by Suzanne Rose

Created on: March 03, 2010

Contrary to popular stereotypes, a student does not attend school as a clean slate.  Their home life and other factors come along with them in the form of emotional baggage.  This can affect both their academic and social progress at school.  The following is a discussion of the emotional baggage you will find.

Problems with the parents

If a child has major problems with his or her parents, this will often manifest itself in some way in the school environment.  This will be especially poignant if the child is abused in any way, whether it is physical or emotional.  The child may bring a disrespect of adult or authority figures because of this poor relationship they have with their parents.  This can spill over into their relationship with their teachers, which can be detrimental both to them and the classroom environment.  It can be beneficial if either the teacher or a guidance counselor can recognize these issues and perhaps help the student to succeed at school despite these problems.  It would, of course, be important for the school to recognize any serious issues such as abuse.

Self-esteem issues

Many young students have self-esteem issues.  This can translate negatively in a variety of ways.  First, the student with the self-esteem issues might try to do anything to get people to like him or her.  They are often always looking for ways to be validated as a good person.  Thus they may fold under peer pressure to do things that they do not want to do.  It may be having sexual relations with a peer or drinking or doing drugs.  They also may act up in class to try to be the “cool” one and get other kids to like them.  Alternatively, a student with low self-esteem might be very shy and have difficulty forming connections with his or her peers because they do not believe that anyone would like them.  No matter what the issue is, work should be done to try to get the students to believe in themselves and feel good about themselves.  Students who do so might make better decisions.

Body image problems

An unfortunately common problem is that of a body image problem.  This is especially problematic among young girls trying to be as skinny the waif-like models peeking up from many fashion and teen magazines, but it can affect boys as well.  The girls might try unhealthy ways to lose weight.  For some it can get to a dangerous level.  The sooner the school can recognize such a problem, the better.

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