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Effects of child abuse on academic achievement
Strands of early literacy development
Effects of child abuse on academic achievement
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Recommended: Effects of child abuse on academic achievement
Emma Solini
Ms. Menickelly
Literacy Development
May 31, 2017
Trauma and Pediatric PTSD The first few years in a child’s life are very important, this is where they are learning how to speak, read, and write. However, some children may be affected by a traumatic event in their life and even suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Having experienced a traumatic event may have severe consequences on a child’s literacy development. There are five stages of literacy development. The first stage occurs around the ages of 6 months to 6 years. During this stage the child is learning the alphabet and how to write her/his name. the child can usually point to a picture and name what it is. Stage 2 occurs through the ages of 6 and 7. The
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A traumatic event that happens within the 2nd and 3rd stages of literacy development can have major effects on how and if the child learns to read and write. AT this stage in their life they are either just learning the alphabet, how letters and sounds are connected, or how to read on their own. Having experienced such a distressing incident could potentially make them stop reading altogether. Some symptoms that may occur if a child is experiencing PTSD would be feeling neglected and start sitting out on class activities which could enhance their reading and writing. If they start to have low self-worth and feel that no one accepts them they may start to skip school in general. Skipping school makes becoming literate harder for the child and become behind in all their classes. Michele Solini experienced a childhood trauma that still causes her to think of the event to this day. One of her classmates, who was a close friend of hers, died at a young age. When asked if this affected her work at school she said, “Yes, I was constantly thinking about it became harder to focus I class. My grades dropped and I was usually sad, angry, and fearful” (Solini 2017). Having a child go through this especially at this age is hard because they have to live with it for the rest of their life.(Kataoka) (Banes)(Cook-Cottone)(Child Neglect and PTSD)(Solini
The International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS)(OECD,2000) assessed literacy by using a questionnaire with a sample of 38,358 in 21 countries. It showed the percentage of the population at the lowest literacy level United States (20.7), United Kingdom (22.6).The Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) provided evidence that 10 year old English school children are rated 3rd out of 35 countries. At national level 20% of children do not achieve the level of reading expected of them at 11 years old. Anxiety is the most common effect that children experience; it causes children to fear reading and writing. Latest research show that 15 to 20% of the population has reading disability ,out of which 85% has dyslexia.,
However, the most clear and abundant effect of childhood trauma appeared to be behavioral problems. This was also the issue that often got covered up the most with “he/she is just a bad kid.” Like what was mentioned before, no kid is a bad kid. However, because the behavioral problems are what normally catches everybody’s eyes its normally what is caught first. Then you have the learning and emotional problems. Many people will often say that the child is slow or that they are sensitive, but many times there is so much more to the problem. There is a much larger problem lying in the background that often causes all the rest of the problems and it is not something that can just be brushed away with words like “lazy, slow, and sensitive.” The main problem must be directed head on that way we can potentially stop these negative effects and labeling that come from childhood
Others believe that the children are too young to understand the trauma that is occuring to allow it to affect their lives and minds. It is common for adults to mistake the symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder in children, such as hyperactivity and lack of attention, as ADHD due to their closed minds. Dr. Nicole Brown has done research on misbehaving pediatric patients and why despite, “referring them to behavioral therapy and starting them on stimulants, it was hard to get the symptoms under control” (Ruiz, 2014). This quote shows that when the children with these symptoms were diagnosed with the heritable brain disorder, ADHD, and given treatment accordingly, they did not respond as they should have.
For one, children with a history of abuse tend to experience more difficulties with learning and just in general in the the school environment. Robert (1993) stated that those children that were physically abused at a younger age run a much higher risk of having serious neurological or mental handicap and thus having a disadvantage in the learning environment. Roberts (1993) also suggests that neglecting a child affected the language development of that child substantially. Neglect was found, in Robert’s (1993) research, to be
For example, some cognitive delays in children are difficulties in the language. Due to the traumatic experience, the children have difficulties in the language and have trouble expressing themselves. Also, some children experience personality disorder, anxiety, and severe depression. Abused children can experience flashbacks of their abuse that causes the child to become more traumatized. This leads to persistent fear where the child fears everything and everyone around them. The child no longer trusts or feels safe in their surroundings.
Trauma relates to a type of damage to the mind that comes from a severely distressing event. A traumatic event relates to an experience or repeating events that overwhelmingly precipitated in weeks, months, or decades as one tries to cope with the current situations that can cause negative consequences. People’s general reaction to these events includes intense fear, helplessness or horror. When children experience trauma, they show disorganized or agitative behavior. In addition, the trigger of traumas includes some of the following, harassment, embarrassment, abandonment, abusive relationships, rejection, co-dependence, and many others. Long-term exposure to these events, homelessness, and mild abuse general psychological
With four million adolescent in the United States assessed to have encountered no less than one traumatic occasion, childhood trauma has turned into a pressing open wellbeing concern. A traumatic occasion can include interpersonal occasions, for example, physical or sexual misuse, war, group roughness, disregard, abuse, loss of a guardian, seeing brutality or encountering trauma vicariously; it can likewise come about because of extreme or life- undermining wounds, sickness and mischances. The immediate and aberrant expenses connected with Child abuse alone make it among the most-immoderate open wellbeing issues in the United States. In the light of national overviews of youth in the United States, 14-34 percent of kids have encountered no
Finally, for many children, trauma exposure can lead to emotional issues, like depression and stress disorders such as PTSD (Hovens, 2012). This can also be applied for very young children and these difficulties can be disruptive with learning new skills. This can make it harder to pick up new cognitive
Children effected by trauma have an inaccurate view of their world and feel unsafe within it and in situations that would otherwise be considered harmless. Children may blame themselves or their parents for not preventing a frightening event or for not being able to change its outcome. These misconceptions of reality compound the negative impact of traumatic effects on children's development. (National Child Traumatic Stress Network, n.d.). Children who respond to emotional trauma in this way have a harder time managing their emotions which in turn wreaks havoc on their cognitive development and ability to have healthy relationships with their peers and adults.
An analysis has been done on how a child is exposed to these early literacy skills. A video called, “Learning to Read and Write Doesn’t Start in Kindergarten or First Grade”, states the facts on how early literacy exposure plays a role in a child life. It is interesting to see the fact that early exposure happens prior to any programs being implemented. Songs, books, and other forms of media have been exposed to us since a very young age. Zero to Three, states that these help a child prior to them enter school and the effects of parental intervention. .