The Effect of Pupil Absenteeism on Literacy and Numeracy in the Primary School

Abstract

Although school psychologists are involved in dealing with the problem of pupil absenteeism at both the individual child and whole school level, one of the possible reasons for their involvement, namely the belief that significant absence from school has an effect on attainments, is actually founded on weak evidence. The literature review presented in this article revealed that, in order to determine the effect of absence on attainments, no satisfactory study had hither to been conducted in which attainments had been measured before and after a period of absence. However, the results of longitudinal research partially conducted by the present author, reported in this article, do show that absence from school has a significant effect on primary school attainments. In particular, it was found that an absence of half a year between the ages of 7 and 11yearsofage resulted in a reduction of 0.7 of a year and 1 year in reading and mathematics test scores respectively. The article ends with a consideration of the kind of research which still needs to be conducted in order to provide school psychologists with the information they need to deal successfully with pupil absenteeism problems.

Truancy in the United States: Examining temporal trends and correlates by race, age, and gender

“…The design of the current study does not permit conclusions about whether low engagement and grades were a cause or consequence of truancy. However, links found in other studies between school absenteeism at one time-point and academic performance at a subsequent time-point (e.g., Carroll, 2010) suggest the importance of helping truant youth cope with academic demands to increase the likelihood that they can remain engaged with the educational experience, despite occasional absenteeism. This would help reduce the likelihood of youth falling further behind academically and dropping out of school altogether.…”

Absenteeism, Educational Plans, and Anxiety Among Children With Incontinence and Their Parents

“…Despite the overwhelming literature base showing the school attendance as a robust predictor of academic achievement for all children, as well as for the subgroup of children with chronic illness, it is difficult to quantify how much school is too much to miss. Our previous research collected attendance data for children with conditions impacting bowel and/or bladder continence.…”

An analysis of the future management of school attendance in Wales

“…Some caution is always advisable when interpreting these statistical data as methods and definitions used when collecting and analysing this information have frequently changed, more especially in recent years in England (Reid 2002). Nevertheless, there is abundant evidence that absenteeism in Wales has always been higher than in England and a more worrying phenomenon is the earlier onset of non-attendance at the primary phase, more especially at Key Stage 2, possibly owing to declining standards of literacy and numeracy (Carroll 1977(Carroll , 2010.The rise in female pupils who miss school and truant is another concern (Reid 2011e).…”