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