The Koala Who Can

A great book to help children cope with change

By Michael (Speech Pathologist)

Change can pose quite a challenge for children. Jacques Lacan, a French psychiatrist, argued that feelings of anxiety often arise when we do not know what is expected of us. New and unfamiliar situations present new expectations, and often these expectations are not only ‘unwritten,’ but also ‘unspoken.’ As adults, we typically have a wealth of experience with the world behind, so when we unexpectedly find ourselves in a new situation, we can draw upon our encounters with other, more-or-less similar situations to guide how we might act in order to meet the expectations that might accompany this new set of circumstances.

For children, however, many situations they will encounter are not only ‘new,’ but ‘radically new’: they don’t have the familiar landmarks they can use to orient themselves and find their bearings in whatever new territory they are attempting to navigate. There is nothing quite like kinder until you attend kinder for the first time, and school only resembles kinder to a small degree.

So how do children cope with the great deluge of situations to which they are subjected in those early years? Pragmatic language and social-inferencing skills are key here: if you can make inferences about social situations and gauge how people around you are reacting to things that you and others do, then this means you can learn-as-you-go and figure out how you should be acting to meet the expectations of the situation. Similarly, if you are able to communicate effectively with other people, you can deftly ask others around you to fill you in on what you should be doing, or perhaps even offer the right apologies or crack the right jokes that will serve to smooth over any unintentional blunders you might make during the period of adjustment.

When children aren’t quite so well-versed in these skills as their peers, then the introduction of even minor changes to a routine, activity, or what-have-you can occasion anxiety. It can be as if a sudden gust of wind has unmoored them, and they find themselves adrift in strange waters without the necessary navigation equipment chart their way back to the dock. From an outsider’s perspective, the change is minor, but that is because past experience and the ability to ‘check in’ with others through communication allows for the recognition that expectations really haven’t shifted all that much, I just need to do or stop doing this one thing now that the situation has changed.

Children who find change—especially of the expected and/or unwelcome variety—difficult to manage need multiple resources to draw upon when such changes do inevitably occur. At the outset, it is usually helpful to help children get a firm grasp on what change means, and the distinctions between welcome/unwelcome and unexpected/expected changes. Leading on from this, helping children to understand that even when unexpected and unwelcome changes do occur, it’s okay, because a) it probably won’t be as bad as they expected, and may even bring along new and exciting things that they will enjoy, and b) they cope with such changes by using one of the strategies they have learned.

The book I want to bring to your attention today (The Koala Who Can, written by Rachel Bright and illustrated by Jim Field) is all about understanding that change is okay, and that there might even be certain disadvantages to avoiding change (like missing out on something fun). It also communicates that there are other people who will support and help you through change, and that going on that journey together can actually strengthen your bonds with those people. Replete with the most wonderful illustrations, the book provides plenty of opportunities to discuss the emotions that the main character, a Koala named Kevin, is feeling at various points in the story. I would also, depending on your child’s age and development, consider discussion the particular features of the changes that Kevin either goes through or avoids: e.g., refusing to change by coming down out of the tree vs. the tree falling over near the end of the book and forcefully reuniting him with terra firma. Most of all though, the book does a wonderful job of representing the embracing of change as a very brave and praiseworthy act—and what child doesn’t want to be brave?