Dubai: It comes round every year but it does not mean that back to school is an easy time for parents and children. Despite its inevitability and regularity, it brings stressors each year. Some are the usual ones that have to do with shopping for clothes, school supplies, getting children back into a routine of dinner and bedtime battles but others can be newer ones, unexpected even, or issues that have been around but have never been resolved.
Psychologists say that the back to school routine can be hard for everyone involved. Students experience old or new anxieties. For some, it could be the start of another year of high expectations leading to possible frustration and disappointment. There could be fears of academic performance or social isolation. For parents, this is a time to rehone their strategies of making their children fit the groove once again. Amnah Husdain, child psychologist and parenting expert at Fun City, says, “Many factors cause students to face problems during the start of the new school year. It’s almost inevitable that some parents could face problems with their children not wanting to go back to school. The most important thing to do at this time is to identify the problem correctly,” says Amnah. This lies at the heart of the solution.
What could the reasons be?
“Fear of being away from parents [separation anxiety], being bullied, not having friends, learning problems, feeling lost at school and not getting along with teachers,” Amnah says.
1) Separation anxiety
With very small children, back to school is a time for separation anxiety to assert itself. It is common among elementary school pupils or beyond and is characterised by crying, tantrums, or clinginess as the child experiences time away from its primary caregiver, says Amnah. Parents need to to be aware of this and seek support to deal with this successfully.
2) Lack of friends
It’s not just the young ones who have problems. Even teenagers can have difficulty reentering the school year and one reason could be a lack of peer support. If a teenager has few friends, he or she may be reluctant to return to school.
Amnah says, “Some teenagers don’t have friends because they’re insecure. They fear they won’t be accepted for who they are or won’t be able to measure up to potential friends’ expectations.” This fear drives them to be isolatory and, in turn, the thought of going back to school is a dauting prospect for them.
Fatima Al Shamsi, administrator, Al Arqam Private School, says, “Some teenagers can experience social anxiety as they have a hard time making friends. Peer friendships are important to teens, so parents should actively try to help their teenager find ways to build friendships.” It doesn’t matter how many friends are made. “Some teens want to have many, while others concentrate on having one or two really good friends,” says Fatima, and both approaches are fine.
3) Bullying
When a child is scared of going back to school, one of the possible reasons could be that he or she is fearful of being bullied. Avoiding school is one of the first signs that a child is being bullied, according to Amnah. “The fear of being bullied triggers fears, especially with students who have had bad experiences with bullying in the past.” if this issue is noticed by parents, they need to take all the steps necessary to eliminate the problem.
4) Poor interaction with teachers terror
Another reason for back-to-school relucatance is a student’s poor interaction with teachers, says Amnah.
“Children who have problems at school, such as not getting along with teachers, reduces their sense of belonging. Young people’s success at school depends on their well-being, how they think, feel and act both in and out of school. Studies have found that fitting in school and feeling like they belong improve young people’s sense of security in the future,” she says.
5) Poor parental approach
“Parental support, trust, patience and common sense help kids and teenagers learn to develop healthy and appropriate social interactions. Some parents might be overprotective and other parents might struggle with their own issues and have trouble setting a good example of how to acquire healthy relationships,” Fatima says.
6) Managing expecatations
“Children’s expectations are tricky for parents. There are children who worry that they won’t live up to expectations. Some exaggerate the likelihood of failure, predicting they will fail if they don’t know all of the materials. They overestimate the difficulty of the task at hand and assume the worst. Some kids may become paralysed by their fears, leaving them incapable of completing or even starting to study for a test. Anxiety can affect their performance during exams, adding further weight to their fears about grades,” says Fatima Al Serkal, a student counsellor at Al Salam Kindergarten in Sharjah.
Fatima said, “Parents as well have unrealistic expectations of their kids’ academic accomplishments. Children under this kind of pressure tend to stop trying in school to the point of academic failure.”
(Nawal Al Ramahi is a trainee at Gulf News).
