Widening Understanding of Attachment, Trauma and the Impact of Covid

One major factor in AAS development was the Covid pandemic. This chapter outlines the impact of the lockdowns on children, families and their mental health, as well as wider social aspects. It considers the proposition that Covid represented a watershed or paradigm change, in attitudes, quoting early policy interventions by DfE (Actions for schools during the coronavirus outbreak. Guidance for full opening https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/actions-for-schools-during-the-coronavirus-outbreak/guidance-for-full-opening-schools , 2020) and associated academic literature around the ‘Recovery Curriculum’ (Carpenter & Carpenter, A Recovery Curriculum: Loss and Life for Our Children and Schools Post Pandemic. https://www.evidenceforlearning.net/recoverycurriculum/#mentalhealth , 2000). It discusses the tensions at policy level between those advocating ‘business as usual’ and those calling for a greater emphasis on emotional wellbeing. This reflects the general ebb and flow which can be discerned in policy-making in this area from 2010 onwards. A further Covid-related issue has been highlighting the social inequalities in significant issues of health and wellbeing (e.g. Marmot et al., Build Back Fairer: The COVID-19 Marmot Review. The Pandemic, Socioeconomic and Health Inequalities in England. Institute of Health Equity, 2020), and the importance of concepts such as intersectionality, gender and race. These were discussed by a number of respondents in the research in terms of their impact on schools and need to understand attachment and trauma in this broader context. Finally, the chapter discusses the extent to which the impact of policy changes since Covid has led to increased teacher agency in this area.