, you wanna focus more differently on that, like more providing them with good test taking strategies, helping them plan better.

There's some clients I, I see who, who have a whiteboard in their room and they'll write down, you know, all the classes that they have, when are their upcoming assignments, just to help them just sort of see it laid out.

And what might help them with, with some of the test anxieties, it's more related to their struggle with executive functioning skills.

So it might be like organizing themselves or struggling to plan their time and like figure out how to, how to study effectively for the test.

So for those kinds of kids to help them with their test anxiety so that they feel a little more confident before the test and feel like they've really prepared well.

It's, it's more about teaching them these, these test taking strategies.

So it might be just, you know, how do I, the moment I, I know that a test is coming up, like, can I put this on my calendar or where can I write this down?

I have some clients who will use a whiteboard in their, in their bedrooms where they just track all of their assignments that are due just so that they don't miss anything.

And yeah, I think that can, that can be really helpful in just, in just planning themselves and structuring their time in a better way.

- Thanks.

And when parents notice some of these indications, what are your recommendations for how they initially respond to the child's concern, even before they take any sort of action?

- Yeah, that's a great question.

It's really important, you know, for a parent to, especially when this is happening, a lot to just, you know, they might notice their own frustration, but it would just be aware of it and to try and be as patient as they can with their child, it's important to just validate their concerns.

If you noticing that your child's feeling anxious before tests, just like normalizing it for them and saying, I can see that you're really stressed out, you know, it's really normal to feel that way before a test.

Can you tell me what's making you feel anxious?

And then, you know, helping their child navigate some of those negative thinking patterns that might be coming up.

So it could be, you know, if the child is afraid that they're gonna fail the test, asking them, you know, what is the proof you that you think you will fail the test, is there a different way in which you can think about this?

If you really did fail your test, what would happen next?

Because sometimes even just thinking about the worst case scenario, sometimes when you say it out loud and you realize that, that actually wouldn't be terrible because I'd be able to get through it somehow.

So helping them, you know, talk through some of that stuff and really evaluate those negative thinking patterns can be, can be a good like first step for, for the family.

- Appreciate that.

I, I suppose any child when they're having a test might feel certain anxiousness, but at what point do you notice a difference between regular nervousness and test anxiety and what really does that look like?

- Yeah, so I, I personally like what I've seen, if it's just like normal stress, you know, being able to talk through it is generally helpful when you are noticing that they are, you know, when they're taking the test and they're feeling so anxious that they're blanking out, they don't remember the material or they, you know, have an urge to just leave the classroom or, or right before the test they wanna leave and go back home or when they're home they don't wanna go to school.

When you're noticing this happen frequently, it's just a sign that, you know, it's really something that you need to help your child with and help them figure out and get them the right strategies to, to get through this anxiety.

- Well, I appreciate that.

So if parents are looking at, let's say, getting professional help with therapists, how do they approach that?

What should they be looking for?

- Yeah, so in terms of the first part, you know, if you're feeling like, you know, I've tried all these strategies, I really, you know, my child is refusing to go to school and you know, I keep encouraging them to go to school when it says a test or they're just blanking out, they're not doing so well at school, or the anxiety is just so high that the parents are also struggling to give them the right strategies and just don't know what to do about that.

I think that's the best time to see, to have your child see a therapist because the therapist can also help the parents just give them that support and help them understand, you know, how they can support their child best.

And then of course give the child those strategies.

Seeing a, a cognitive behavioral therapist who would give some very specific, you know, behavioral concrete skills on like what they can do and also help them with those negative thinking patterns.

I, I would recommend, you know, seeing a cognitive behavioral therapist because that would be the best fit for, for something like this.

- And is it that this kind of therapist helps them better understand what and how they think and how to approach the ways that they approach their thoughts on this matter?

- Exactly.

So the therapist would help them first identify what's going through their mind that's leading to that anxiety because sometimes even when parents ask their children, you know, like, okay, what's going on?

What is, what's making you feel this way?

Kids sometimes have a hard time recognizing what they are feeling.

So a therapist can actually help them through a lot of practice, like to understand how to recognize what it is that's going through their mind that's, that's causing the anxiety in the first place.

And then if there, if there is some inaccuracy to that thought like, which probably there is, which is leading to like, you know, so much anxiety, really recognizing that and helping them look at perspectives as a, as a CBT therapist, one of the things we also do with the children is help them create coping statements based on facts.

So based on things that they share with the therapist, we create a coping statement for them so that they're reading that statement throughout the week and then specifically before the test so that it's helped.

It's something that helps them recognize like, this is something that I created for myself and this is all based in facts and it's the truth about the situation.

And it just makes them feel a lot calmer when they're in those stressful situations.

- Now you spoke at the outset a bit about parents and their expectations.

How do you work with that when you find a family that is a high achieving family but perhaps the pressures become counterproductive?

- That's a great point because, you know, we see this a lot where parents don't realize that they're putting so much pressure on their child or indirectly their child is feeling pressured even if the parents don't need to put that kind of pressure on them.

So, you know, the first thing that I would do is just talk to the parents about how this is affecting their child.

And even if they, you know, don't mean it in, in that way and they just looking for to have their child do well at school, I, I try to explain to them how this is in fact making it worse for them, how their anxiety is just making this so much worse.

And the other really important thing that I, I encourage them to do is focus more on the child's efforts rather than the final grade.

So instead of them when they come in, like, you know, really praising them for getting those a, praising them instead for, you know, when they're doing a really good job with homework, when they're being very organized, when they're motivated to work hard and you see them planning their work or studying hard, those are the, those are the things you wanna praise as opposed to just that final grade.

And if they are getting, you know, if they do get a bad grade to not put a lot of pressure on them and to let them know that as long as they worked hard that it's okay and that they can try again the next time.

- So I was wondering at what point with families that have a perfectionist mindset when the child's saying I have to get all As I have to be perfect or I want to achieve this goal at that point, how do you set their mindset, let's say on a different path?

A more positive one?

- Yeah, so it does take a long time.

You know, when people have these very rigid thoughts about situations and these very perfectionistic thoughts, there's a few different ways in which we handle this, but one of the main ways is identifying if it were not perfect then what, right?

What is the alternative?

And teaching them ways to be okay with that alternative.

And again, it takes a lot of time for them to do that, but helping them like with slowly trying different things that that would help them face that the, the fact that if there's something were not perfect, would they be okay with that?

So sometimes, like for an example, it's if you see a child who's coming with very perfectionistic tendencies, it's not just in the area of academics, it's sometimes you'll see that in other areas as well.

And so we start working on an area that's a little less stressful for them if it were not perfect and then gradually work our way towards some of these perfectionistic thoughts that they have in more like high stress situations like school.

- Appreciate that.

When a child works through CBT, what do you see over times in terms of the kinds of trends and differences in their behavior outcomes from addressing these things?

- Yeah, we actually see, we see a lot of confidence.

It takes like a lot of change in the way in which people handle situations, the way in which they think about situations.

It does take some time and of course it depends on the age as well of the child, like younger children, it takes a little longer time for them to be able to get to that point.

Teenagers, it's a lot, it can be a lot faster and it depends on how motivated they are in treatment because CBT does require some work to be done outside of the sessions as well.

And some practice identifying thoughts and, and trying to look at alternate ways of, of looking at situations.

But because this your, not just like your, your thoughts that are coming up but also be out, what are your core beliefs about yourself and about the world around you and working on changing some of those, if we're noticing that those are tied to the thoughts that you're having about a situation.

And so when you're really looking at, you know, these deeper things that are going on with the person, you really do see a lot of change over time.

So generally we say like, you know, within, within six months to a year you really do start seeing a lot of changes in the way in which people are handling these situations or these stressful events.

- So we've spoken a bit about parents' work and the therapist work, but at what point do you introduce teachers and schools into the mix and how do you find yourself working with them?

And on that point, what sort of accommodations or plans might parents want to consider?

- Yeah, so sometimes if kids are having difficulty, you know, during a test, so say they're, like I mentioned earlier, you know, if they're blanking out during a test or you know, if they start looking around the room and seeing, oh everybody's, it looks like everyone's finished their test and I'm the only one working, that can even lead to more anxiety.

So sometimes, we'll I, I recommend you know that the parents speak with the teachers about maybe changing their placement, so maybe sitting in the front of the class as opposed to wherever else they're sitting in the classroom so that they're less eco, they're less motivated to look around the room because they're just looking at their paper and just completing what's in front of them and they're not really able to scan the room for, you know, what else is going on.

Sometimes kids might feel they're already anxious and then they might feel more anxious when they, they they hear the sound of the clock ticking or you know, they'll see people outside, you know, talking or they'll hear different sounds.

So even putting in like earplugs in their, in their ears to drown out some of the sounds like getting this from the teachers, but if, if it is to a point where the child really does need even more accommodations than speaking to them about, you know, getting accommodations where they can take a break and leave the classroom or you know, get extra test time or, and that, that just varies case to case by case, but these are some other options that are available to students.

- So is that a, a 5 0 4 plan essentially?

- Yeah, so they would get that on their IEP and their like on their, on their plan for, you know, these extra accommodations.

But in terms of sitting in the front of the class, that's something that you could just speak to the teacher about and just have that or, you know, it could be even things such as if, if you notice that students will, they start, they look at their, their exam paper and they start looking through all the questions and it just becomes really overwhelming for them.

It could even just be, you know, teaching them like, just look at the first question and that's it.

And then maybe cover the remaining parts of your test paper or have the teacher give you a piece of paper that you can cover the rest of your, the rest of the sheet with so that you're not looking at anything else other than the question that's right in front of you.

- Thank you.

When it comes to sort of focus and concentration, could you talk a little deeper about this issue of mindfulness of meditation and what's involved, how does it help them perhaps in the moment to cope with their, their stress, their anxiety?

- Yeah, so with any kind of mindfulness or meditation, the principle behind that is that you are just focusing on the present moment.

And when your thoughts are just focused on the present, you're not thinking about the past, you're not thinking about the future.

You are trying to, whatever thoughts are going through your mind, you're trying to not judge anything and you are just focusing on what's happening now.

And when you do that, you notice that whatever emotions, strong emotions you're feeling, they're gonna gradually go down.

But one thing that I hear a lot from people is, oh, mindfulness doesn't work.

And the reason they say that is because they're not practicing it and making it a part of their life when they are not stressed out because you have to use, it's sort of like, it's like a skill that you would, you would practice.

It's like learning how to play the piano.

Like you have to practice it a bunch before you start getting good at it.

So it's the same thing with mindfulness and sometimes I encourage families to practice these exercises all together so that when, you know, maybe it could be as part of their daily routine, say before going to bed at night, so that when they are in a stressful situation, say before taking a test, they're able to utilize these strategies more effectively and they're more likely to think about it too and use them in these situations.

- And when it comes to test anxiety, are there certain age ranges where you see this more often and do you find yourself using different strategies based upon a child's age?

- That's a great question.

I actually see it more with kids in middle school and high school.

Generally the strategies just remain the same because it really depends on, again, what is causing that anxiety.

And most of the time it's just figuring out what are these thoughts that are leading to you feeling so stressed out and how do we work through that?

How do we come up with a plan so that you feel less stressed out?

So, and then, and, and a lot of the times if it's just related to their thoughts and there's not so much with the, with the test taking strategies, but sometimes that is, that is also effective.

The one thing I've noticed more with, with younger kids, although the can happen with, you know, older, younger kids is that refusal to go to school when there's a test and the parents will often say, you know, oh my gosh, my my child was so stressed out, it's okay, you can stay home, but that's not something you wanna do.

Because that ends up reinforcing that anxiety.

And in that moment the child feels, okay, I I got to stay home, you know, this is so much better, I feel so much better.

And the parent is also happy to see that their child feels better about it and they're like, it's just one test.

But what ends up happening later on is that, you know, when the next test comes, it makes it even harder for that child to then wanna go to school.

So, you know, it's, it's just really important if they're expressing it, you know, that they wanna stay home to just gently, you know, to validate them to, to to say, you know, I know that you're stressed out.

I know this is a scary test for you and it's really important for you to go to school, you know, to like make sure that they are going and taking that test because when they face their fear, you are gonna notice some of that, that anxiety getting better over time in the long term, - Parents will want to check in on the kids and see how they're doing.

But what are your recommendations in terms of finding that that line, that balance between checking in and supporting a child and making them feel stressed because you're doing that too much?

- That's a really good question because it's, so, it's, it's really different for a lot of kids and sometimes what I will do is actually speak with both the child and the parent together about this, especially when it's a teenager and they, they wanna be more independent, but the parents wanna check in a little more because they're concerned.

So I sort of try to have them both come up with some, some middle ground where I say, okay, what would be a good mom's concern and just wants to check in with you, but I know you wanna feel more responsible.

So where can we, you know, meet halfway where, you know, mom's checking in once in a while, but it's not, it's not too much generally, you know, they'll say could be sometimes, sometimes kids will say like, okay, maybe at the end of the day they can just check in to see that homework was completed, you know, or it might even be some, some parents would just check in like once a week just to see that things are going okay.

But I, I usually do encourage them to like, you know, unless it's absolutely needed to give your child some independence and freedom to like do their own thing and try it themselves instead of the parents like hovering and you know, and being there when, when the children like don't, when the child doesn't want them to be around.

- I understand.

And you know, at first parents can see some of these behaviors go on to school, but what sort of indicators do you see when a child is more at ease when tests come up that a parent could see, oh, they feel more at ease.

Things are going better than they had before.

- Yeah, so, so you, it just depends on what the, what was coming up before.

So I'll see with kids who are refusing to go to school, I'll see them, you know, it'll force be school refusal.

If it's school refusal very often I'll gradually see school refusal maybe twice a week, then I'll start seeing it once a week and then I'll just see that go away, you know, or if it's kids who are getting very, very anxious before tests, you know, you'll start, no, I'll start noticing like some of that anxiety start to go away as well.

Like they're not, they're not expressing it as much or they're not, you know, depending on what physical symptoms are coming up, they report alluring in some of those symptoms.

So is this important to check with your child?

What, what is the baseline in the first, in the first place?

Like how are they, how are they showing anxiety?

So you can continue to monitor to see how things are going.

- Thank you, appreciate that.

Is there anything else we haven't discussed that you think it's important for parents to know when it comes to the issue of testing anxiety and addressing it?

- I guess for, you know, just in general for study strategies, something that could be helpful for them is in addition to what I've mentioned about creating a, you know, a schedule for them, that's something also that parents can help with their, with their kids.

Because a lot of times, especially in middle school children have a harder time, you know, creating a study schedule for themselves and need a little bit of help.

Something else that could help that I've noticed even working with clients is that working with somebody like a peer from their class or a friend can be helpful so that they can quiz each other on material.

And if they're not able to physically, you know, sit in the same place together to FaceTime each other and do homework together or, you know, prepare for a test together, that seems to be a really popular strategy.

Other things that could be helpful is just being able to, when they are learning something new to, to summarize the material and think about, you know, what questions could possibly be asked on the test.

And, and parents can definitely help with a lot of these things if kids are, are struggling to, to do some of these.

And also finding out a little bit about the test before it even happens.

So knowing what the format is, is it gonna be multiple choice?

Is it long answers, is it short answers?

And sometimes it comes up in our sessions when, you know, they'll express being really anxious about the test and when they ask them more they, they say, oh, actually I actually don't know, you know, what, what we're gonna be tested.

And I'm just, so just the thought of the test is so overwhelming that I didn't bother to, to find out more about it.

So it can be helpful just to out more details about what you're being tested on, what that's gonna look like, and that itself can just make you feel like you can be a, a bit more prepared for the test.

- So it's fear of the unknown in some sense, not knowing what you're going to deal with.

- Yes, exactly.

Sometimes for, for some of the clients that I see it is that, that fear of the unknown, like it could just be this really scary thing and the more we talk about it and the more we evaluate what is making you feel scared about this, what part of the test, what aspect of it, you know, you, you recognize that, oh, they just need more information about it.

And I think that could, that could help ease some of the anxiety.

And then of course there's other stuff that, that might be going on that you can navigate with them.

- Thanks.

If there was a, a bit of advice or a takeaway message you'd have for parents who are nervous about this and seeing what their children are going through, what might that be?

- I would just say that, you know, try like, firstly understand that when your child express anxiety about some of these things, to, to take it seriously and to, it's so important, you know, not to shut it down and to think that, oh, you'll be fine, you'll get through it.

But to just validate them and just be there to support them, that itself can go a long way.

And just helping them understand that you understand how they're feeling and if you know you have used a lot of strategies and you feel like you're at a loss, there's always, you know, they can always get support from their school counselor or it could be helpful to, you know, see a therapist.

And it doesn't necessarily mean that you'd be stuck in therapy for a long time, but you can get the reso the, the strategies that you need, the skills that you need to then build your confidence.

- And a final question, if I may, materials any books or materials you recommend to parents who want to better understand this topic?

- Yeah, there actually are some, I could recommend some apps as well on the, on the phone that could be helpful.

So there's, for mindfulness and just general like relaxation strategies, smiling Mind is a really helpful app and it has some very kid friendly exercises that could be great.

And it's a free app.

There's also, I'm gonna look at my phone.

Thank you have this app.

Yeah, of course.

It's called mindshift.

It's a CBT app that can actually help you and this is something that they can use throughout, you know, to, to help children like understand their thoughts and identify what they're feeling and notice any, any thoughts that are leading to some extreme thinking and help them work through that so that these apps actually help with, with some of that Mind Over mood is another, is another book, it's a CBT book that can be helpful for, for parents to do with their child, but that that's a more general one.

It's like CBT in general for both anxiety and depression, but there's some exercises in there that can be helpful to do with their child.

- Thank you so much for your time and expertise.

I really appreciate it.

- It was really nice meeting you.

I thank you so much.

You as well.

Okay, bye-Bye.

- Okay, thanks for joining us on this Ohio Learns 360 webinar on the subject of test anxiety.

Join us again the future for more educational webinars for families.