ABSTRACT
A child’s exposure to abuse and neglect obviously has a detrimental effect on their overall health and development.It is also likely to have a significant effect on wider issues such as their participation in education and their eventual achievement. Imagine what it must be like to have to get yourself to school every morning because your parent does not bother to wake you,wash, dress or give you breakfast. Some 6-year-olds have to manage such responsibilities themselves.Or what must it be like to spend the day at school counting down with dread the minutes until it’s time to go home,knowing that he winked at you over breakfast – his special sign that tonight you have to wait in your room before you have a bath because mum’s going out. Children do not learn when they are frightened.Abuse hurts, and not just at the time. No wonder the homework wasn’t done and the pupil reacted aggressively when the teacher asked where it was.
