How Do They Impact the Academic Success of a Student?
Outlook and attitude – toward self or another person – can make or break a person’s success in life. This is certainly true in education. Let’s consider how labels can affect the academic achievement of a student. People can certainly make themselves believe one thing or another about themselves, for good or for ill. The issue of negative labeling or pigeonholing a student according to ability, disability, cultural, socioeconomic status, etc, is a matter to ponder seriously. A teacher can label a student, peers can label a student, and the student can label himself. This can permanently affect the student’s academic progress throughout all his school years. Sometimes a label (usually a derogatory one, but sometimes one that is well-meaning but damaging) can give the child a predisposed attitude of to whether he will amount to anything in school. In other words, the label itself can cause a child to believe he cannot rise above his characteristics or difficulties. A wise teacher and an
