Resilience – Tuhinga

Building resilience when faced with the pressures of examinations and final assessment.

Examinations and final assessment can all add to the pressure on a student’s life at school, wanting to succeed and be the best we can be in our academic endeavours.

Research has shown that stress can increase for teenagers in their later years of schooling. Examinations and final assessments are something that we have to deal with during this time. It is important to find ways to build resilience towards these, and try to minimise the pressures that it can cause.

Students’ relationships with their peers is one way to help. Maintaining these relationships, even when we get busy, is not only a great way to lower levels of anxiety but also are linked to higher academic outcomes.

Parents also have the power to help mitigate this assessment and examination anxiety. Not by continually reminding or nagging your son about the importance of these assessments as that can increase anxiety, which can lower academic performance. Using fear does not help and has been linked to lower student motivations.

BUT there are ways we can help at home to counter assessment and examination stress and help build resilience. Building resilience can lead to better performance and minimise stress toward academic adversity. Reminding the boys that by being prepared and systematically working their way through study, finishing internals and/or resubmissions will increase the likelihood of academic success and showcase their ability. This will also help reduce anxiety. Each of these assessment opportunities give students a chance to learn and best prepare for future assessments, helping to build academic resilience.

Parents and caregivers, along with teachers play a significant role in helping students have a positive educational experience. Building resilience and positivity in students, rather than using fear, will minimise stress and instil confidence. This has been proven to prevent stress and anxiety in what can often be an early challenge to a young man's resilience. Building up resilience towards their academic endeavours will also set them up to deal with other daunting experiences that they will face later in life like interviews, job performance reviews and presentations. 

As being judged externally cannot be avoided we need to help our boys establish healthy thinking habits towards these challenges. These habits will also help them to better deal with stress and any setbacks they may come across in their future academic assessments and life challenges.