Education, for most parents, is the foundation on which we build our dreams for our children's futures. When a child excels we fantasize about Harvard or Yale. When our children struggle, have learning disabilities or emotional issues that prevent them from succeeding in school not only do our dreams falter but our confidence in our children having happy and meaningful lives is in jeopardy. All foster and adopted children have experienced trauma and loss. All have experiences and emotions that can, and often do, stand in the way of their success in school.
Children who have been placed in permanent, loving homes still face difficult issues about identity, family and self-esteem. Throughout their schooling, lessons like the infamous "family tree" can trigger self-doubt, anger and frustration. Children in foster care carry the additional burden of not knowing who, if anyone, will be there for them next month, next week or tomorrow. Will they still be in the same class, school or home? Imagine trying to solve a math problem when you are worried about who to call Mom?
Anxiety is fast becoming the number one psychiatric diagnosis among children. Is it any wonder that foster children, whose lives are unstable and often truly unsafe, should be anxious in our already anxiety provoking modern world. We can and must extend the security and support of fostering into our schools.
Teachers and other education professionals need to understand the real life issues foster children face, the language of their experience, and the resources that are available not the least of which are the dedicated and caring foster parents with whom for however long, these children live.
Lessons and language that trigger stress in any child can lead to acting out behaviors, failure to complete assignments or succeed in school, as well as social relationship difficulties with teachers and peers. In today's complex society there is no one size fits all type of family. A child living with one parent, two moms, a grandparent or a foster family may not know what to do when asked to "give mom a note" or "make a valentine for your dad." For a foster child who has been removed from an abusive parent, just the word "Mom" could trigger terror. In the world of foster care, the word "visit" means only one thing to a child - to see his or her birth parent.
Talking about a visit to anywhere could cause complete panic in a young child too frightened to hear the rest of the sentence. A question about "home" might seem obvious to the teacher but impossible to answer for the child. Educators can't change the English language or re-write their entire curriculum for one student; but, they can be aware of the issues and special needs that one student - or more likely many of their students may face.
There are approximately 525,000 children currently in foster care in the United States. More than 120,000 children are free for adoption and most have been waiting for more than two years to find permanent families.
Many foster children have multiple placements, many have been exposed to or are the victims of violence or neglect. They may move from one emergency location to another with nothing from their home or past. They may not have access to photos, medical records or birth family. The parent they cannot trust to feed or care for them is still someone they love and miss. These children need and deserve additional sensitivity and support in school.
All children understand life, self, family and their relationship to the rest of the world in increasingly complex ways as they grow. For the foster or adopted child, this means reprocessing trauma, loss and often violence or abuse. These issues surface at each new developmental stage and have the potential to sabotage the child's academic and social success whether in kindergarten, sixth grade or college.
REACTIVE ATTACHMENT DISORDER - the failure of a child to effectively bond and learn to trust his or her primary caregiver, is often present to varying degrees in children who have been in foster care. How do you learn trust if your mother neglected or abused you? Why learn to care about a foster parent who you may not live with next week? Why bother doing what a teacher asks when he or she is just another adult who can't keep you safe? A child who feels he or she must be hyper vigilant to survive and truly fears that loss of control is life threatening has little interest or ability to focus on academics.
EDUCATION'S PRIMARY MOTIVATIONS - good grades or parent and teacher approval for work well done are delayed gratifications of little value to a child focused on survival in the moment. Difficult classroom behaviors can be unexpected but there is always a trigger whether internal or external. "The more a teacher figures out about an attachment disordered student's triggers, the more effectively the teacher will be able to work with that student." Joyce Pavao writes that "Too often, teachers seem to be making diagnoses and suggesting medications and treatment to parents. This is inappropriate and unethical, and it is one of the reasons I feel the curriculum in schools of education must include information concerning the special circumstances of adoptive families."
It is imperative that teachers currently in the classroom receive this training as well. Teachers need to be creative and open to alternative lessons that meet their academic objectives without unfairly jeopardizing the success of some of their students.
Some strategies I have seen used successfully include having a peer buddy to help a recently placed foster child learn about his or her new school and welcome him or her on the first day. Using open ended and more generally inclusive alternatives to assignments like the family tree, family genetics or heritage, "What I did on summer vacation" or "Bring in a baby photo." Educators need to be aware that adopted and foster children may not have any photos or know their birth weight. Or, the information may be too painful to think about. Also commonly triggered by this type of assignment are discomfort and sadness about divided loyalty, difference or privacy. No child should be put into the position of having to choose between parents or expose painful experiences in order to not fail a school assignment.
Adoption and Foster Care School Awareness Project is working actively in Massachusetts to educate educators on the effects of adoption and foster care on students' social and emotional development and academic achievement by establishing up to date, parent and professional resource collections through the public libraries and providing grade level adoption and foster care information binders for teachers.
What began as two neighbors, one a foster mom, one an adoptive mom, sharing their concerns about their children and the schools has grown into an active monthly support group focusing on education and open to all parents and professionals who are touched by adoption from 18 communities on the South Shore.
We are committed to increasing awareness in the schools and in our communities of the special needs of our children and families; supporting adoptive and foster families; and advocating for positive change. We hope to provide a model for others and have received an overwhelmingly positive response. We sponsored our first annual "Adoption & Education Forum" on Nov. 19, 2006 with guest speakers Adam Pertman, executive director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute and author of "Adoption Nation;" Joan Clark executive director of Adoption Community of New England; and Dr. Peg Kirby, attachment specialist from the Attachment Institute of New England.
We will launch our first "Kid Packs" campaign this May for National Foster Care Month, collecting and distributing totes, suitcases, backpacks and diaper bags with essentials to local foster care agencies for children in need. For more information, visit www.asapmass.org.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Charlotte Simpson is an adoptive parent and founding member and president of ASAP. She is also the resource liaison for her local Special Education Parent Advisory Committee and has her own Web site at www.aboutmebooks.biz. She resides in Massachusetts with her husband and daughter.
