Family Factors & Home Environments

Family factors and home environments leave an everlasting impact on a child and their career as a student. As teachers, we have to face the reality that we do not know every child's family situation or home environment. However, we must examine these factors in order to know how they play a role for the child during the school day. As stated by the National Literacy Trust family factors and home environments impact children academically, socially, and emotionally. There is a large range of family factors and home environments that could be influencing the child within the classroom. Parental involvement, trends in family life, income, demographics, and other topics play a large role. These factors influence literacy and language development as well as educational achievement.  This topic is extremely important in the educational field because, in order to support the child academically, we must first understand their background and personal experiences. Understanding these aspects of children within the classroom can help foster strong relationships and developmentally appropriate actions.

A mother and father working with
their three children to create objects
with colorful blocks.

I believe understanding students' family factors and home environments is one of the most important things a teacher can do within the classroom. Without first knowing and understanding the children in your classroom, how can you effectively relate and determine where they are socially, emotionally, and academically? As teachers, we must figure out where the child is developmentally, and meet them where they are. Personally, I have had experience with family factors and home environments affecting children at school. For example, at one Knoxville inner-city school, one of our students came into the classroom every day asleep, and not willing to get involved with the morning meeting. At first, looking at this situation without examining family factors or the student's home environment, one may think the child is just bored or disengaged within the classroom. However, when learning more about his home environment and family factors, it began to make more sense why this student was exhausted in the mornings. At night, this student shares a room with an infant sibling which keeps him up throughout the night. Furthermore, before school starts in the mornings at 7:30 am, they have to drop his sibling off at daycare which is thirty minutes away from their home. The student is exhausted when he gets to school in the mornings after not a full night's sleep the night before and having to leave extremely early. Background knowledge of students' family factors and home environment is crucial in understanding the behaviors and actions of students within the classroom.