Prevention of maladjustment in first-graders

School maladjustment - what is it, concept

With the beginning of educational activities, big changes appear in the child’s life. At this stage, his psyche may experience stress due to changes in lifestyle, new demands from parents and teachers.

Therefore, it is extremely important to monitor the general condition of the student and help him avoid difficulties in the process of adaptation to the school environment.

This article will discuss the concept of school maladaptation, its main causes, types of manifestation, and also provide recommendations for correction and prevention developed by psychologists and teachers.

School maladjustment does not have an unambiguous definition in science, because in every science, be it pedagogy, psychology and social pedagogy, this process is studied from a certain professional angle.

School maladjustment is a violation of the child’s adequate mechanisms of adaptation to the school environment, affecting his educational productivity and relationships with the outside world. If we bypass scientific terminology, then in other words, school maladjustment is nothing more than a psychosomatic deviation that prevents a child from adapting to the school environment.

According to psychologists, schoolchildren who experience difficulties in adaptation may have problems mastering school material, resulting in low academic performance, as well as difficulties in forming social contacts both with peers and with adults.

The personal development of such children, as a rule, is delayed; they are infantile, deceitful, subject to the influence of others, and do not hear their “I”. Most often, younger schoolchildren face maladaptation, but in some cases, high school students as well.

As a rule, children with this kind of problems in primary school stand out from the entire team:

• emotional instability;
• frequent absence from school;
• sudden transitions from passivity to activity;
• frequent complaints of feeling unwell;
• lagging behind the curriculum.

High school children who have difficulty adapting are more likely to:

• - increased sensitivity, sudden outbursts of emotions;
• - the emergence of aggressiveness, conflicts with others;
• - negativism and protest;
• - manifestation of character through appearance;
• - can keep up with the curriculum.

Diagnosis of school maladjustment

Friedman Semyon F-42

Diagnosis of school maladjustment

“Thermometer” technique

Target:

allows us to determine the degree of anxiety of first-graders, which is associated with educational activities.

Before the diagnostic procedure, the teacher conducts a preliminary conversation with the students, during which he presents an object that is found in every home. This is a thermometer. The teacher explains to the children that at a high temperature a person feels bad and anxious. This temperature can be 38°, 39°, 40°, 41° (the numbers are written on the board). Normal human temperature is 36.6°. He has no anxiety, everything is fine, everything works out for him, he is healthy. The temperature is 35°. At this temperature, a person experiences weakness, fatigue, lack of interest and desire to do anything. After the explanation, the teacher invites students to play a game. He will name educational objects, and the children are invited to fantasize and name or write the temperature that conventionally appears to them when naming this object. Example: Russian language - 39°, mathematics - 36.6°, etc.

Technique "Paints"

Target:

determine whether the child has learning difficulties that are related to his success in educational activities.

Students in the class receive a set of paints or markers. And also sheets of drawing paper. There are 10 circles drawn on each sheet. The teacher names ten school-related subjects for students. The students’ task is to color the circles themselves, determining what color to paint this or that object. Objects that need to be given one color or another are a bell, a book, a teacher, a briefcase, a class, physical education, school, a lesson, homework, a notebook. If a child paints an object dark or completely black, this indicates that he is experiencing learning difficulties, which is associated with his success in educational activities. From the diagram we see that lesson (90%), school (70%), class (60%), homework (50%) are colored black. This suggests that this is precisely what causes the student’s difficulties in the first days of training.

Methodology “What do I like about school?” (according to N.G. Luskanova)

Target:

to identify children’s attitudes towards school and children’s motivational readiness to study at school.

Children need to draw on a piece of paper what they like about school. Analysis of the drawings: the children depicted non-educational situations (students at recess, students with briefcases). These children tend to have a positive attitude towards school, but with a greater focus on external school attributes. Students depicted play situations (swings, toys). These are children with a positive attitude towards school, but their play motivation predominates. Schoolchildren lack school motivation if they depict cars and patterns in their drawings. The students’ drawings depict a teacher with a pointer and a board with written assignments. This indicates that the child has cognitive learning motives.

Methodology “Sun, Cloud, Rain”

Target:

determine how the child feels in different situations.

Each student in the class receives a sheet of paper on which the sun, cloud, and rain are drawn in three versions. Students are asked to determine their well-being in class, at home, with friends using weather phenomena. Students need to answer questions and highlight the state that matches their mood.

In class I -

With friends to me -

At home for me -

If children indicated their mood at school with the sun, this is associated with the emergence of new friends and a new social role.

Method “What am I?”

Target:

determine the self-esteem of a preschool child.

The experimenter, using the protocol presented below (Table 1), asks the child how he perceives himself and evaluates him on 10 different positive personality traits. The assessments offered by the child to himself are entered by the experimenter in the appropriate columns of the protocol, and then converted into points.

Evaluation of results

Answers like “yes” are scored 1 point, answers like “no” are scored 0 points. Answers like “I don’t know” and “sometimes” are scored 0.5 points. A child’s self-esteem is determined by the total score he scores on all personality traits.

Conclusions about the level of development

10 points – very high.

8-9 points – high.

4-7 points – average.

2-3 points – low.

0-1 point – very low.

Causes of school maladjustment

Psychologists studying the phenomenon of maladjustment identify the following among the main reasons:

• strong suppression by parents and teachers - overprotection (fear of failure, shame, fear of making mistakes);
• disorders of a somatic nature (weak immunity, diseases of internal organs, physical fatigue);
• poor preparation for school (lack of certain knowledge and skills, poor motor skills);
• poorly formed foundation of some mental functions, as well as cognitive processes (inadequately high or low self-esteem, inattention, poor memory);
• specifically organized educational process (complex program, special bias, fast pace).

Types of manifestation of school maladjustment

1. Cognitive – manifests itself as the student’s general poor performance. There may be chronic underachievement, lack of skills, fragmentary acquisition of knowledge. Lack of adaptation to the collective pace - being late for lessons, taking a long time to complete a task, getting tired easily.

2. Emotionally - evaluative - there are violations of the emotional attitude towards individual lessons, teachers, and possibly to learning in general. “Fear of school” is a child’s reluctance to go to class, anxiety, tension. Uncontrolled manifestation of violent emotions.

3. Behavioral – weak self-regulation, inability to control one’s own behavior, aggression and conflict appear. Lack of learning motivation manifests itself in a reluctance to do homework and a desire to engage in other activities.

Correction of maladjustment in school-age children

Currently, there is no unified method for solving problems with the adaptation of a schoolchild, since this problem includes several aspects of a child’s life. Here you need to take into account the medical, pedagogical, psychological and social aspects.

It is for this reason that it is necessary to understand the seriousness of this problem and solve it through qualified specialists.

Since psychological assistance in resolving this issue is the main one, either a school psychologist or a private psychologist, or in some cases a psychotherapist, can work with a child experiencing difficulties.

Specialists, in turn, to determine methods for correcting school maladaptation, conduct a detailed study of the student’s life and identify the main points:

• learn in detail about the child’s social environment, the conditions of his development, collecting a detailed anamnesis;
• assess the level of psychophysical development of the child, taking into account his individual characteristics, conduct special tests appropriate to the child’s age;
• determine the nature of the student’s internal conflict leading to crisis situations;
• identify factors that provoke manifestations of signs of maladjustment;
• draw up a program of psychological and pedagogical correction, focusing specifically on the individual characteristics of a given child.

Teachers are also inextricably linked with the process of creating positive conditions for student adaptation. It is necessary to focus on creating comfort in the lesson, a favorable emotional climate in the class, and to be more restrained.

But it is important to understand that without family support , the chances of developing positive dynamics are quite limited. That is why parents need to build friendly relationships with their children, encourage them more often, try to help and, of course, praise them. It is necessary to spend time together, play, come up with joint activities, and help develop the necessary skills.

If a child does not have a good relationship with a teacher at school or with peers (outcast option), parents are advised to consider options for transferring to another school. There is a possibility that in another school the child will become interested in educational activities and will also be able to establish contacts with others.

The concept and essence of school maladjustment among first-graders

Definition 1
School maladjustment is a fairly common phenomenon among first-grade students, characterized by the psychological discomfort that the student experiences when attending school.

School disaffiliation among first-grade students is a common phenomenon. This is due to the fact that yesterday’s preschoolers, who attended kindergarten with caring teachers and nannies, find themselves in a school environment where there are completely different rules, a new team and a completely different daily routine. Not all first-graders manage to adapt to new living conditions.

In especially difficult situations, first-grade students experience not only severe discomfort when attending school, but also negative emotions that block cognitive activity, thereby inhibiting the child’s development. That is why the problem of school maladaptation of first grade students cannot be ignored.

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School maladjustment consists of three components:

1. The cognitive component is that the child understands that he is now a schoolchild and has a new social role, but he cannot adapt to it. The child’s awareness and acceptance of new rules, his responsibilities and rights helps to cope with maladjustment at this level.
2. The emotional component is associated with the child’s self-esteem and the level of his aspirations. The problem is that the child is not able to fully control his behavior, and he develops school phobias. If a child has adequate self-esteem and a low level of aspirations, then it will be easier for him to cope with school maladjustment.
3. Behavioral component - includes the characteristics of a child’s behavior in society, the ability to interact with others, knowledge of the rules and norms of behavior in society. If a child is not sufficiently educated, he has a desire to break the rules, and he breaks them, then the process of adaptation to learning at school is difficult and, as a rule, maladjustment occurs.

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