Abuse or neglect comes in a variety of forms, including:

• Physical abuse is non-accidental and could lead to a variety of physical injuries.
• Sexual abuse could come from actual sex acts or children being exploited.
• Neglect is whenever a child is not receiving what they need or when they are not being provided proper care.
• Emotional abuse can be caused from explicit acts from an adult or when the adult leaves the child out. This leaving out could lead to abandonment when the adult fails to provide adequate support and/or contact with the child.

On a very rare occasion, a student may open up to you about their homelife to reveal abuse or neglect. More often than not, we have to rely on what we are observing. Keeping an eye out for physical abuse or for signs that indicate emotional abuse or neglect is important. This can also be observed, sometimes, in the student’s writings or in what you hear them say.