The biggest school refusal my child had was when she was put into a small special-needs classroom with high special needs. She knew that she wasn’t learning and that she wanted to learn. She said it makes her feel like a baby. She also had school refusal when she was in kindergarten and grade 1, in a mainstream classroom. She would say, “I try so hard and I just can’t do what the other kids are doing. Spelling and reading are so hard for me.” After having various combinations of tutoring and smaller classrooms where are they specialized in dyslexia, she was in a mainstream private school classroom by grade 10. She is on the honour roll. If you ask her, though, when she is finished school, what she will do, she will say she wants to work in sports, but have nothing to do with classroom or school ever again.
School Phobia and Exclusion
Youth Mental Health Canada
