Stressors that affect Children

The stressor that I have been affected by is chaos. For a year, I had a student who was tossed back and forth between his mother, father and grandmother. His situation affected his work as well as his behavior. It became a very big issue in the classroom. He was six years old and on more than one occasion had loud outbursts and tantrums when things would not go his way. He often fell asleep during class time. I knew that something was going on at home because he did not act this way at the beginning of the school year. However when we returned from the holiday break, he was violent towards the other children. He would get so angry that he would stand still and scream while waving his arms. His sudden change in behavior was frightening the children and puzzled me and my team teacher. After several phone calls and written notes, we finally had a conference with the child’s grandmother. She informed us that the child’s mother and father were going through a very bad divorce, and the child had often witnessed, with his other siblings, acts of violence against his mother by his father. The situation was corrected as he became comfortable with his living arrangements with his grandmother. Unfortunately after a few weeks, his parents came for him and supposedly reconciled. The child started back having tantrums and exhibited violence towards his classmates. I got the counselor and social worker involved. Eventually, the child was permanently placed with his grandmother. By the end of the school year, his behavior improved tremendously. He was more focused on his work. He received an award for the most improved student- behaviorally and academically. This is just one example of how unstable situations in the home can cause a child to be unable to develop fully from a social perspective. Each time that his situation changed, he changed. He was unable to focus in class. He didn’t have friends because he was violent towards him. The children accepted him each time he acted out and calmed down. He was dealing with a situation that his brain could not process at a six year old level, and the only way he knew to respond was to lash out, which is a learned behavior from his home life.

Child neglect or failure by the caretaker to provide needed age-appropriate care is the most common type of reported child maltreatment in rural America. I chose to discuss child neglect in rural and or urban communities because I have family members that live in these areas, and have heard the stories of this type of treatment against children. Parents are stressed because of lack of money and resources. Often times the parents anger and stress oozes out into the children. They are sometimes presumed to be the cause of the stress; therefore they become the target of abuse by the parent. Please visit this website for more information on maltreatment in rural and urban areas in America: http://carseyinstitute.unh.edu/publications/FS-Mattingly-Childabuse.pdf

Reference:  http://carseyinstitute.unh.edu/publications/FS-Mattingly-Childabuse.pdf

Child Development and Public Health

The public health topic that I chose to discuss is immunization. The textbook defines immunization as the process of protecting a person against a disease, via antibodies. Immunization can happen naturally, when someone survives a disease, or medically, via a small dose of the virus that stimulates the production of antibodies and thus renders a person immune. (Berger, 2012, page 149) Being that I am in a public health position working at an elementary school, I feel that children need to be up to date on the immunization requirements. It amazes me that every year during registration, some parents seem oblivious to the immunization requirements. Often times they feel as if we should allow the child to be in school and they will provide the immunization paperwork at a later date. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way, and the parent or guardian has to be told that the child cannot enter school without the proper documentation.
Immunization protect children from temporary sickness, as well as serious complications including deafness, blindness, sterility, and meningitis. Wow. I had no idea that immunization can protect children from so much! As the saying goes, you learn something new every day. My personal experience with the importance of immunization came to be when I contracted chicken pox from a child in the daycare classroom that I worked in. I was eighteen years old with itchy bumps and spots all over. Needless to say, I learned the value of children having the proper immunizations from that day forth. This makes me wonder why some parents make a big deal on the first day of school if they are turned away from registering their child for school if they have no proof of immunizations. Not only is the welfare of other children at stake- the welfare of the staff is at stake as well. In my opinion, a fussy, irritable child who may or may not run a fever after shots is a small sacrifice that can possibly save his or her life from disease in the long run. As with anything, there are problems with immunizations. The biggest problem is that no effective vaccine has been found for AIDS, malaria, cholera, typhoid, and shigellosis. (Berger, 2012, page 151) All of these diseases are deadly and worldly.

I am enclosing a website which details immunization criteria all over the world. Please check it out! It is quite interesting.

http://www.iamat.org/pdf/world_immunization_chart.pdf

Week One Blog Assignment

I was sixteen years old in the delivery room with my twenty-six year old sister giving birth to my nephew. Nervous and excited, I held her hand and felt a sharp pain in my wrist because she was squeezing my hand extremely tight. My mother was holding her other hand, coaching her along. Mommy has a lot of experience with child birth. She herself gave birth naturally to nine children- four boys, five girls. The story I always hear is that I was the hardest birth. She told my father in the delivery room that she didn't think she was going to make it. Guess I fooled her, being that my birthday is April 1. The doctor and nurse began to talk to eachother, and he told my sister that it wasn't  safe for her to continue a vaginal labor being that my nephew weighed 10 pounds. A few moments later, the nurse handed the doctor a device, which sort of looked like an electric knife, and my sister was crying and emotional because she wanted to give birth naturally. Mommy calmed her down and they proceeded. 
                 I will never forget the smell. I will never forget the sound of the device. I thought they were burning my sister alive! Looking at her made me feel better because she was calm, but moaning softly. In the end, my nephew came out kicking and screaming! I jumped up and down for joy. He was beautiful. He is now a twenty-two, six foot 2 young man. But he will always be auntie's baby.
                I researched the birthing practice of Germany. In Germany, midwives are highly respected. By law, a midwife must be present at birth, and a doctor is optional. This reminds of the tales my grandmother told, as she was a midwife in south Georgia where my parents were born and raised. My grandmother was my mommy's midwife for her first two children. A doctor would make a house call only to check out the child and mother if requested. I found it interesting that the women in Germany focus on the act of giving birth more than the outcome. A Berlin resident originally from Maryland was asked if she felt like a failure for having a C-section. Giving birth by C-section is a normal practice for mothers in the U.S. 
           The government offices in Germany
 keep a list of acceptable names that parents must register. This is the law. If the parents choose an unusual name, they must provide a reasonable explanation for doing so, and it has to be approved. This is done in the best interest of the child in order to avoid potential ridicule for having a different type of name. I have mixed emotions about this. In a way I feel as though this is a helpful law/practice because I have come across some names that have me questioning why parents put children through this. I work with Kindergartners. Some of them enter without knowing how to write or spell their names. Sometimes their first names have ten plus letters. This can be quite challenging for the student and teacher. On the other hand, I feel that as a parent you should be able to name your child whatever you want. America is a free country, so have at it, right?


Reference:  http://www.parents.com/pregnancy/giving-birth/vaginal/birth-customs-around-the-world/?page=3