How Lessons in Loss™ Is Changing the Way Schools Support Grieving Children

“You have changed our children’s lives with this wonderful project."

This Children’s Grief Awareness Week, the theme is Sharing Stories, Strengthening Hope. One of our grief specialists, Deb Brown is doing just that for children up and down the country.

When a child experiences loss - whether through the death of a loved one, the separation of parents, the serious illness of someone close, or changes that disrupt the familiarity of home - they often navigate big emotions without the words or confidence to express them.

Adults want to help, but many feel unsure how to begin the conversation, afraid of making things worse, or overwhelmed by their own feelings. Lessons in Loss™, created by former headteacher and Certified Grief Recovery Specialist Deborah Brown, is transforming that experience for children and the adults who support them.

Through thoughtfully designed journals, small-group work, and high-quality training, the project offers gentle, practical guidance for navigating grief - and a voice to children who often feel they don’t have one.

Deborah’s work is shaped by both her years in education and her own lived experience of loss. She recognised the gap in schools: children are carrying enormous emotional burdens, and staff are unsure how to offer safe, effective and consistent support. Combining her background as a headteacher with her training in the evidence-based Grief Recovery Method, Deborah developed the Lessons in Loss™ journal series and a range of training opportunities for schools, professionals, and families.

These resources are now used in schools, homes, charities and community settings, helping children aged 4–11 explore grief with clarity, honesty and compassion.

Each journal in the Lessons in Loss™ series is designed to help children gently explore emotions that feel confusing or overwhelming, memories of the person or situation that has changed, questions they’re afraid to ask, ways to talk to trusted adults, and strategies that help them feel calmer and more grounded.

The pages use accessible language, emotional literacy guidance, creative activities and bespoke artwork and optional mindfulness colouring to help children externalise what they’re feeling in a safe, structured way. Settings describe the programme as excellent value for money, highly impactful, and easy to embed within existing pastoral systems.

Alongside the journals, Deborah delivers the widely praised Helping Children with Loss course, bespoke full-day training for school staff, and corporate workshops supporting workplace bereavement and employee wellbeing. Adults frequently describe the training as practical, reassuring and transformative as well as offering new tools that support them both personally and professionally.

The feedback from schools is powerful and consistent. Staff often describe Lessons in Loss™ as something they “wish they’d had years ago” and something that “changes the way children talk about feelings”.

From Rushbrook Primary School, Senior Pastoral Leader Dee Lowe shared: “You have changed our children’s lives with this wonderful project. The children love coming together to work through the journals … You have given them a voice, which is extremely important.”

At St Bede C of E Academy, another pastoral leader Sarah Hobson said: “It has given the children a voice to be able to express their feelings … I wish I had enough money to roll this out for every child.”

These responses reflect the central aim of the project: giving children permission to feel, express and process their experiences in a safe and structured way.

But the clearest impact comes from the children themselves. Their words reveal what it feels like to finally have a safe space to place the things they have been carrying. One nine-year-old opened their journal for the first time and immediately hugged it - a moment that said everything without needing a single word.

A ten-year-old shared: “The journal has helped me a lot. I didn’t know I was allowed to get emotional about my mum being disabled.” That permission - to feel, to speak, to be honest - is life-changing.

Another child spoke about using the journal to process the suicide of their cousin: “I liked the page where I could write questions down about my cousin’s suicide and then I went to talk to my mum about it. My mum answered the questions and it made the grieving of my cousin a lot easier. I liked the mindfulness colouring because when my mind was full of scary thoughts, when I am colouring it kind of lets it go.”

These reflections show how the journals open conversations, strengthen relationships and provide meaningful emotional relief.

Children experience grief in many forms: a death in the family, a parent leaving, changes in health, changes in home, separation, imprisonment of a parent, or the loss of someone important in their lives.

With the 2026 RSE curriculum requiring schools to teach about death, dying and bereavement, there is a growing demand for resources that are evidence-based, child-friendly and practical for staff to use with confidence.

Lessons in Loss™ offers exactly that. In a time when children’s mental health needs are rising, early intervention matters. Sensitive grief education prevents issues from becoming entrenched, builds emotional literacy, reduces anxiety, and helps children feel less alone during their most difficult moments.

Lessons in Loss™ continues to grow, with new journals, expanding partnerships and increasing interest from both education and corporate sectors. Deborah’s vision remains clear: every child deserves support when they are grieving - and every adult deserves the confidence to offer it.

With heartfelt thanks to the schools in our research and development project that have continued the work: Gorse Hall Primary School, Tameside; Washacre Primary Academy, Bolton; Rushbrook Primary Academy, Manchester; Failsworth Primary School, Oldham; Alder High School, Tameside; St Stephens C of E; Burnley, Emmaus Catholic Academy Trust and The Quill C of E Trust.

Thanks also to the team at Works4U, Tameside and Alfies Squad; Liverpool for trailing the journals and to our Local MP Johnathan Reynolds and Local Councillor Dave Sweeton for attending Gorse Hall Primary School to listen to the views of the children and teachers and to Local Ward Councillor Steve Barton for visiting Rushbrook Primary School to see the project in action. This support is essential to the success of our work and we are incredibly grateful to everyone involved.

To learn more, partner with the project or bring Lessons in Loss™ to your school or organisation, visit www.lessonsinloss.com.