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Exam season is upon us. Whether your kids are doing Highers, A-levels, GCSEs or end-of-year exams, what is the best way to support your child? Perhaps they are doing everything they can to pretend the looming exams don’t exist. Or maybe you have the opposite problem, and your teen is paralysed with anxiety.

Dr Jane Gilmour, a Consultant Clinical Psychologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital, joined Anita Rani on ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour. They discussed how to support teenagers through this stressful time.

She shared her best advice for parents...

“As soon as you hit puberty, the brain is marinated in these pubertal hormones, and it means the brain changes state,” says Dr Gilmour. “There are some unique drives that we need to know about, as the adult supporting the teenager, so that we can capitalise on them and make sure that they reach their potential. Some of those drives might include a search for novelty, getting integrated into the peer group, a search for identity – thinking about independence and autonomy.

“So, we want to think about how neuroscience and education can join hands and learn from one another, so that this young person can ride on a crest of a wave and get through this learning period – whether that be life skills or content in terms of exams – and make the most of this time.”

“You need to know what’s going on. Is this young person frightened about the idea of getting engaged because it feels like a big hill to climb, or do they not know where to start?” says Dr Gilmour. “Let’s imagine GSCEs - there’s a lot of content there, and it’s an organisational issue. You want to ask the question with genuine curiosity: What is it that’s stopping you getting going?

“One of the key things we know about the teenage brain is that they respond really well to a consultative model – this is part of their drive towards being independent. So, I would ask that young person: What is it that’s stopping you going today? What do you think the hardest thing would be? Ask them to write their timetable and find out what you should do as a parent to keep them to their plan."

“If you start to yell, the teenage brain will see that as a threat,” says Dr Gilmour. “Try not to let that emotion bleed into the conversation with your teenager. It’s ok to feel those emotions but take them to your partner or your friend and let it all hang out. Sort through them with that adult context, and then once you’re clear-headed and calm, go back into negotiations with your young person.”

“For the Year 13 kids who are doing A-levels in England and Wales, they haven’t had any gateway exams before,” reminds Dr Gilmour. “I think there is some anxiety in some of the families I talk to at work, that they haven’t had the experience of GCSEs, so will they be ok?

“I think it’s worth bearing in mind that many young people in the world have only one set of gateway exams, and in fact, there’s a push in the education and neuroscience community to rethink GCSEs in their entirety.”

“Is it the young person or the parent who is anxious? The strategies would be different depending on where the anxiety lies,” says Dr Gilmour.

“As parents, we all hold some anxiety about these exam periods because we are looking forward into future. Young people are more likely to be in the moment so I would want to think about that.”

“Perpetual reassurance rarely helps. I would get practical about this,” suggests Dr Gilmour. “The three things we know help in terms of learning material is: rest, active learning and sleep. Have a bit of wakeful rest – a short period of active learning and then a rest. Then make sure they’re getting good quality sleep – it’s the glue of the memory.

“Also, think about learning in a calm environment. If you get that info across to a young, conscientious person so they have a realistic timetable that’s not overwhelming, they’ll take that on board.”

“Recognise what message you’re sending at home,” says Dr Gilmour. “If the first question you ask when they come in the door is ‘How was the test? What was your mark? What did everyone else get?’, you’re giving them the message that academic work is your priority.

“Of course, exams are important. But if you ask any parent, the only thing they care about is that their kid is alright. So, think about the messages you’re giving. ‘You can be fabulous and not perfect’ is something you might say out loud and act out and talk about in words and actions.

“Praise a conscientious kid for taking a break, for seeing their friends, for taking care of themselves. Holding that balance and perspective is really one of our key tasks as a parent.”

“We want to differentiate between chronic and perpetual stress, which is overwhelming and toxic, particularly for the developing brain, and short bursts of stress, which can be embraced and can push you to find something about yourself that is wonderful,” says Dr Gilmour.

“There’s a group at Stanford who looked at the different mindsets about stress. If you consider a short burst of stress ‘extra energy’, your brain and your body react in a different way and you’re more likely to build resilience. Think about that mindset at home as well – exam nerves are extra energy, this is rocket fuel to get you through your exam. That can really change the way you can consider the experience of stress.”

“For a child that has lost that perspective, it might be about showing that their value to you is not about their exam results. You can say: ‘I don’t want to know what your exam mark is, I want to know that you’re looking after yourself... The thing that matters to me is that you’re engaged with this, you’re enjoying it and you’re doing your best’.

“If that young person has perfectionist tendencies - and girls sometimes are more likely to have these - I would want to keep an eye on that, because sometimes it can build a bit of momentum.”

“We know that even if switched off, a mobile phone in the room influences our cognitive capacity. It’s as if you’re doing something in a sleep-deprived state,” says Dr Gilmour.

“I would come to using a consultative model again: ‘The deal is, the mobile phone stays out of the room. How are we going to make sure you have enough access, so you find out what’s going on?’

“Then you’re not penalising your young person by having the mobile phone out of the room. You’re allowing them to take control of how that happens. The non-negotiable part is that the phone stays out of the room.”

“I work with lots of families with working parents, so one of the things you could do is think about using technology in an innovative way,” says Dr Gilmour. “You might drop in and do a FaceTime after 20 minutes. You could even use your lunch break to do some social learning together. You don’t need to be in the room to be emotionally available.

“You could also think about using that social brain and get some study groups together to get peer-to-peer learning going. If you learn to be able to teach someone, it’s embedded more richly than if you learn to simply pass a test. You might not be the person supporting the learning process, but there can be a social group that is.”

Listen to the full interview with Dr Jane Gilmour on ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Sounds, where you can also find every episode of Woman’s Hour you may have missed. Follow us on and @bbcwomanshour.