A new study in the March issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior and reviewed at the EurekaAlert web site on March 9, 2011, examines the affects of a negative classroom environment on children’s mental health.
The study is extremely pertinent to the Birmingham school system and to Alabama’s school system in the advent of funding proration, forced retirements, reduction in teacher benefits, and the hiring of teachers outside of the state.
The study finds that the following classroom events adversely affect children’s mental health.
Inadequate material resources.
Teachers discouraged by the lack of resources to teach properly.
Competition between teachers.
Lack of support from colleagues and principals.
High student to teacher ratios.
The study considered four components of mental health: learning (as measured by attentiveness), externalizing problems (fights), interpersonal behavior (forming friendships), and internalizing problems (anxiety and sadness) as measures of 10,700 first graders as reported by interviews with their parents and teachers.
The researchers also note the difference in government and parents attitudes about schools. Governments use high test scores as a measure of success while overlooking the affect of policy on children’s mental health.
Are the present policies of Alabama and Birmingham governments regarding schools breeding mental health problems in children that will be reflected in higher crime rates, more drug and alcohol abuse, and an overburdening of an under funded and overtaxed mental health system?
There is a simple solution to proration. Tax the land owned by big political campaign donors like Alabama Power and ALFA at the same rate as parents pay for their property. Politicians in Alabama and Birmingham will never go that far in protecting the mental health of children or teachers.
Paper
"Classroom Learning Environments and the Mental Health of First Grade Children,"
Authors
Melissa A. Milkie, sociology professor at the University of Maryland, lead investigator
Catharine H. Warner, sociology PhD candidate at the University of Maryland
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