Research Topic: improving Absenteeism in class 5

Introduction (area of focus)

"In recent years, education leaders and scholars have become increasingly concerned about
student absenteeism" (Camille et al.,2017 as cited in Balfanz & Byrnes, 2012).
This highlights the increasing attention being given to the problem of students missing
classes and its potential impact on classroom teaching and learning. It emphasizes the
importance of addressing and finding solutions to this issue in order to ensure that students
have the best possible chance to succeed academically. Tamang (2020) stated that he has
been working as a teacher for 32 years and has observed consistent issues with student
absenteeism, with some variation based on the location and development of the area. By
drawing upon Tamang's observation, it shows the possible variable leading to student’s
absenteeism in the class and its impact on classroom teaching and learning. Thus, our
research is to examine the underlying factors contributing to class 5 student absentees. By
analysing the impact of individual, family, and school-related variables, we aim to identify
effective strategies and interventions to reduce absenteeism and improve class 5 student
engagement and academic performance. The research topic is within our locus of control as a
researcher as we can focus on aspects we can directly influence. For instance, we can
investigate the impact of our teaching practices and interventions on reducing absenteeism.
We can implement evidence-based strategies such as proactive communication with parents,
personalized attendance tracking and creating supportive classroom environments. By
implementing and evaluating these strategies in our own classroom, we can showcase our
active role in addressing and improving students' attendance.

Statement/observation: 5th grade student’s absenteeism in class.

Question:
 What could be the possible causes behind student’s absenteeism in class and how can
we improve their attendance?
Reconnaissance
We believe that there are various underlying causes for absenteeism among students.
“Absenteeism is a student behaviour grounded on physical, psychological and social reasons
and affecting students' development negatively. Absenteeism can be not only a symptom of
students' negative feelings about school but also sourced by many different reasons (Gökyer,
2012, as stated in Ocak et al., 2017, p.332), The current state of absenteeism in schools is
shaped by a combination of family, cultural, societal and educational factors, meaning there
are many possible causes. For this reason, we find it important to consider the specific
context of each and every possible cause when addressing, developing and implementing
strategies to reduce absenteeism.
Throughout my school days there were many times that I missed school/classes, but given
that my reasons were genuine and I didn’t fake anything as an excuse to stay at home. At
times I didn’t like how my teacher reacted because even though I had legit reasons I was
questioned, scolded and the teacher would also contact my parents to validate. Perhaps, my
perceptions were misjudged, because reflecting back on those moments I realize that my
teacher was concerned for my wellbeing and education.
Within the school or a particular classroom, we can observe cases where some students
frequently miss classes and some occasionally, with some due to genuine reasons and some
with excuses. As far as I can remember, reflecting upon how the issue of absenteeism was
addressed during my schooling years, I can tell that not much was done to addressed this
issue, besides that, after a certain limit we wouldn’t be allowed to do our exams and even this
kind of case was rarely seen in some cases where a student has not attended his/her classes
for months due to medical issues.
Relating to this issue we found that the Ecological systems theory, by Urie Bronfenbrenner
could provide some valuable insights in doing this research. The Ecological systems theory
suggests that individuals are influenced by multiple interacting systems, including the
microsystem (immediate environment), mesosystem (connections between the different
microsystems), exosystem (external settings indirectly affecting the individual), macrosystem
(cultural values and beliefs), and chronosystem (change overtime). In the context of
absenteeism, this theory helps in understanding how factors like family dynamics, school
climate, community support, and societal norms can play a role in shaping the student’s
attendance behavior.
“Among the main areas of work for education managers is determining and eliminating the
factors that lead to absenteeism and their effects on educational environments.” (AKKUŞ and
ÇINKIR, 2022, p.978-997). It is essential to recognize that absenteeism has always been an
issue of concern throughout the history of schooling system (Teaching and learning), to
which many expert researchers and educationists have taken efforts to address the issue but
still it exists, and it’s this reason that caught our attention and interest towards this particular
issue. Now to this moment when the responsibility befalls upon our shoulders as
teachers/educators, we have concerns towards creating a supportive and inclusive learning
environment that fosters engagement, motivation and good interpersonal relationship between
students and teachers. So that students feel safe and open to approach the teacher and the
teacher can help in addressing the potential barriers(causes) to regular attendance and develop
strategies to prevent them.
“Student nonattendance is a problem that extends much further than the school. It affects the
student, the family, and the community.” (Yahaya et al., 2010, p.623-639), Absenteeism has
been and is related to many other cases, not just student’s academic performance but also
affecting the overall environment that surrounds the student including their parents, peers,
teachers and the society, leading to arising of problems such as sexual and drug abuse,
teenage pregnancies, increased dropout rates, gang fights, social and emotional effects and
many more. Whereby, it suggests that absenteeism is a problem of concern to be addressed.
Although we wouldn’t stress on saying that it the same issue in every educational institution,
but majority lies on the side where this issue is related to the aforementioned cases.
With support from the data collected from the works of few researchers (e.g Şahin et al.,
2016; AKKUŞ and ÇINKIR, 2022; Ocak et al., 2017), and relating to our own experiences
we could identify the following causes which seems to have significant impact on as of why
students stay absent.
 Family variable
Family dynamics can mean many things, the relationship between parents and
children, whether they have a good relationship or not, if the child or a parent is
subjected to domestic violence, if the family is financially stable or not, whether the
parents are educated or not as some illiterate parents due to their lack of knowledge
on the importance of education restrict children’s education etc.
We also considered in putting the cultural beliefs and values under this variable, be it
attending annual rimdro, doing rituals, early child marriage, or any other cultural
beliefs of the student to which it poses as a cause for their absenteeism.

 Health Variable
We all suffer or have endured some kind of illness or disability to which this is
another variable that identify as a leading cause to student’s absenteeism.

 Teacher variable
The relationship between the teacher and students undermines as one of the important
variable due to the reason that if the relationship between a teacher and the student is
not good the student is more likely to skip classes of that particular teacher. The
attitude and reaction of teacher towards his/her students is a crucial area to be
focused.

 Fellow student variable

Under this variable it basically covers on how friends at school or at home is a cause
for absenteeism. It involves peer pressure (forcing to stay absent or bunk together),
bullying by other school mates, no friends or ignored/left out by others etc.

 Environmental/ natural calamities variable

Natural calamities such as heavy rainfall, flood, landslides, house located far from
school, danger of wild animals, or needing to cross a stream/river or forest.
Therefore, with everything mentioned above we intend to do this research to dig out the
reasons behind absenteeism of grade 5 students in the class, how this issue has been
addressed before in the particular school (My TP placement) and to frame, discover and
develop appropriate strategies to tackle this issue.

References
AKKUŞ, M., & ÇINKIR, Ş. (2022). The problem of student absenteeism, its impact on
educational environments, and the evaluation of current policies. International Journal
of Psychology and Educational Studies, 9, 978–997.
Tamang, D. S. (2020). Absenteeism: Its causes and effects in Bhutanese context. Journal of
Education, Society and Behavioural Science, 78–92.
Ocak, G., Baysal, E. A., & Ocak, I. (2017, March). (PDF) the causes of absenteeism of high
school students. ResearchGate.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/315076112_THE_CAUSES_OF_ABSENTE
EISM_OF_HIGH_SCHOOL_STUDENTS
Whitney, C. R., & Liu, J. (2017). What we’re missing. AERA Open, 3(2), 233285841770366.
Şahin, Ş., Arseven, Z., & Kılıç, A. (2016). Causes of student absenteeism and school
dropouts. International Journal of Instruction, 9(1), 195–210.
Yahaya, A., Ramli, J., Hashim, S., Ibrahim, M. A., Abd.kadir, H. B. Hj., Boon, Y., & Raja
Abd , R. R. (2010, January). The effects of various modes of absenteeism problem in
school on the ... ResearchGate.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/289221295_The_Effects_of_Various_Modes
_of_Absenteeism_Problem_in_School_on_the_Academic_Performance_of_Students_i
n_Secondary_Schools