Is your child scared of going to School?
Mar 22, 2011
THE threadbare purple shirt can hardly fend off the chilly morning breeze piercing through his skin. He is lost in thought and worried whether he will make it to school on time. He signals out to his friends to move faster.
By Conan Businge
THE threadbare purple shirt can hardly fend off the chilly morning breeze piercing through his skin. He is lost in thought and worried whether he will make it to school on time. He signals out to his friends to move faster.
However, his colleagues ignore his calls as they chew sugarcane.
Twelve-year-old John Okello struggles to convince his friends to proceed to school in vain. He is a Primary Five pupil at Enduru Primary School, 10km from Lira town. For Okello’s friends, going to school is like a punishment.
Does your child fret when told to go to school? Does she or he complain of headache and stomachache all the time but when you visit a paediatrician, no obvious physical signs of illness are diagnosed? Have you noticed a decline in your children’s school performance? In general, do they have other fears, phobias, or symptoms of anxiety such as clingy behaviour, excessive worry or nightmares? If they do, they could be suffering from school phobia. According to the 2011 Education For All global monitoring report, school phobia among pupils is on the rise.
Studies have showed that several factors like long distance to school, early marriages and domestic work lead to an increase in pupil absenteeism in schools. However, a disturbing trend has emerged indicating that about 20% of children in sub-Saharan Africa simply lose interest in schooling due to school phobia.
School phobia, which experts estimate affects all school children nationally, is not so much a fear of school but of being away from home, psychologists and psychiatrists say.
“It has nothing to do with school. The basic problem is separation from the parent,’’ says Kajumba Mayanja, a psychologist at Makerere University.
Dr. David Basangwa, a psychiatrist at Butabika Hospital, also says the problem affects children who depend strongly on their parents, largely because “the parents do not allow them to grow up.’’
As soon as the child tries to go to school, there is a fear of interfering with that relationship.
“I have trouble dressing up my child to go to school every morning. She throws tantrums and cries. She hates school,†Joyce Kivumbi, a parent, says.
For many parents, the stress of forcing their children into the school uniform is getting more frustrating as they search for answers to this puzzle.
Research in the last few years has indicated that school phobia, or “school refusal’’, as some experts call it, covers a variety of psychological problems.
In 2008, Dr. Leslie Atkinson, a clinical psychologist in Canada, studied records of 100 such children admitted to four Toronto hospitals and clinics. Fear of separation from the parents, a perfectionist’s fear of failure and fear of something in the school setting emerged top on the list.
“Part of the problem is that some parents seem to deem it (school phobia) a light problem,†Atkinson noted.
The parents’ nightmare
When Beatrice Nyakato’s 10-year-old son told her that he did not want to go to school, she took him to another school. But that has not stopped him from complaining.
“He is performing poorly. Almost each morning when it is time to go to school, he says he has a headache. I do not know what to do,†Nyakato laments.
Stella’s 12-year-old daughter used to be anxious to go to school, but as she grows older, she wants to stay home or play with her friends.
“She is a bright girl, but is always creating excuses to keep away from school. Children are too difficult these days,†Stella says.
A flawed education system
Experts say the increasing school phobia among children is linked to the flawed education system in Uganda. In an era where children are only being coached to pass exams, it is inevitable that children lose interest in school, Prof. Augustus Nuwagaba, a poverty consultant and senior lecturer, observes.
“You find small children with too much work to do, so how should they concentrate? How can such children wake up excited to go to school?†Nuwagaba asks.
Fagil Mandy, an education expert, also feels schools are putting too much pressure on children through long hours at school. “We need to revise this,†Mandy advises.
While teachers acknowledge that
some children lose interest in school when they are punished for indiscipline or when they are told to repeat a class, others say there are other factors that divert their attention such as the nature and status of the household from which the child comes from.
Budo Junior’s headteacher Tom Kawooya cites lack of lunch, absenteeism of teachers from schools and lack of role models as some of the reasons.
“You cannot, for instance, expect a child to study while he or she is hungry. A good parent who wants his child to learn provides food to the child, but some parents send children to school on an empty stomach,†Kawooya says.
What can be done?
Education minister Namirembe Bitamazire says the Government is reviewing the curriculum to make school interesting, severely punishing defilers and finding a solution to the feeding problem.
She also appeals to parents to encourage their children to go to school.
Bitamazire also says teachers need to have discussions with parents so that some phobic children are forced back into school.
The United Kingdom Department for International Development and Government last year initiated research to generate an information base of ongoing initiatives on school feeding with specific focus on best practices for wider dissemination. They plan to develop guidelines, based on best practices.
The World Bank says there is evidence that school feeding programmes increase school attendance, cognition and educational achievement; particularly if supported by complementary actions such as de-worming and micronutrient reinforcement.
Uganda still has the lowest survival rate of pupils up to Primary Seven in the region, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation. A follow-up of every 100 pupils who joined Primary One in 1999, showed that only 25 reached Primary Seven in 2006. This is the lowest in the region compared to Kenya where 84% of all its pupils reached Primary Seven.
In a different study by the Ugandan Government, on average 50% of pupils who enroll in Primary One do not complete Primary Seven in the set time-frame. For instance, education ministry records show that only 444,019 pupils managed to sit the Primary Leaving Examination last year, out of a total of 890,997 enrolled in 2001.
This means that 446,978 pupils repeated classes or have dropped out of school. While only 49% of pupils in Uganda reached Primary Five in 2004, in Kenya it was 83%, in Tanzania 84% and in Burundi 67%. Data from the education ministry shows that school dropout rates in the country are higher at primary level than at secondary level.
THE threadbare purple shirt can hardly fend off the chilly morning breeze piercing through his skin. He is lost in thought and worried whether he will make it to school on time. He signals out to his friends to move faster.
However, his colleagues ignore his calls as they chew sugarcane.
Twelve-year-old John Okello struggles to convince his friends to proceed to school in vain. He is a Primary Five pupil at Enduru Primary School, 10km from Lira town. For Okello’s friends, going to school is like a punishment.
Does your child fret when told to go to school? Does she or he complain of headache and stomachache all the time but when you visit a paediatrician, no obvious physical signs of illness are diagnosed? Have you noticed a decline in your children’s school performance? In general, do they have other fears, phobias, or symptoms of anxiety such as clingy behaviour, excessive worry or nightmares? If they do, they could be suffering from school phobia. According to the 2011 Education For All global monitoring report, school phobia among pupils is on the rise.
Studies have showed that several factors like long distance to school, early marriages and domestic work lead to an increase in pupil absenteeism in schools. However, a disturbing trend has emerged indicating that about 20% of children in sub-Saharan Africa simply lose interest in schooling due to school phobia.
School phobia, which experts estimate affects all school children nationally, is not so much a fear of school but of being away from home, psychologists and psychiatrists say.
“It has nothing to do with school. The basic problem is separation from the parent,’’ says Kajumba Mayanja, a psychologist at Makerere University.
Dr. David Basangwa, a psychiatrist at Butabika Hospital, also says the problem affects children who depend strongly on their parents, largely because “the parents do not allow them to grow up.’’
As soon as the child tries to go to school, there is a fear of interfering with that relationship.
“I have trouble dressing up my child to go to school every morning. She throws tantrums and cries. She hates school,†Joyce Kivumbi, a parent, says.
For many parents, the stress of forcing their children into the school uniform is getting more frustrating as they search for answers to this puzzle.
Research in the last few years has indicated that school phobia, or “school refusal’’, as some experts call it, covers a variety of psychological problems.
In 2008, Dr. Leslie Atkinson, a clinical psychologist in Canada, studied records of 100 such children admitted to four Toronto hospitals and clinics. Fear of separation from the parents, a perfectionist’s fear of failure and fear of something in the school setting emerged top on the list.
“Part of the problem is that some parents seem to deem it (school phobia) a light problem,†Atkinson noted.
The parents’ nightmare
When Beatrice Nyakato’s 10-year-old son told her that he did not want to go to school, she took him to another school. But that has not stopped him from complaining.
“He is performing poorly. Almost each morning when it is time to go to school, he says he has a headache. I do not know what to do,†Nyakato laments.
Stella’s 12-year-old daughter used to be anxious to go to school, but as she grows older, she wants to stay home or play with her friends.
“She is a bright girl, but is always creating excuses to keep away from school. Children are too difficult these days,†Stella says.
A flawed education system
Experts say the increasing school phobia among children is linked to the flawed education system in Uganda. In an era where children are only being coached to pass exams, it is inevitable that children lose interest in school, Prof. Augustus Nuwagaba, a poverty consultant and senior lecturer, observes.
“You find small children with too much work to do, so how should they concentrate? How can such children wake up excited to go to school?†Nuwagaba asks.
Fagil Mandy, an education expert, also feels schools are putting too much pressure on children through long hours at school. “We need to revise this,†Mandy advises.
While teachers acknowledge that
some children lose interest in school when they are punished for indiscipline or when they are told to repeat a class, others say there are other factors that divert their attention such as the nature and status of the household from which the child comes from.
Budo Junior’s headteacher Tom Kawooya cites lack of lunch, absenteeism of teachers from schools and lack of role models as some of the reasons.
“You cannot, for instance, expect a child to study while he or she is hungry. A good parent who wants his child to learn provides food to the child, but some parents send children to school on an empty stomach,†Kawooya says.
What can be done?
Education minister Namirembe Bitamazire says the Government is reviewing the curriculum to make school interesting, severely punishing defilers and finding a solution to the feeding problem.
She also appeals to parents to encourage their children to go to school.
Bitamazire also says teachers need to have discussions with parents so that some phobic children are forced back into school.
The United Kingdom Department for International Development and Government last year initiated research to generate an information base of ongoing initiatives on school feeding with specific focus on best practices for wider dissemination. They plan to develop guidelines, based on best practices.
The World Bank says there is evidence that school feeding programmes increase school attendance, cognition and educational achievement; particularly if supported by complementary actions such as de-worming and micronutrient reinforcement.
Uganda still has the lowest survival rate of pupils up to Primary Seven in the region, according to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation. A follow-up of every 100 pupils who joined Primary One in 1999, showed that only 25 reached Primary Seven in 2006. This is the lowest in the region compared to Kenya where 84% of all its pupils reached Primary Seven.
In a different study by the Ugandan Government, on average 50% of pupils who enroll in Primary One do not complete Primary Seven in the set time-frame. For instance, education ministry records show that only 444,019 pupils managed to sit the Primary Leaving Examination last year, out of a total of 890,997 enrolled in 2001.
This means that 446,978 pupils repeated classes or have dropped out of school. While only 49% of pupils in Uganda reached Primary Five in 2004, in Kenya it was 83%, in Tanzania 84% and in Burundi 67%. Data from the education ministry shows that school dropout rates in the country are higher at primary level than at secondary level.