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Effects of family background on academic performance
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When one pursues academics, they must start in child hood. Good academic development during adolescence is important for one to have a life time of achievements in academics and work related fields. The transitionary period between primary and secondary school, a period of time where a child’s academic works often declines is the time when one needs to devote themselves to academics. In their article Academic Success Across the Transition from Primary to Secondary Schooling among Lower-Income Adolescents: Understanding the Effects of Family Resources and Gender, Lisa Serbin, Dale Stack, and Daniel Kingdon conducted a study on school age kids and the need of academic success, in the article they exaplian, “Successful academic performance during adolescence is a key predictor of lifetime achievement, including occupational and social success.” (Serbin, Stack and Daniel, 3). It is a known fact that children who have high academic success, do better in workplace achievements. They go on to say, “the present study investigated the important transition from primary to secondary schooling during early adolescence, when academic performance among youth often declines. The goal of the study was to understand how risk factors, specifically lower family resources and male gender, threaten academic success following this "critical transition" in schooling.” (Serbin, Stack and Daniel, 3). The author suggests that when students face hardships at home, it impacts the success of their academic careers. If a student is always worried about money, or when they will be able to eat again, they are more likely to drop out of school and start work. This would ruin any chance of them being able to attend college or have a better career. Students ... ... middle of paper ... ... 261. ProQuest. 17 Apr. 2014 . Serbin, Lisa A., Dale M. Stack, and Danielle Kingdon. "Academic Success Across the Transition from Primary to Secondary Schooling among Lower-Income Adolescents: Understanding the Effects of Family Resources and Gender." Journal of Youth and Adolescence 42.9 (2013): 1331-47. ProQuest. Web. 27 Mar. 2014. Trapmann, Sabrina, et al. "Meta-Analysis of the Relationship between the Big Five and Academic Success at University."Zeitschrift für Psychologie/Journal of Psychology 215.2 (2007): 132-51. ProQuest. Web. 27 Mar. 2014. Upadyaya, Katja, and Katariina Salmela-Aro. "Development of School Engagement in Association with Academic Success and Well-being in Varying Social Contexts: A Review of Empirical Research." European Psychologist 18.2 (2013): 136- 47. ProQuest. Web. 27 Mar. 2014.
(Brooks-Gunn et all, 1997) That points out the disadvantage and how the family income influence youngsters overall childhood, since under the poverty condition, they children do not have enough money to support for their necessary needs, they will more likely to have low self-confidence and hard to blend in with their peers. Poverty has impact on children’s achievement in several different ways. Payne (2003) maintained that the poverty could affect children achievement though emotional, mental, financial, and role models (Payne, 2003). Thus, the children from low-income family are more likely to have self-destructive behavior, lack of control emotional response and lack of necessary intellectual, that is really important for the students under the age of 16.
This would lead to higher grades, test scores, school attendance, decreased use of drugs and alcohol, and lower rates of suspension and dropping out (What Research). With his parents not around to support him, he lacked the necessary moral compass, decision making, and social skills needed to succeed not only in school, but in the world. Many kids have the same parental situation as Holden, also with similar results. -----Family participation in education was twice as predictive of students ' academic success as family socioeconomic status. Some of the more intensive programs had effects that were 10 times greater than other factors” (What Research). Increased parental involvement could be the first step to breaking the cycle of poor education and poverty. Poor students are at a much higher risk of not having parental involvement, which draws a clear parallel to these students and Holden
Reading, writing, math, science, and other skills learned in school are instrumental for a child to have in order to be successful both in higher education and in life. Many factors contribute to a student’s acquisition of these skills such as their learning environment, preschool education, mental and emotional development, parental involvement, and dedication to learning. The issue that many young children are facing, however, is that all of these factors can be greatly influenced by the Socioeconomic Status (SES) of their family. Unfortunately, up until recently it was virtually unknown how teachers could help these “at risk” children, which caused an increase in the likelihood of children dropping out of school or repeating a grade. However, it is now becoming clear that there are ways that educators can help ensure children have successful academic careers and lead better lives.
Students’ wouldn’t be able to hold down a job is the second reason they shouldn’t dropout of high school. Many employers would like to have someone who has been too high school and that have been educated so they can handle money and add things p...
Students in poverty tend to obtain low grades, have little academic achievement, and often misbehave. Many often drop out before graduating high school. Students ages sixteen through twenty-four are up to seven times more likely to drop out. A study published in Nature Neuroscience discovered “a link between physical brain development and poverty level. In a study of eleven hundred children, adolescence and adults from around the US, researchers found significant differences in the brains of children from the lowest income bracket in comparison to those in the highest. Families who lived on less than twenty-five thousand dollars a year had as much as 6% less surface area in their brain in areas like language and decision making than families who made more than one hundred and fifty dollars a year.” This may support why many students in poverty tend to do worse in school over middle class students. Employers usually lean toward more educated workers, leaving the poor at a serious disadvantage when it comes to work Children growing in poverty regularly have families of their own poverty. Some workplaces, manufacturing jobs have replaced their human labor with machinery and technology, which leaves many potential jobs out of the hands of people hungry for work. Having a weak education leaves them unskilled, resulting poor and low paying occupations. This creates a long lasting loop of poverty, a loop which is hard to escape. They
In order to understand the educational gap, it is first important to understand the effects of poverty on students of lower socio-economic backgrounds. A significant part of the education function is socioeconomic background of a student. Studies show that 30-50% of behavior is genetic and 50-70% is explained by one’s environment (ASCD). If behaviors are a predominant result of environmental factors then it is important to see the difference between the environment of low SES students and that of affluent students. Many factors must be accounted for when looking at behavior. Lower SES students face daily overwhelming challenges that are different from affluent students. There are four risk factors in particular that affect children in poverty and those are: emotional and social challenges; acute and chronic stressors; cognitive lags; and health and safety issues.
It is established that as a person goes higher in their academic career they have a greater opportunity in earning higher incomes, good employment opportunities as well as an improvement in their daily living conditions (WHO,2014, as cited Swain et al.,2014). Evidence suggests that children who have access to good early childhood education tend to earn a good income, low crime rate, reduction in teenage pregnancies, improved adult health status and decrease behavioural risk factors (Muennig et al.,2011 as cited in Swain et
The effects of poverty can cause negative behaviour in the classroom due to emotional and social challenges. Research suggests that children who have had a disadvantaged upbringing are less likely to do well at school (Connell, White and Johnson as cited in Ewing , 2013, p. 74). Not being socially accepted because of socio economics can deter a child’s experience of schooling and create cognitive lags. For this reason, it is important for schools to bridge this gap. Children from different socio economic backgrounds bring similar knowledge to the classroom, but it is the children’s experiences that can have a negative impact on a child’s learning (Thomson, 2002, p.4). For example, children from low socio economic backgrounds can have high levels of behavioural and emotional problems, anger, have less linguistic knowledge and high levels of absent days from school. Likewise, another factor that can affect a child’s schooling experience is gender
Family issues, poverty, and homelessness cause students to drop out of high school as it impacts education by placing stressful obstacles in children’s learning path. A National study found, “Overall, 22 percent of children who have lived in poverty do not graduate from high school, compared to 6 percent of those who have never been poor” (National Study). Lack of educational success can also contribute to throwing in the towel on school. Some students may not be receiving the additional supports to give them success in school. Imagine coming home on the bus after a ten hour day and having your ninth grader ask for help on their algebra. If you possessed the skills, which you likely do not, you may be too exhausted to help. In addition there is still dinner to cook and other household chores to complete. It is a daunting request that you may not be able to comply with. “Family poverty is associated with a number of adverse conditions — high mobility and homelessness; hunger and food insecurity; parents who are in jail or absent; domestic violence; drug abuse and other problem…” (Shonkoff & Garner, 2012 as quoted by Rumberger). Poverty is an obstacle to learning even for the brightest children. As a result few can overcome these stumbling
Pressures on children in today’s society are a problem that is becoming more evident in academics as parents and teachers put more and more emphasis on these children to outperform their classmates, stress in the child’s life becomes an interfering problem (Anxiety.org, 2011 Weissbourd, 2011,). From preschool children to college adults, pressure to execute academic perfection extends across all areas of curriculum. In our highly competitive, American society, emphasis placed on academic achievement has never been so intense (Anxiety.org, 2011, Beilock, 2011). This need to be the best, fueled by our culture in America, has created a social force affecting education, a force to be reckoned with at that. Too often, parents and teachers sacrifice their chil...
Due to parents having to take on 2-3 part-time jobs or low wage jobs, parents are required to deal with long hours, unusual hours, lack of benefits that cover paid sick days, paid medical, parental leave, and vacation time. This prevents parents from participating in their children’s development. (Spross, Jeff. "Low-Wage Jobs Don’t Just Harm Workers — They Harm Their Children." ThinkProgress RSS. 7 Dec. 2012. Web. 5 Oct. 2014.) Parents are not home to look after their children. When parents are home, it is for a short period that allows parents to feed the children, bath them and put them to bed. Parents have to choose their family time or making income and income is priority to try and provide the necessary needs like a home, electric, and food. This struggle between income and family has put tremendous stress on parents which lead to a higher level of depression which affects the whole family. Some young adult children are forced into the work force before they graduate to help the family. If these young adults are one of the fortunate ones that don’t need to join the workforce, they are still faced with taking on an adult role due to having to play mommy or daddy to their younger siblings. Having this kind of responsibility at such a young age causes some of these young adults to fall into a depression or stressed out with all the responsibility that they start rebelling authority or looking for
Living in poverty exposes children to disadvantages that influence many aspects in their life that are linked to their ability to do well in school. In the United States of America there are an estimated 16.4 million children under the age of 18 living in poverty (U.S. Census Bureau, 2010). “The longer a child lives in poverty, the lower the educational attainment” (Kerbo, 2012). Children who are raised in low-income households are at risk of failing out before graduating high school (Black & Engle, 2008). U.S. children living in poverty face obstacles that interfere with their educational achievement. Recognizing the problems of living in poverty can help people reduce the consequences that prevent children from reaching their educational potential.
The purpose of this literature review is to examine the relation between students’ socioeconomic status and their academic achievement. To be more specific, the goals are to determine (a) what defines low income; (b) review identified student characteristics (e.g. parental involvement, ethnicity, and school location) that have an effect on student achievement; and (c) what current research is saying about the best practices are for addressing the needs of low income students within the school setting. This literature review is not intended to provide a comprehensive review of the available literature, but to serve as a starting point for future directions for research and policy.
lack of financial resources, value systems and ensuing interest and encouragement in students school life also contributes to underachievement. It also cannot be discounted that historically males have been regarded as the head of the home. In the Caribbean, where we have a large majority of fatherless families, boys are sometimes either opting to or forced to seek employment to meet the family's socioeconomic needs. This pursuit means that a great many males are absent from school and or dropping out of school. Research has indicated that students’ academic outcomes are related to their socioeconomic status (SES) and gender (Jones, 2004; Lupart, Cannon, & Telfer,
It can be argued that the academic performance of children has nothing to do with their socioeconomic status, because there have been many cases of children from very poor families who have excelled greatly in academics (APA, 2017). Furthermore, many predominantly high-end schools have posted poor results when compared to school with poorer backgrounds. This is despite the fact children from lower socioeconomic classes do not have access to the best forms of learning materials. The high performance of children from poor backgrounds is often attributed to the fact that they are not preoccupied with many activities which would otherwise hinder them from concentrating on their studies (Sacerdote, 2002). Therefore, some believe it is false to say that poor performance is associated with children who come from low socioeconomic classes. Rather, they believe academic achievement is genetic (Sacerdote, 2002).