Human behaviour flows from three main sources: desire, emotion, and knowledge.
– Plato
Understanding human behaviour is essential to know the mental state of people around us. This helps us to analyse why people behave the way they do, and we get in a position to handle them effectively in accordance with their behaviour.
In the context of children, behaviour assumes greater significance and needs serious attention from parents and teachers. However, behavioural issues in children are a common challenge to parents as well as to schools. It’s of course a menace, as it directly challenges the school operations involving all stakeholders – students, teachers and parents. Resultantly, challenging behaviour in students affects the entire learning process causing serious difficulties in student – teacher relationship.
There is no denying the fact that students’ behavioural problems in schools directly impacts the classroom atmosphere. Their attitudes and weird acts create chaos in the classroom discipline and hamper the teaching and learning methods. The students with behavioural problems not only cause challenges for teachers, but also make it difficult for them to socialise with others. This breeds aggression and acute behavioural disorders in them. Resultantly, they find it too tough to learn their lessons effectively in the classroom.
Here, we have to understand that a child is not born with behavioural disorders. In fact, these problems have its roots in various issues such as emotional factors, social factors, learning disabilities, parental conflicts, health issues, etc.
It has been found that sometimes they need attention from teachers and peers, which makes them create a nuisance in the classroom. Sometimes students learn behaviours from others such as friends, families, teachers, etc., which causes students to act like them.
Even some students don’t like the way teachers teach them, or they find it difficult to adjust to their class teachers. In such scenarios, students make fun of their teachers and behave badly. Due to this reason, students become resentful of teachers who are sarcastic or treat them unfairly.
Parental conflicts are one of the main causes of poor behaviour in schools. Lack of support from parents and domestic violence at home can lead children to develop disorders and make students respond poorly. Due to this, children behave oddly in the classrooms and they find difficulty in connecting with others.
Overcoming these behavioural problems needs priority to streamline the overall journey of the education. This problem can be overcome by foreseeing the problems and creating positive solutions. Finding the root cause and building a collaborative learning environment is an incredible way to overcome behaviour problems in schools.
Active listening is one of the effective ways to enhance good behaviours among students. It is also essential for teachers as well to understand the needs and requirements of students. This helps students develop trust and credibility among others.
A collaborative environment helps students to connect with others, builds community and enhances educational equality. Collaboration with others helps in developing social emotional learning and helps in promoting a holistic education. This helps them to behave in a good way and enhances their behavioural outcomes. Through a collaborative environment students find it easy to communicate with teachers and share their thoughts and feelings.
Parent support is essential in enhancing good behaviours of students. Creating a positive home environment is essential; conflicts, arguments, violence, etc, hamper the development of children. In such a scenario it is essential to build a proper parent child relationship for contributing to the overall learner’s development.
In this issue of the SHAECH (The Message), we have tried to cover various issues related to the child’s behaviour and included expert opinions to find solutions to the behavioural problems in children. It’s fervently hoped that you will enjoy the reading and the topics covered will help you (all stakeholders in the child development) to understand your responsibilities.
– Sajjad Bazaz