Every year, The Good Childhood Report asks young people a simple question:
How is life going?
Based on insights and recommendations from The Good Childhood Report 2025, this blog explores what young people are telling us about school wellbeing and belonging.
Children and young people feel like the system says:
- Perform.
- Comply.
- Never stop.
What they need to hear is:
- You belong.
- You are valued.
- Take time to breathe.
“Perform. Comply”
School is now the part of life where children are least happy. The top worry is getting good grades. Success feels like a narrow doorway.
- If you get the grades and follow the rules, you belong.
- If not, you fall out of view.
One young person described it simply: “It keeps piling up.”
Another said: “The meritocracy of schools is very academic and not very holistic. If you’re not seen as achieving… you’re not belonging.”
Every teacher and leader knows the tension:
You want to nurture every child and you want them to achieve.
But when time and resource are tight, performance wins.
“Never stop”
Young people say that life feels constant.
- School is intense.
- Home is intense.
- Online is intense.
There are fewer youth clubs. Fewer safe spaces. Less time to be children, have fun, mess about, laugh, dance, make mistakes and… breathe.
Young people describe bombardment. Always on. No space to switch off.
Rest is rare. Stopping feels unsafe.
One said: “We need positive, community spaces… not to create a vacuum that is filled with spaces that aren’t safe.”
As the report recognised: “Their worlds are smaller… they don’t want to go out.”
What children need
Underneath the pressure, another truth appears. Children and young people, like all people, want to:
Belong.
Be noticed.
Breathe.
This is not anti-academic. It is profoundly educational. Fundamentally human.
When children feel they belong, they learn, engage, achieve and grow.
They enjoy school. They walk in with a spring in their step and a sparkle in their eyes.
A young person said it well: “Wellbeing is how you feel about yourself and your life.”
Belonging has two essential ingredients:
- A trusted adult
- Wellbeing that is integrated, not bolted on
Without these, belonging is conditional and fragile. Sadly, the Good Childhood Report 2025 shows that these two essential ingredients are missing, and missed, by children.
Trusted adults are vital
When young people talk about what got them through, they mention a person.
That adult who noticed, listened and believed in them.
A young person explained:
“Now I’ve got a great staff member, and they have made all the difference… it shows how much the relationship is so key.”
Another said:
“Young people need to not only be listened to, but heard.”
This is not incidental. It is developmental and it is vital.
Relationships are the mechanism of learning, safety and growth.
Every school has those adults. The challenge is not caring — it is capacity.
Trusted adults make school possible.
They keep children coming back tomorrow, and the day after.
If we want children to belong, adults must have time, training and support to truly know them.
Discover the right qualification to help make your school a place where children belong with our…
Wellbeing must be integrated, not added
Schools do enormous work on wellbeing.
Breakfast clubs. Counselling. PSHE. Mentoring. Check-ins.
Staff go above and beyond every day.
But young people can tell when well-being is something added, rather than embedded.
A bolt-on. A poster. A themed week. A rushed lesson.
A young person noticed this gap:
“We had PSHE every other week… he had maybe five minutes to prepare.”
Well-being needs to be integrated into leadership, policy, curriculum, and culture.
Not as an initiative, but as part of how school works.
When well-being is integrated, children do not need to earn belonging.
They walk into school knowing they matter.
Making the change
We help schools make wellbeing part of how school works.
We train and qualify staff to be trusted adults.
We support leaders to build cultures of belonging.
We support schools to create space for children to breathe.
Children are not asking for lower expectations, they value good grades more than ever.
They are asking for humanity alongside ambition.
A system that says:
You belong.
You are valued.
You have space to breathe.
Perform, yes.
Learn, yes.
Grow, of course.
But not at the cost of childhood.
Join us in making this change.
Get in touch to discuss how we can support whole-school wellbeing.