Get Support Death & bereavement The impact on... Older children Research shows that a child's understanding of death will vary according to their age and stage of development. In our experience, Primary School aged children can: start to understand the permanency of death experience anxiety about their future care, their own survival and the survival of other family members feel anxiety when they are separated from their main carer think that something they said or did caused the person to die regress in their behaviour for a period of time find it hard to concentrate at school fall out with friends have difficulty getting to sleep / interrupted sleep / nightmares develop physical complaints e.g. tummy-aches, head-aches etc have angry outbursts or cry unexpectedly only sustain their grief for short periods of time Our experience has shown that children in this age group need: reassurance affection age-appropriate information honest answers to their questions chances to express their feelings opportunities to play Manage Cookie Preferences