Love and Loss research project

‘Love and Loss’: Exploring the Role of Picture Books in Supporting Conversations about Death, Grief, and Loss with Primary School Children

This year, I had the absolute honour of taking part in a research project led by Professor Anna Lise Gordon, Co-Director of the Centre for Wellbeing in Education at St Mary’s University, Twickenham. The project, run in partnership with six primary schools, explored how picture books can support meaningful conversations about death, grief, and loss with young children.

A Timely Change in National Guidance

The timing couldn’t have been more relevant, with grief education now a confirmed inclusion in the Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) statutory guidance for schools published this week. From 1st September 2026 onwards, the primary school curriculum will be required to cover:

“That change and loss, including bereavement, can provoke a range of feelings, that grief is a natural response to bereavement, and that everyone grieves differently.”

Bringing the Project into the Classroom

I worked alongside the Year 2 teaching team at my children’s Infant and Nursery School to plan a lesson using the beautiful picture book The Memory Tree by Britta Teckentrup. As the children engaged with the story, I observed the session, took field notes, and collected examples of their work as part of the data for the research project.

Following the lesson, I worked with a focus group of children to explore their responses in greater depth and carried out an interview with the class teachers to reflect on the experience.

Now that data has been collected from all six schools, each researcher has shared their initial findings at a dissemination event hosted at St Mary’s. The next stage of the project will see Professor Anna Lise work with a research assistant to analyse the data and prepare a report and journal article with the findings.

The Power of Picture Books in Grief Education

As a primary school teacher, I’ve seen first-hand how high-quality picture books hook children into learning across the curriculum, and I know that classrooms are safe spaces for meaningful conversations. As a mother to bereaved children, I also know the value of books in moments of real-life challenge; I turned to them to help explain what our family was experiencing and to provide shared comfort after my husband died. One of my son’s teachers used a picture book to prepare his Year 1 classmates for his return to school just days after our family bereavement.

Picture books are a powerful tool in the primary classroom: they help children explore complex emotions, build empathy, and make sense of the world around them. With rich language and nuanced illustrations, the books chosen for this project supported both literacy and emotional learning around death, grief, and loss. They also opened up meaningful discussions and created shared, inclusive experiences that nurtured emotional wellbeing and connection.

In the lessons I observed, I saw how a well-chosen picture book can act as a conduit between the author, the teacher as reader, and the children as listeners. The books chosen for this project offered gentle guidance for adults by providing the right language to talk about death with young children and helping open honest, thoughtful conversations that match the children’s emotional stage of development.

Listening to Children’s Voices

For me, this project created a valuable opportunity to hear children voice their understanding and feelings about death, grief, and loss before they experience it first-hand, as my children did. They did not disappoint. They spoke openly and shared willingly. They understood that grief is a natural response to bereavement, and that it’s okay to feel sad — just as the animals did in our book, The Memory Tree when Fox died. They were also able to reflect on their own experiences, as one child shared:

“When my grandpa died, we were all very sad… we think it’s important to care about the people we love when they die.”

Why Grief Education Belongs in the Curriculum

This experience has reinforced my belief that there is a place for grief education in primary schools; not as a one-off, reactive response, but as something thoughtfully embedded within the curriculum. The children in my focus group clearly wanted to share their stories, and their openness highlighted the importance of creating safe spaces for these conversations.

In primary school classrooms, teachers often turn to picture books as a way into new topics and discussions, so it feels natural to use a picture book to open the ultimate ‘big’ conversation: one about death, grief, and loss. With careful preparation, the right resources, and a trusted adult present, children can engage with these topics in creative, healthy, and meaningful ways. I hope this project encourages more schools to explore what’s possible, because the impact goes far beyond the classroom.

You can read the full RSHE statutory guidance published on 15th July 2025 here: Relationships and sex education (RSE) and health education - GOV.UK