In the words of Ehimmora (2001), he stressed that truancy is an age-old aspect of indiscipline which brings the school authority into disrepute and addition, the unofficial coming and going of children at others times, other than normal school day, naturally brings about indiscipline and interrupts normal school routine. Disinterest in certain school subjects as a cause of truancy-students hatred for certain teachers can be a cause of truancy, as the hatred will be brought about through the interaction of students and teachers in the classroom. Also, un-stimulating or un-interesting lesson can cause truancy. Still on school circumstance as a cause of truancy, Blair, Green and Jones (1999) observed in their book “Educational psychology†that. In the face of thwarting and distressing school situation, some pupils find that, easiest way out is to keep away from school and some of the children develop hysterical reactions, e.g some children become ill on examination days.
In a similar manner, Ezekugbo (2005) points out that truancy may bee due to the type of teacher posted to a school or the attitude of the teachers towards the students, poor teaching, poor organization, poor attendance of teachers contribute highly to the truancy of students. She made reference to Simpson’s idea that a truant is one who is not happy with schoolwork, either because of something is wrong with the school or with pupil himself and instead plans to do something else.
Izuogu (2002) in her own contribution to the causes of truancy holds that “poor preparation of lessons by teachers, use of abusive words on pupils, frequent use of punishment and too much demand of this or that from the pupils, can contribute to pupils staying away from schoolâ€.
2.3 Implication of Truancy on Academic Performance of Students
Some researchers have highlighted some of the implications of truancy on academic performance of students. These are tyrman (2009), Rogers (2002) and Moreland et al (2006). Tyerman (2009) in his research on school performance and truancy, found out that backwardness among truants was more pronounced in spelling and reading than in other subjects. This is not to say that they perform well in other subjects. In another causes of truancy, he asserts that in the house test taken, all age eleven and above, the ability quotients of these children ranged from 70 to 122 with an average (mean) of 88. The attainment of quotients were between 75 and 115, the average was again 88.
According to this result, and the head teachers’ rating, truants were or the whole inferior intellectually and academically to the majority of the age group. The child becomes frustrated and depressed, and this causes him to develop feeling of inferiority. These feelings further lead to lack of effort and failure. The child then becomes apathetic and escapes from school or become rebellions and tries to play truant. In explaining why students perform badly academically, Rogers (2008) says that children who are held in low esteem by their teachers would also hold themselves in low esteem. Children who see themselves as being highly valued by their teachers tend to do well. He says that a pupil’s self-concept will exercise a causal influence over his/her level of academic performance. One could just readily suggest that the level of academic performance that a child experiences will exercise a causal influence over her self-concept. If a child has low self-esteem, he/she may not want to attend school regularly.
Moreland et al (2009) comment that college students vary widely in their attitudes and interests, yet most of them are concerned about academic achievement and the pursuit of grades. Many problems that prevent poor students from earning higher grades might also limit their chances of discovering an instructor’s grading criteria. For example poor students tend to be less intelligent than their classmates and often have worse memories. Poor students are also less likely to attend class (truants) with their instructors both in class and out. All of these characteristics suggest that poor students may have less ability or opportunity to acquire information about their instructor’s grading criteria. This lack of information might well as responsible for the inaccuracy of their performance evaluations.
2.4 The Role of Counselling in Eradicating Truancy
Counselling is an effective tool in eradicating truancy among students at the senior secondary school level. Trunats do not want to be identified as truants, thus, there is need for a professional qualified counsellor to help identify truants and assist them in solving their problems in order to make them have positive attitude to schooling.
Truancy could be checked through counselling. Lutton (2002) says that the typical counsellor in secondary schools, certainly spends by far the larger part of his time in educational programming and college advising. Other important part of counselling duties are counselling for inadequate achievement i.e for underachievers. In order to work out policy as regards guidance and counselling services and to co-ordinate them, (i.e local education board) normally have a director or co-ordinator of guidance services who often works within the office of pupil personnel services so that co-ordination of these different service is theoretically possible.
A counsellor is expected to act between parents and teachers. He is often, the buffer between students and teacher. When students have teacher-trouble; they usually expect the counsellor to be on their side. Students who present persistent disciplinary problems should be sent to the counsellor for investigations and non-punitive counselling. Holden (2006) is also of the opinion that counsellors play important role in correcting deviant acts in students.
He says that counsellors see their clients as they are. They accept and understand feelings and opinions about moral issues as well as about the relative trivialities of dress and homework. They believe that people are intrinsically valuable. In so doing, they establish communication with their clients and once this is done, the latter will listen to them. The student may not act upon what he/she hears immediately or be instantly transformed by it but he/she will consider it instead of rejecting it outrightly, as they so often reject moral preaching A. truant may have psychological problems which the teacher can not solve. If such a student is referred to the counsellor he may identify the student’s problem and lead him into solving it as a way of correcting the bad behaviour. Writing further on this, Mortensen and schmuller (2009) pointed out that the need for guidance in today’s schools has grown in the students. As the practical expression of this belief, guidance serves as a primary means for providing the contact and help needed in the school on a personnel level for the enhancement of the individual and the facilitation of the learning process.
