The hormonal nightmare of adolescence can be exacerbated by problems related to school well-being, which can be contributed to by many factors. As a parent, you need to be aware of them, as they can negatively impact your teen’s school experience.
Factors Affecting Adolescent School Well-being: A Guide For Parents
These can range from the usual stress of exams and homework help to more serious issues like bullying, so being aware of them can help you respond sensitively and keep your child happy and satisfied.
In this article, we turn our attention to the most common problems that plague teenage school and look at how you can provide the right support.
School Life.
Your teen will spend the best part of all five days in school, and it will be a major part of his daily life. If there are problems at school, your child will feel as if they are affecting his whole world. Below are the main challenges to be aware of.
Choosing the right school
If your focus is on your teen’s school well-being, you should know that it depends on your choice of school. It is important that it is right for your child and that they too are involved in deciding which school they themselves will go to.
There is a lot of diversity even among the top schools. For example, a big difference is whether it is a boys-only school or a girls’ school or a co-educational school.
Some schools pay more attention than others to academic achievement, and as such create a more intense environment in which some children will excel and others will “falter.”
There are institutions known for their strong information technology capabilities (Eaton School is the first among them), and whether or not that environment is comfortable for a child depends on his or her personality.
You know your offspring best, and finding an institution that fits his personality means finding the key to his happiness throughout his school years.
Academic underachievement.
Declining academic achievement in a child who used to reach the highest levels can be an alarming sign that something is wrong.
Academic failure can be caused by a number of issues. It’s important to get to the bottom of what exactly caused this difficulty, but also to not make your child feel like you’re picking on them or are disappointed in them.
This can affect their self-esteem, and if not handled sensitively, it can have a lasting detrimental effect on their attitude toward learning.
A tactful conversation with your child can help determine the root cause of the problem. Perhaps they are being threatened (more on this later), or they lack academic support, or they have lost motivation for some reason.
There are many ways to stop the negative impact of academic failure before it gets worse and becomes unmanageable. Read our article “What to do if you’re falling behind” for more tips for yourself.
Study stress, workload and exam stress
Exam stress can get to even the most diligent and confident kids, and it’s something you should pay special attention to, especially at the time of the annual exam session.
They are under a lot of pressure: they need to pass their high school diploma exam to make those results look good on their university application, and then they also need to do as well as possible on the Advanced Placement exam to gain access to the universities they want to apply to.
On top of that, they will often take on part-time jobs and participate in extracurricular activities, not to mention trying to maintain their social life.
Having to do a lot of things at once, and if they become irritable and unrestrained as exams approach, it could mean that stress is coming to them as well. Unfortunately, there’s not much you can do to help them other than be a supportive presence in the background.
Let them know that you are there in case they might need your help with something, and make sure they have the quiet and peace they need to be able to learn. Make sure they are aware of your love for them, which exists regardless of the grades they receive.
You may not realize it, but they may be working themselves to exhaustion because they are afraid of your reaction when they don’t reach a higher level.
Relationships with Teachers
It is important for children to build a good relationship with their teachers. It should be noted that this relationship makes for a happier daily school experience, not to mention the fact that it is the teachers who will write recommendations for university.
If your child doesn’t like one or more teachers, it can affect their well-being and academic performance- they will be less motivated to excel in a subject when they don’t like the teacher.
On the other hand, if your child feels that a particular teacher dislikes them, it can cause anxiety when they have to go to school, as well as have a bad effect on their self-esteem.
The best thing you can do is to take the opportunity to talk to your child’s teachers whenever this problem arises, with parents’ evenings being a notable example.
This should enable you to catch any kind of problem, whether or not the teacher will speak frankly to you, and then direct your efforts to, literally, nip it in the bud.